It's true that when a bid is made the username of the bidder and the date and time of his/her bid shows up immediately in the bid history. His/her actual bid does not, unless it's exactly the same as the amount needed to be high bidder at the time of the bid. Are you saying that the bidder who placed a bid five days before yours didn't show up under "Number of bids" or in the bid history at all until after you placed your bid with 9 seconds to go? That's very unlikely; I'm tempted to say that it's impossible. When did you first look at the bid history? Did you set up your snipe knowing that there was a prior bidder of record or did you think that you were the first bidder? (The item description should have contained that information. Did it show "0" opposite "Number of bids" right before your snipe was placed?)