First loss :(

[sneaks]

Hi all,

First time posting as I've never had an issue and I'm usually the one to spread word of this service. I just had my first encounter where gixen has disappointed me. Ever since I've upgraded to the mirrored service I figured 3 second snipers would be better than 6 for me but in this most recent case it turns out the servers have failed me... For this auction I was actually watching the auction end unlike others and as I see the seconds count down my anxiousness grows waiting for me to see the bid price go green in the last few seconds. As soon as the auction hit 2/3 seconds nothing happened... The auction ended at a lower price than I had entered and I'm too confused to do my usual safety net manual bid. I check gixen to confirm that I had actually entered my desired bid into the service and I'm disappointed by this message, "AUCTION ENDED EARLY OR SNIPE LATE"...

I guess what I want to say is that I will take Mario's word and avoid the 3 second sniper as this service is not perfect... I'll just make myself believe that the winner had a ridiculous max bid ready and that I had no chance haha. I'll also take this as an opportunity to thanks Mario for the service as well since it's has helped me win quite a few things in the middle of the night thus saving myself much loved sleep.

Cheers,
Ed

[Cupid]

That is unfortunate, Ed, especially if both servers failed to place the bid... this weekend will be a busy one for ebay as it is another one that is a week since a free listing weekend.

Did both servers give the same status?

As you might be aware, if you have read any of my posts on this subject, I don't believe 3 second snipes represent an advantage to a Gixen sniper.. but not because I doubt the reliability of the Gixen servers to be able to place them... I think you will find that if you use 8 seconds or more that your win rate will increase because you will less often hit the 'Bid Under Asking Price' block when you were willing to pay more than the winning bidder.
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Mark

[sneaks]

Hi Cupid,

Yeah I generally rely on gixen for sniping at unsuitable times so I don't normally adjust/increase my bids. I think both servers did fail as no bid was entered and I don't think I'm told which server actually places the bid when I use it. In case you were wondering, here's the item id: 281071188653.

I've contacted the seller and he's informed me that he and the winner have already agreed to cancelling the auction (ended at a price much lower than he wanted haha) so I'm not really disappointed anymore.

For cases where I'm under the asking bid price I'm happy to lose as it saves me money and gixen makes sure I'm not so impulsive haha.

Thanks for the reply!
Ed

[Cupid]

I guess those things are collectable now?

You can usually work out which server managed to place the bid by looking at the two different status's that Gixen gives the snipes on the Main and the Mirror tabs.

I can't look at your snipe, only Mario can do that... but I would think you are probably correct and that both servers had a problem, but not necessarily the same one.

The winning bidder outbid themselves twice, so I would also guess that you would have needed a considerably higher price to win them... but that isn't really much comfort if the aim is also to make sure that others don't pick things up too cheaply.

Sounds like you have resolved the situation to your satisfaction in any case... so that is good.
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Mark

[Gixen]

[mario]

Ed, this listing was indeed ended early by the seller. If you go to the listing you will the message on top "This listing was ended by the seller because the item was sold."

It is extremely rare that both servers are late. It happened only a handful of times in millions of auctions Gixen had sniped.

[sneaks]

Hi there Mario, thanks for the confirmation! I hadn't realised as I would have assumed he would cancel all bids first since he's now sort of obliged to sell at that price. He also did it in the last second which was surprising.

All in all, gixen is still a great service and the convenience and savings made from sniping easily cover the cost of the membership.

/suckingup

[Cupid]

Damn,

I missed that, I went straight to looking at the bidding without taking in all the details of the main page... by now I really should know better than to assume Gixen might not have performed as expected... I'm too aware that things could go wrong, but I guess I'll have to wait longer before they actually do...

I would now suspect shill bidding on that auction... but, of course, there is never conclusive proof of that.
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Mark