Doubt regarding event at the end of an auction.

[co2014_patin]

I wanted to bring this matter to eBay's attention, ask them to review the records and get an explanation, but I couldn't find a way to do it. I did not find options to communicate a matter like this on the Internet page.

I communicated the facts to the seller and he recommended that I contact eBay.

Does anyone have an explanation for this?

Together with my wife, we closely followed the last 30 minutes of an auction to buy a cell phone. For a long time after my last bid (I would say at least 20 minutes) which was 725€, there were no more bids (absolutely no other bids) and the auction ended with my bid.

The screen showed: Completed, 725€, “Pay now.”

But seconds later new information appeared on the screen: Completed, 805€, “Pay now.”

It was very strange. That made me suspicious. And, of course, it worried me.

Unfortunately, it didn't occur to me to take a screenshot at that moment, to document the end of the auction. I was so happy with the purchase and I didn't think something like that could happen.

What could be the reason for this unexpected increase of 80€ in the amount to be paid? Do you think it is possible that I can do something to get those 80€ refunded, which I consider was overpaid, since according to what we saw, the auction ended with my offer of 725€?

Thank you.

[woodland_gnome]

The display was simply premature due to the limitations of multi-server database management and eBay customers wanting quick answers instead of accurate ones (or at least that's what managment think the buyers want).*

The countdown you see is not a real-time feed of bids coming into eBay's servers and the eBay clock counting down. Rather, it is a script that runs on your computer and calls for updates on the auction status about every 3 seconds. It uses the time remaining from those updates to start your own computer's clock counting down from the time the page loads or the last successful update, and displays the "current price" and your status as of the last successful update.

Meanwhile, on eBay's end, a bid coming in is timestamped before eBay does anything else with it. If it gets the timestamp before the end of the last second of the auction, it is a timely bid. Then the bid must be processed to see that it is a valid bid for that item (meets the currently calculated minimum bid amount, not subject to a seller block or over the Buyer Activity Limit or from an account with a bidding suspension, timestamped before the end of the auction) before it is handed over to the server that is calculating the status of the auction. This is usually all done in a fraction of a second, but sometimes can take a couple of seconds. Only after the status server calculates the new "current bid" and leader is that information available to be sent in response to an update request from your computer (and it takes some fraction of a second for your request to get to eBay's servers and another for it to get back, get loaded into RAM, and get displayed on your screen, and the script runs the clock down from when the new "time remaining" loads in RAM, which usually results in your countdown being slow because of the time lag).

So, between the 3 second (at best, not all updates are succesful) gaps and the time to process a new bid, there is always at least a 1-4 second window at the end where the results of a new bid will NOT display on your countdown screen before YOUR clock reaches 0 and the script calls for a full refresh of the Item Page. At that time the results of the late bid usually come up (you are not seeing the actual bid, you are seeing the calculated "winning price" or "current bid"), but not always, as you found out, so give it a few seconds and then manually refresh just to be sure before relying on the result as final (again, on a busy night it might take a few seconds to finish processing a bid).  This can result in you losing an auction you thought you won (but didn't) or the price being higher (the price being set by the high bid of the second highest bidder).

*ETA:  eBay actually experimented with a fix for this a couple of years ago by inserting a timeout on the "final" display that the results were still being determined,  but buyers didn't like it and there were some problems with it loading the results at the end of the timeout.

[co2014_patin]

Thank you very much, for your reply.
It clarifies a lot for me.
However, it is still curious and strange to me that 20 to 30 minutes before the end of the auction no offer is made and that it is made at the last second. That causes me a certain doubt.
Is it possible to see the bid record for the last few minutes? I have looked for it on the eBay website and have not been able to find it.
Thank you

[woodland_gnome]

However, it is still curious and strange to me that 20 to 30 minutes before the end of the auction no offer is made and that it is made at the last second. That causes me a certain doubt.

That's  normal.   "Sniping" (bidding only one time at your true maximum in the last few seconds) is a very good defensive strategy to prevent someone else (including dishonest sellers using another account) from probing your maximum bid to bid just over (or just under) it.

Is it possible to see the bid record for the last few minutes? I have looked for it on the eBay website and have not been able to find it.

Go to the Listing Page for the auction (the one with the Description and the Shipping and Payments tab or whatever they are labelling them this week) and from there click on the # of bid display  to get to the Bid History Page. 

[co2014_patin]

Again, thank you very much, for your reply.