Interest on Consignment Offsets?

[Exhibitman]

I got my statement from the November Heritage auction and noticed that the sneaky bastards charged me interest on my consignment offset. They treated the invoice as unpaid until their artificial "settlement date" of 12/31. And I know that my lots were paid off long before the 'settlement date' because I saw my stuff listed all over eBay within two weeks of the sale.

The details: I sold a bunch of stuff in the November 15-16 auction and won a few lots worth far less. I contacted them on November 19th to ask them to offset the wins against the sales, as every other auctioneer does, and got a response saying it was all taken care of. Not a word about interest or charges. Had they mentioned it I would just have written a check.

I have never seen an AH do this before. Definitely gives me pause before considering another consignment.

Anyone who did a consignment offset, you might want to check your statement and see if you got hit too.