You would think that the “Ship-to Locations” section would define who could bid on your auction. Early on, this was wrong. The “Ship-to Locations” was pretty much informational. That is, it simply told your potential bidders where you are willing to ship to, or that you are not willing to ship and the item must be picked up.
There were good reasons to allow seeming unqualified bidders to bid. Sometimes bidders from outside of your specified shipping area, will have the item shipped to someone in your shipping area. For instance, I have had bidders from Canada ask me to ship to an address in upstate New York. I suspect they do this to avoid Customs Fees, but there is no real way to tell.
In any case, be prepared to get bids, even winning bids, from people who don’t read the details of your auction. My experience shows that people rarely read much past the Title, days left, and maybe a couple of the description lines. They will always look at the pictures, but not much more for the bulk of eBay bidders. Even I have bid on items expecting to pay with PayPal, only to find out that they don’t accept PayPal. We’re all guilty.
I’ve even put the following text in a few auctions:
Will Ship to 48 Contiguous
USA States ONLY!
If you do not live in the USA,
Do Not bid!
No Exceptions!
I had bidders from Australia, Germany, Europe & the USA, with the successful bidder coming from Australia. I even ended up shipping the item to Australia with the shipping expenses being over $50. Just assume that no matter what you do, bidders will screw up.
Many people logged complaints with eBay that this section should limit who can bid. The initial response was that it’s just not the way it works. After numerous complaints eBay provided an additional specification in the “Buyer Requirements” section of this page to keep people registered in countries to which you do not ship from bidding. Thanks eBay!