Obviously no one violated any rules. Quite honestly, I have no business buying what I was prepared to buy
, but you know that how goes.
Tony - Yes, I'm aware that stuff comes up and sellers can't respond. However, if you are consigning items, you owe it to your consignors to be prepared to respond to customer questions, (even on the last day of the auction) and if you can't, having someone else available to at least say "I can't respond at the moment, but will get back with you....". I think ebay even has an automated feature that will handle that for you. If you can't do these things, then you aren't giving your consignors the best bang for their buck.
And if it is planned, shutting things down 9+ hours prior to auction end is not a good thing for your consignors. I hope you are not telling us that you do that.