As you say, eBay has fixed it...I had an item close once and eBay went down 5 minutes before the close of the auction. It was a rare piece and I learned later that bids were in for $200 more than the closing. Unfortunately when this happens eBay rarely corrects the error by adding extra clock to the items or freezing the auction until the problem is fixed. Seller must accept eBays bids...the buyer can get very lucky, so at least someone does okay...Peter