'Bidding started at $5': Online auctioneer outsmarts a lazily coded bidding bot, forcing them to pay $170 over MSRP for a used kid's toy by continually bidding overvalue

Author image for Jesse Kessenheimer
Jesse Kessenheimer • Writer and Editor
Aug 8, 2025 7:00 PM EDT

This online shopper found a way to scam the scammers on an online auction site, exploiting the lazily coded bots to make a fake buyer spend way too much on a used toy. You'd think that if you're planning to scam buyers online, you'd at least put a little time and effort into your buying bots, but this lazy coder got outsmarted by a clever shopper with a keen eye for a grift. 

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  • I took a gamble and made a bot spend $170 more on a Jeep Wrangler Wagon than its original MSRP
    via SmallDckGnarly
  • Cheezburger Image 10540132096
    via Wpaddington

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • I found a local online auction house for my area about a week ago, and it got me addicted. A few days ago I came across this $600 Jeep Wrangler wagon to carry my kids around in. Bidding started at $5. So i bid it and
    via SmallDckGnarly
  • waited. Over the next couple of days the bidding kept going up, but i kept seeing this one user bid $.75 over my bid the second I sent mine in. After the total came to about $90 the user was still ahead. I sat on it for a few hours, came back and saw that that user was still at the top.
    via SmallDckGnarly
  • I really didn't wanna but I tossed up $150 and saw that the next one was sitting at $150.75 right after me. I ended up bidding more and more until eventually it hit the last 5 minutes and I got it
    via SmallDckGnarly
  • up to around $770 and the bot still had it at $770.75. The bot ended up winning the auction, now IDK if that user is going to actually pick it up or not because the auction site uses automatic
    via SmallDckGnarly
  • payments with payments being final. On top of the auction price there is a 20% fee of the total win price to include state tax. I'm glad I gambled and it paid off because otherwise it would've been me who'd have to pay all that for the item cuz after 20% auction fee and sales tax it probably would've been closer to $1K
    via SmallDckGnarly
  • May not have gotten the wagon but at least I was able to beat someone to spend more money on something idk if this is considered petty revenge but it was pretty petty imo.
    via SmallDckGnarly
  • Edit: The Jeep Wrangler Wagon is literally a wagon for kids that you can pull or push. it's not an actual car lol
    via SmallDckGnarly

  • Conning a conman is the only way to gain their respect, but in a world that's constantly inundated with bots and “clunkers” at every turn, it feels good to stick it to the man hiding behind the curtain of 10,000 binary codes. Because in the dishonest world of online auctions, tugging at the thread that leads to an actual person is tougher than it sounds. However, the guy in this next story was able to shine a blinding spotlight on a dude's poorly designed bot operation, forcing him to pay $170 over MSRP for a kid's toy car as petty revenge. 

    Now that's a con that'll always go to the highest bidder.

  • 9lobaldude. Lazy moron did set up a bot and forgot to define a maximum value, you made him overpay, nice petty revenge
    via 9lobaldude
  • CatlessBoyMom ⚫ I'll occasionally do this to "diamond" sellers on eBay. It's entertaining if you have an hour or so to kill watching scammers bid against themselves while you wait for the items you want to close.
    via CatlessBoyMom
  • madbull73 · You sure it was a bot? It just sounds like someone else had a max bid in that you never beat. If they put in a max bid I'd $1000 and you only went to 700 then the bidding system would keep bumping their bid to the next highest bid. It's an automatic thing.
    via madbull73

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online toys msrp petty revenge online shopping pay back payback auction
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