Hi all. Just thought I'd give you an update. I sent a message to the support address, and the kid who replied denied any knowledge of a bug, said he couldn't track it, etc etc. I bet they have people working on a fix though. I think it's only a sporadic thing, maybe a couple of percent. The last few snipe bids I've placed through AS have gone through fine.
It may be related to a similar thing I've seen a few times, where AS fires normally, and sends in its bid, but the auction remains listed as 'ready' just like it's still open. It seems part of the problem is the software wrongly categorizes the status of the auction. In my index case from the original post, it simply decided the auction was 'cancelled', and seemed to have treated it as though I had won the item, which meant it emptied the bidgroup! Ain't technology grand?
Breaks my heart when I see you guys with hundreds or thousands of posts to this forum-- you really should get out more! There's more to life than ebay. So long!
Natch