Forgive me for this long post but I just wanted to share my experience with Auctionsniper.com's customer 'support' after an 'Ebay verification' captcha error occurred to me yesterday (26/07/15)
This is a widespread and persistent problem, yet auctionsniper's report staff have admitted that they are unwilling to notify their customers because 'it affects a small percentage of our customers'. As this thread and others have shown, this is simply untrue and it's certainly not a small problem! Here is a transcript of my conversation with their support staff, perhaps it can be used as a warning to others trying to find answers via this channel- you will simply get a copy and pasted reply that won't answer your question. Absolutely farsical behaviour!
"Category: General Question Case Topic: 'Ebay Requires Verification' Error
m***********7@gmail.com
Customer
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 1:23 PM
To whom it may concern,
While attempting to place a snipe for item number 3**********6 on Ebay my snipe was unable to be placed due to an 'Ebay Requires Verification' error which prevented the bid.
After much research I have discovered that this is an ongoing problem faced by auction sniper.com, yet I was not made aware that this might be an issue. I fulfilled all the necessary steps required to place the snipe, and even double checked that my auction sniper account verified my ebay username and password, yet the snipe was still not placed. If I had been informed by auction sniper that this could potentially be an issue, especially on Sunday evenings that I have now learnt severely increases the chances of this error, I would have bypassed this website's processes entirely and placed the bid manually.
Both my auction sniper account, and my eBay account were in perfect order, yet the bid did not take place.
I am extremely frustrated and disappointed, and feel that auction sniper has breached it's contractual obligation towards me since I have handed over money for this specific service. Going forward I will no longer be using auction sniper.com, as I cannot even be sure that this senseless and unpreventable error will not occur in the future.
Sincerely,
Martin
Operating System: MacOS
Browser: Safari
Involved eBayItemNumbers: ***********
Kenneth Support
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 2:08 PM
Hello Martin,
Thank you for contacting us regarding this matter and I am sorry to hear the trouble you are facing. I certainly understand your point of view, however, while reviewing your account I found that snipe for the provided item number is showing up status message ‘Ebay Requires Account Verification’. The 'View Confirmation' (an eye shaped icon) located at the right of the snipe is displaying following message:
“Enter a verification code to continue
To keep eBay a safe place to buy and sell, we will occasionally ask you to enter a verification code. This helps us to block unauthorized users from entering our site. Please enter the verification code in the image below and click on the "Continue" button to enter our site. Learn more about our security policies.- opens in a new window or tab
Enter the verification code
Change the image | Listen to the numbers
Continue”
The "View Confirmation" page is not an actual eBay page, but a snap shot/record of eBay's request when Sniper attempted to access your account to place the bid. You will not be able to access/verify your eBay account via this page.
As we are unrelated to eBay, we have no control over what eBay may present at log in and eBay may present such a request at any time for any account. Sadly, our service is unable to complete such a re-quest or otherwise work around it when eBay presents it, and so in those cases, Auction Sniper is unable to place your bid. I am not aware of any similar service that can work around such a request. Typically, this situation resolves itself in a period of time and snipes are then set normally
If you have any other questions or encounter further difficulties, please don't hesitate to ask!
Sincerely,
Auction Sniper Support
m***********7@gmail.com
Customer
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 2:25 PM
Thank-you for this information. If I understand you correctly, you are not able to solve this problem. In that case why wasn't I made aware of this issue before I purchased the services of this website? It is clear to me that this issue undermines your services completely, and yet this was not communicated to me until after the fact? Why is this?
Sincerely,
Martin
Kenneth Support
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 3:13 PM
Hello,
Thank you for getting back to us regarding this matter and I certainly understand your point of view. I would like to inform you that Auction Sniper is an automated tool that places your snipes as per the max bid amount and lead time that you set. Once your snipe is placed on eBay it indicates that our system has performed its task.
However, the verification steps are RANDOMLY presented by eBay; in this situation there is no way we can inform you that this is going to occur for your future snipes or not. Typically such requests cease within a day or so and sniping resumes normally thereafter.
We apologize for any inconvenience caused and appreciate your understanding regarding the same. Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance to you.
Sincerely,
Auction Sniper Support
Customer
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 4:49 PM
Many thanks Kenneth for your apologies, however I still haven't received an answer to my original question of why this issue was not made clear to me BEFORE it became a problem, rather than after. If I had been appropriately warned by this website, I wouldn't have signed up and paid money for a service that might work 'RANDOMLY'. I was not told by auction sniper at any point during my purchase that this 'RANDOM' ebay error might occur.
Martin
Kenneth Support
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 5:13 PM
Hello,
You're very welcome!
As informed in my initial message, we are unrelated to eBay, we have no control over what eBay may present at log in and eBay may present such a request at any time for any account. Sadly, our service is unable to complete such a re-quest or otherwise work around it when eBay presents it, and so in those cases, Auction Sniper is unable to place your bid.
Also, there is no way we can inform you that this is going to occur for your already placed/future snipes or not. Typically such requests cease within a day or so and sniping resumes normally thereafter.
Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance to you.
Sincerely,
Auction Sniper Support
m***********7@gmail.com
Customer
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 6:15 PM
Dear Kenneth,
Thank-you for evading my question for the third time. Without copying and pasting the same reply could you please listen to my question and answer it:
Why wasn't I warned beforehand by auction sniper.com that an 'Ebay Requires Account Verification' problem could occur?
If you are unable to answer my question could you please put me in contact with someone who can.
Many thanks,
Martin.
Alexis Support
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 7:15 PM
Hello Martin,
Sorry for the inconvenience caused.
Please note that we cannot inform users beforehand because it is not clear whether captcha will be presented for you or not. That verification page is only presented when systems tries to place your bid on eBay.
So, there is no way we can inform our users for verification code.
I hope you will find this response to be helpful.
Sincerely,
Auction Sniper Support
m***********7@gmail.com
Customer
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 7:24 PM
Hi Alexis,
Thank-you for you reply, however you are misunderstanding my question- I fully understand that you are not able to predict when a captcha will be presented, but that was not my question.
I'll try and ask my question for the fourth time:
Why wasn't I warned beforehand that this error even existed?
I did everything correctly yet my snipe was not placed.
Not once was I warned that there is a chance this could occur. Why?
Many thanks,
Martin
Alexis Support
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 9:21 PM
Hello Martin,
Thanks for following up with us. Sorry for the inconvenience.
Please note that this verification step is recently introduced by eBay to make eBay more secure. Earlier also this message was used to be presented but frequency was very low. Currently eBay is presenting this captcha randomly for random accounts and for a period some period of time.
I hope that you will find this response to be helpful. Please do let me know if I can be of any further assistance.
Sincerely,
Auction Sniper Support
m***********7@gmail.com
Customer
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 9:47 PM
Hi Alexis,
Thanks for your reply but you've just repeated yourself again. I must admit my patience is beginning to wear thin.
I fully understand the problem. Please stop repeating the problem back to me. Please stop explaining ebay's security captcha protocol, it is now fully understood, and does not need repeating.
I've now had five replies from auctionsniper's customer service and not once has my question been answered.
For the fifth and hopefully last time I ask:
Why wasn't I warned about this potential problem?
You said yourself that this issue has been occuring for some time now.
Why didn't an auctionsniper.com representative send out an email notification to warn its users about this potential issue?
If I had been told about it I would have taken extra steps to safeguard my bid, but I wasn't. I have been left in the dark and now it's too late to do anything about it.
Please answer my question or forward me to someone who is willing to.
Many thanks,
Martin.
Michelle Support
Posted Sunday, 7/26/2015 11:56 PM
Hello,
Please accept my deep apologies for the inconvenience caused you due to this.
We are trying our best to support you. You have not been informed about this because it is not 100% sure that you will get this captcha verification while placing your bid on eBay. We have hundreds of thousands of customers and they all are not facing this issue. So, we cannot just generalize this issue for everyone.
However, I can understand if there would be anyway to determine it beforehand, it would be very useful for our users.
Once again I apologies for the difficulties you are facing. Please note that our engineers are trying to resolve this issue as soon as possible.
Thanks for your patience on this matter.
Sincerely,
-Auction Sniper Support
m***********7@gmail.com
Customer
Posted Monday, 7/27/2015 4:54 AM
Auctionsniper.com and its support staff have shown themselves to be negligent in the extreme, and unwilling to inform its customers of potential problems that could severely and catastrophically effect their service simply because 'it affects a small percentage of our customers'. This is unacceptable and frankly borders on negligence. The conversations and actions of this company will be forwarded to the UK's trading standards, and I hope others in my position do the same. You cannot keep your customers in the dark like this. Utterly disgraceful.
Status: Closed "