Give minutes is add to last bid to make time for counter bid like all auctions.

EBTH states their policy clearly. I tend to read the fine print before I engage in a bidding war with anyone... This is their written statement clearly displayed on their page that explains bidding-

"Additionally, if an Item receives a bid within the last 5 minutes, the close time will be extended 5 minutes from the time the bid is placed. The time will continue to be extended for 5 minutes with each newly placed bid and the item will not close until 5 minutes have elapsed with no additional bid activity. The Item will say "Ended" once bidding has ended."

EBTH does, indeed, add five minutes to an auction if someone comes along and bids when there's under five minutes left on the auction. This practice (fairly new from what I can ascertain) is, in my opinion, another way for EBTH to jack up the price of whatever it is you're bidding on.

It happened to me not too long ago and to say I was angry would be an understatement. EBTH claims this allows all bidders a chance to win the auction. Not true. What it does is create a back & forth bidding war between "two" people & I was one of the those people/

Initial bid was $80... I went as high as my budget would allow -- $251 -- of course, the other bidder was right behind me w/a bid of $252. While I didnt count how many extensions were put into place, suffice to say a great deal of time was wasted (on my end) as there wasnt a chance in he__ that I come out as the winner.

This nothing short of greed & it comes down to who has the money to play the game. While $251 may not seem like a great deal of money, for me it was way above my initial budget for the item. I finally gave up not only because of the money but the extensions were aggravating and it became obvious that the winner would be someone with a great deal of money which allowed them to continually outbid me.

There arent extensions on eBay nor Heritage... when the clock ticks down to zero and youre the highest bidder, you win period.

I, myself, am done with EBTH... Their mission statement is hogwash and the reasons given regarding extensions I'd pure BS.

Sorry to to hear a similar situation happened to you --

Same thing happened to me. I was the winning bid on a lithograph. The time ticked down to 0 and up pops, YOU WON, or something like that. When I tried to pay I got a message that stated the seller would email me with shipping info and I could pay at that time. I got no email, so I went to EBTH and checked my won auction list and the item I'd won was no longer listed. After tracking down the lithograph, I was shocked it now said I had been out bid. My question to both EBTH and the seller, how can I be outbid when I was online for the end of the auction and had won according to you. How can an item be listed on my auction wins and then disappear and said item then be awarded to someone else after time had run out? I have no idea what sort of game they're playing and not surprisingly I never got an answer from either seller or EBTH. But how could they possibly have an explanation for such a backhanded deal so I guess ignoring the situation worked best for them. That was the last time I went to EBTH. So sorry you had the same experience.