Buy Backs
Last year there was a auction from Richie Brothers in Petrolia, and I was looking for an extra attachment for the front end loader, and there was this guy from Brindley(I know the guy), who sells all this stuff. Well all the stuff what went to cheap, he bought it back. Not to speak of the 'internet-bid' . If you are bidding on an item there is always someone bidding on the internet... how do I know it is not the owner(or his wife,or his son), who is sitting behind his computer in a warm office, buying his own stuff back????
To address your first comment on the attachments. It took me awhile, as I'm in Caseyville, Illinois and this sale was in Ontario, BUT I checked it out. There were no consignors from Brindley, and checking the buyers, I found one. That purchaser purchased a considerable amount of items of which none were his ............ period and verified. If you ever suspect a buy back or bid-in at a Ritchie Sale, please walk right up to one of us. We will not allow it ever. No one's time wants to be wasted, including ours.
To address your second comment about the warm office. Although we trust our consignors very much, we still verify by running reports throughout every sale looking for buying anomalies. Thankfully, a buy back is an EXTREMELY rare event, but we've certainly had a couple of individuals attempt using a friend (known as a shill).
We catch them. And when we do, there are extreme financial penalties in addition to re-selling the equipment. The bottom line is....it doesn't happen at a Ritchie sale, because consingors know we're always keeping a sale fair and transparent.
That's the difference. We look. We don't wink. We don't walk away if there's an issue. Relationships mean something to us, and they're two-way streets.
