Bidding Early with AS?

It did this for all three of my bids today. This is a MAJOR malfunction as it allows manual auction watchers a huge gap to monitor bids. At this point, I believe fees should be waived for any auctions that this happened to.

You don't pay fees when you don't win the item! If your snipe was beaten then you won manually then you shouldn't pay fees IMHO - click on HELP and ask for a refund!

Without knowing auction numbers or specific times then it's impossible to guess at a reason. As to it being a malfunction well AS adjusts lead times to suit network/server loads at busy times - could this be what happened here? (and every Sunday evening???!)

R2

I don't understand why this is still such a problem after all this time. I just won an auction but likely paid more than necessary b/c 3 bids came in after mine. Yes, the auction did end on the half hour, but if traffic was so darn hoppin' on a Monday night, how is it that others got their bids in 4 seconds before the auction end, but my 6 second AS lead time had to hit 20 seconds ahead?

Have you considered that the later bids may have been automatic snipes so the order they came in would make no difference? Unless, of course, you bid a whole number which exactly matched a subsequent bid/snipe and your 'early' snipe would have meant that you won under ebay's proxy bidding rules.
And I don't care what anyone says, no-one can manually react with only 30 seconds to go.
That said, AS should respond to explain how their automatic system is perhaps over-reacting to perceived slowness as shown by other sniping software being able to send in snipes closer to the deadline?!
And finally, the recommended lead time by the forum members is 8 seconds...
Congrats on your win!

R2

quote:

And I don't care what anyone says, no-one can manually react with only 30 seconds to go.

Fair to say that no R2 can.



THE EARTH ISN'T THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE!
Fair to say that won't provide any enlightenment.

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Originally posted by Rick:
THE EARTH ISN'T THE CENTER OF THE UNIVERSE!

R2 didn't disagree!!! Things are improving.

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Have you considered that the later bids may have been automatic snipes

Yes, I had, but that's not a more pleasant thought since it has the implications you describe above.

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And I don't care what anyone says, no-one can manually react with only 30 seconds to go.

Care or not, I've done it countless times. It is so incredibly easy if you're really paying attention and ready to react. My system is nothing special, I'm still running 98 as my OS for heavens sake, and I can still easily manage to get a reaction bid in even if there are only 20 seconds remaining. (Done it in less, too.) Remember, you can have more than one window open at a time to complete the task.

Oh, and I've done this on Sunday evenings most often because that's when I tend to be present for auction closings, especially since I've given up having AS place bids for me at that time. In fact, I almost never start the process of placing my bid prior to 30 seconds remaining so that I can see as many of the last minute bids as possible. This past Sunday I reacted with only 9 seconds left in an action and won, so I know it can easily be done.

quote:

Originally posted by mar:

quote:

And I don't care what anyone says, no-one can manually react with only 30 seconds to go.

Care or not, I've done it countless times..... Remember, you can have more than one window open at a time to complete the task.

Absolutely. I've done it with like 9 or 10 seconds to go. I see no reason why it can't be done in even 7 or 6 seconds, maybe less. The process (1) click on refresh screen (2) screen refreshes, (3) mentally register fact that a price change has occurred (4) click "confirm bid" on your back-up bid (already set in another window, obviously) (5) bid goes thru, could all happen in just 3 or 4 seconds.

I suppose "reacting" to a bid, to R2's mind, includes viewing a bid then ruminating on the appropriate response, then setting up and confirming one's new bid; or maybe he means, being able to react in such a way (i.e. several last nibbles) as to be sure of topping the other bidder. Sure, only a fool would count on accomplishing that within 10 or 20 seconds.

There was once I bid manually on something with 30 seconds to go, and another guy got in 2 bids within that time, that I'm fairly sure were both reacting to mine, for several reasons. E.g. He placed 3 bids near the end (the 1st one was a little bit before mine), and he had this pattern with other items too. I'd definitely have been ticked if my bid had been an AS snipe firing early. It's an occupational hazard of using AS, but I've never found the usual explanations all that convincing.

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no-one can manually react with only 30 seconds to go

I did, when AS bid so terribly far in advance, but in any case, let's stay on topic:


- Why does it occasional bid SO early, and is there a way to prevent that?

I'm using a 7 second snipe, and it has, from time to time, gone off 30 or 40 seconds early.

Last night, AS bid at 11 seconds. I'm not worried about that small a gap. As said above, perhaps in a case like that, it's adjusting for server lag. But 40 seconds?


I'm not trying to get my bid money back. I'm not griping; I love Auction Sniper.


But I AM trying to understand why AS sometimes bids 5 times earlier than specified.

Hi there, Dann

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Why does it occasional bid SO early . . .

Those that know (support) AREN’T willing to say – those that don’t know (users) ARE. Usually the response is that ebay is running a bit slow, so AS pads the lead time to make the snipe “on time”, but then it’s a little difficult to accept that explanation when some other user places a snipe 3 seconds before the end of the same auction, OR places a couple of snipes in response to another snipe.

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. . . and is there a way to prevent that?

No. There’s been several requests on the forum to “turn off” padding (“adjusting”), but AS doesn’t appear to be open about it, and they usually close those topics on this forum. They usually say something about such an enhancement making the service too complicated, but then someone usually suggests the feature be added to some “advance setting”, but then the topic gets closed, so I won’t suggest AS adding such a feature to some “advance setting” to avoid having this thread closed.

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- Why does it occasional bid SO early, and is there a way to prevent that?

I'm using a 7 second snipe, and it has, from time to time, gone off 30 or 40 seconds early.

The past couple weeks, I've been on sort of a bidding spree on ebay! I've used AS to snipe more auctions than I have in a while. I've NOT had the excessive time padding to my lead times that several others have experienced. I have set my default lead time to 11 seconds for over a year now (maybe 2!), since I first saw the lead time padding complaints here on the forum. The most time padding (curiously, almost ALL my recent snipes were padded -- none seemed to have fired at the set 11 second lead!) I've seen to my snipes is 2 - 5 seconds (for a total lead time of 13 - 16 seconds). Occasionally there are bids after mine, which I realize MAY or MAY NOT have been in response to my bid. While I, like most snipers, would like my bids to register less than 5 seconds from the end of auction, I definitely would like to avoid the excessively LONG leads some have experienced. SO FAR I don't recall having experienced the long padded leads that others on here apparently have. Now of course that could be purely coincidental rather than direct correlation to my set double-digit lead time, but there it is for whatever it's worth!

Regardless, the fact I can set up bid groups to bid until I win, that I can bid within the last MINUTE of an auction, that I can bid while I sleep(!), is all valuable enough TO ME to continue using AS services.

My 2 cents....