quote:
If Ebay can search its whole 'store' for an item in 2 seconds, surely A.S. with only a few ID numbers can flick through them in jig time...... one day.
The difference is that eBay has direct access to their database of info. We on the other hand have to go to the eBay item page and pull up the item just like you would. Then our computer programs have to find the price on the page and save it to our database. This works out to be probably 100x more work and bandwidth than eBay requires to get the same price.
We update the prices about once a day during the first few days of the auction, then twice a day as it nears the end, then something like every 4 hours on the last day.
We also have an "Update Items Info" button right on the My Snipes page that lets you update your items prices at any time you'd like.
We have many reasons for not doing it at the time you login. A few are... it would considerably slow down how long it takes for the my snipes page to come up since we'd first have to update all the items before showing the page. Many people just want to go to that page to add a snipe. It would take a lot of computer power and bandwidth, likely slowing the service slightly for all users, even ones that chose not to have theirs updated. And then of course a bid could always be placed on any of your items as soon as we updated it, making the data we give out of date.
We're always keeping our eyes out for ways we can make this happen. It's something we'd like to add if we can overcome the downsides.