Can you cancel an auction?

Certainly.

I do not beleive Agon allows this, but EBAY does. There are prompt in EBAY that mention 'did you know most people wait to place a bid until the last day or hours of an auctio? You could be losing out in a sale'. EBAY also gives you options like, 'ended because of error in listing' and/or 'item is no longer available'.

Now, this has become more of an issue in EBAY recently, as many people find local buyers, and just end their auction.
I personally like that option because it puts someone in a situation of 'sh_t or get off the pot'. Now there are times, like you mentioned, where I like to see where it ends up, but is canceled for whatever reason. That can be frustrating!

By ending an auction early for a sale outside EBAY, they lose the final value fees! This has happened enough over the years that they have been increasing the insertion fee.
I like AGon, well, as far as I know, there is no final value fee for an auction. It is just the $2 to list it.
If I am wrong here, please clarify!

Dan

I don't know where Audiogon stands on this. There can be good reasons to cancel an auction. Something may have happened to the auctioned piece that changes it's original description/value. Removing a piece from auction because it was sold elsewhere seems a bit unethical. From time to time I see pieces here on Audiogon that appear to be both for sale and up for auction simultaneously. I also see items that seem to be for sale / auction on multiple sites. I think this is inappropriate. Perhaps Audiogon, like e-bay could provide a provision that would allow auctioned items to be available to the first bidder who offers X $. While this may seem moot, at least it provides the ground rules to prospective bidders up front.

i saw it happen on audiogon just a few weeks ago after the item had been listed for a week or so. then item then appeared in the "for sale" section a few days later at the going price. i don't know how audiogon could force a sale. i think what happens is some one makes a mistake in setting the minimum price to encourage bidding but finds there are few interested at the time and he doesn't want to take the chance that he will lose money. my guess, anyway.

If you have a piece up for auction, it's still yours until somebody wins it. I don't see any reason why someone couldn't cancel an auction without explanation before the reserve is met. After the reserve is met, I would frown upon this, although at the end of the day I doubt there is anything either a bidder or Audiogon could do about it.

Yes you can cancel an auction here. This is a relativly new feature at audiogon.

There is an option for the seller to cancel until the minimum has been bid. That option then disappears from the seller's menu. That is not explained in the rules but that is the way it works. Here are the rules.