People make plans. An auction house can't publicize a closing date, then start changing things because they aren't paying to have an adequately powered company service their auctions. There was an item I really wanted in the Heritage auction 2 weeks ago. They had lots divided into three groups, some closing Thursday, some Friday, some Saturday. My lot closed Friday and went smoothly (and I won my lot,) leaving the rest of the weekend free for other plans, which was important because I had an invitation to my buddy's fishing cabin in Wisconsin that weekend.
My point is, had the auction house delayed closing for another day, or two, it would've tied me up the entire weekend. That just isn't acceptable.
You can blame the people who run the auction software, and I get that, but bottom line, if it is YOUR business, then take the responsibility to come up with a game plan that works. Do what Heritage did, by closing lots on different days. Maybe divide it by sport (baseball one day, basketball the next, etc.) or category (cards one day, memorabilia the next.) Have smaller (but possibly more frequent) auctions. Hire a company with more robust servers.
It's happened enough times to enough different auction houses that all should be aware of the problem. In my opinion, it's the full responsibility of each auction house to be able to run and close their auctions on schedule. Otherwise it isn't fair to bidders or consignors, or their families.
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