Auction mistakes - web-site?

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Posted By: Scott

I just received an auction catalog from a trusted auction house. The catalog contains a misrepresented item which has a starting bid 4X it's value, and while the item is worth about $20 (that's what I paid for one), it will probably sell for $500-$5,000 based on the erroneous description.

The dilemna: do I simply call them and report the mistake?

Normally I would make a simple phone call, but given some of the things that David Rudd and Robert have posted, it makes me think that we could use a web-site listing all auction errors that board members have spotted - this way we don't have to rely on the auction houses updating their own web-sites. I have personally bid on items based on auction catalog descriptions that I didn't realize had been updated on the auction web-sites. If I had a single place to check for ALL auction house errors and corrections, it would be much easier.

PS - certainly I would call the auction house prior to posting a note on such a web-site, just to make sure there wasn't more to the story. This particular auction house is very, very honest, so I definitely won't post more detail until I've spoken with them.