Purchase Option: Make Offer in a nutshell

As part of our Purchase Option system, you have the ability to add the Make Offer option to your Lots and Listings in both Timed Auctions and the Marketplace.

Setting the Purchase Option to Make Offer will enable a special Make Offer button at the bottom of that Item, allowing your Bidders and Buyers to submit offer amounts:

These Offers can then be Accepted or Rejected from the Bid Table in the Webtron Dashboard:

Using Make Offer

If you or your Vendors would like to experiment with Purchase Option: Make Offer, there are a few aspects of Make Offer you should be aware of first.

Purchase Cut-off for Lots

If you are using Item Type: Lot and Purchase Option: Make Offer (i.e. Bidding and Offers), your Lots will be subject to the Timed Auction/Marketplace’s Purchase Cut-off setting.

What this means is that the Make Offer button will disappear from your Lots once the last 24 hours of their countdown has been reached, at the latest. The default Purchase Cut-off setting is 48 hours, but this can be updated at any time by editing your Timed Auction/the Marketplace:

Any offers submitted before the Purchase Cut-off kicks in will still be available in the Bid Table, where they can be Accepted or Rejected.

Sold and Closed Status

If you accept an offer in the Bid Table, that Item will immediately move to Sold – Closed status. The Item will still be visible in your Timed Auction/the Marketplace, but it cannot be re-opened.

Accepting or Rejecting an offer is final, it cannot be undone and that item cannot be re-opened for bidding or purchase. If rejected by mistake, the Buyer must submit a new offer.

If you have accepted an offer by mistake or the purchase has fallen through, you will need to create a new item and copy of the sold item’s details. Items in Sold status can be hidden, but they cannot be re-opened or deleted.

Per-Item Offer Cap

By default, your Bidders and Buyers can make up to 3 offers on each Item. This Max Offer cap can be raised or lowered, but it will apply across all Items using Purchase Option: Make Offer.

Reach out to us via the Get in Touch page to discuss your current Max Offer cap.

Minimum Acceptable Offer

We cover the Minimum Acceptable Offer option in more detail here, but in a nutshell, there are 3 rules governing whether an offer can be submitted, and whether it will be auto-rejected:

1. For Item Type: Lot, Bidders and Buyers will be unable to submit Offers that are below or matching the Opening Bid or Current Highest Bid.
2. For Item Type: Lot, Bidders and Buyers can submit offers that are below the Reserve amount set for that Lot. As the Reserve is not disclosed publically, these Offers will be submittable and can then be Accepted or Rejected by your Dashboard Admins.
3. For Lots and Listings, your Dashboard Admins and VendorPlus Consignors can set a Minimum Acceptable Offer by setting an amount in the Purchase Price field. Any offers submitted that are matching or below this amount will be auto-rejected on your behalf.

Who can see and manage Offers

Pending Offer Notifications

When an offer is submitted, an automated notification is sent out to your Dashboard Admins that are part of the Purchases notification list in your Auctioneer profile settings.

This email will contain the following information:

An offer was made by Bidder_Username (Email Notification Template)

Auction: Auction Title
Item: Lot Number and Lot Title
Ref: Item Reference Number
Vendor: Vendor Name

Offer: (Currency) Offer Amount
Placed on: Time of Offer (Remaining time: Time Remaining until Item End Time)

Current bid for this item: Current Highest Bid (if using Item Type: Lot)
Reserve on this item: Current Reserve Amount (If using Item Type: Lot and Reserves)

This email is not sent to your Vendor, only to your Dashboard Admins.

Pending Offers in the Bid Table

Dashboard Admins with Bid Table access (Tier 4 and higher) can see Pending Offers in the Bid and Purchase history for each Item:

Only Dashboard Admins with Tier 5 access can Accept or Reject offers.

On your Portal

As with bids and auto bids, all Offers are anonymous on the Portal and only the Bidder/Buyer who submitted the offer can see that they have a Pending Offer:

Your other Bidders and Buyers will have no visibility of Pending Offers for each Item.

If an offer is accepted, the Item will display a “This Item has been Sold” message and all Bidding and Purchase buttons will be removed from that Item.