What a mess.
When most auctions were live, I'd see that sort of bidding occasionally, and it was handled by auctioning the individual lots first, then the larger lot, asking for the next advance over the total of the individual lots as the opening bid.
I had a sort of similar thing happen with a bike auction.
Left bids by website on maybe 10 items. Bids I had to forgo other stuff to be sure I could cover it all if I won. Their system didn't handle bids electronically, more like the old fashioned system of writing the left bids down, only they accessed those bids by internet.
Checked the prices realized the day after the auction and it looked like I'd won 8 of them.
Monday, Tuesday, no invoice.....
So I ask, and they say I didn't win anything. Gave them a rough idea of the bids I'd left, and they said they had an internet problem, and couldn't access left bids for something like 120 items. So instead of waiting, they just kept going. Tough luck, sorry?
When I complained on the bike list I'm on everyone defended them.
I still won't bid there, won't visit the sale the day before, and will never consign anything with them. I do look when I get the announcement email, just in case there's something I really must have. But over a decade that's been a big no aside from one item that went for like 12K when their auction estimate was maybe 1500.....
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