(A) License required. No person shall sell or offer for sale at public auction, any goods, wares, merchandise, furniture or any other article, or effects, carried in stock, or applied merchandise without first obtaining a license to do so and paying a license tax as provided by law or ordinance.
(B) Tags on sale items; contents; statement of warranty.
(1) Any person conducting an auction shall attach to each article of merchandise exposed or offered for sale at the auction, a tag on which shall be written or printed in English, a true statement of the character and quality of the goods or article offered or exposed for sale. The purpose of the tag shall be to given to each purchaser of any article at such a sale full and correct information of the nature, kind and quality of the article of merchandise being sold. The auctioneer shall read the information or statement contained on the tag before offering the merchandise for sale.
(2) If any secondhand goods or articles are offered for sale at such an auction, that fact shall appear in the statement on the tag. The tag attached to the articles of merchandise shall be signed by the person conducting the sale and shall be firmly attached to the article of merchandise sold at public sale.
(3) The tag shall be delivered with the article so sold to the purchaser and the representations on the tag shall constitute a warranty of the kind, character and quality of the article sold.
(4) The statement on the tag shall begin with the words: “The undersigned represents that the (describe or name the article) to which this statement is attached is (then shall follow in detail representations as to the quality, kind and character of the merchandise, together with all facts relative thereto, in detail as above provided) .”
(C) Bidding regulations.
(1) Any person conducting an auction sale, or who may hereafter be licensed to conduct such a sale by auction, shall not employ or use at the sale any “by-bidder”, “capper” or “booster”. No auctioneer shall, at such a sale, accept or pretend to accept any false, misleading or fictitious bid for any article offered for sale, but every sale must be bona fide.
(2) The auctioneer at the sale shall recognize no bidder for any article exposed for sale, unless the bidder shall speak in tone audible to those present, the amount of his or her bid, or shall extend his or her arm above the heads of the crowd so as to be plainly seen and identified as the bidder by those present.
(3) The article sold shall be immediately and publicly delivered to the bidder and the amount of the bid then and there publicly paid for the article by the purchaser.
(4) When an article is offered for sale and a bid is received therefor as provided for herein, the article shall be sold for the bid offered, unless the auctioneer, at the time he or she offers the article for sale, shall publicly announce that he or she reserves the right to reject the bid received. Only when such a reservation is made shall the auctioneer have the right to reject the bid offered.
(D) Bond required. All persons shall, before beginning to conduct an auction or public sale, execute a bond to the city in the sum of $5,000 conditioned on their fully complying with the provisions of this section and that the articles sold at the sale are the kind, quality and character which are represented to be on the tag attached to the article sold. The bond shall be for the benefit of the purchasers of any articles sold at the auction which may prove not to be of the kind and quality represented.
(1984 Code, § 111.050) Penalty, see § 121.99
Statutory reference:
Licensing of auctioneers, see KRS 330.010 et seq.