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| sam houston philatelics auctions |
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instructions: new auction system
1. click 
on the main page of our site.
2. this link will take you to our auction on stamp auction network. if you have not registered with stamp auction network, the next step will be to do so.
- at the top of the san page, click "register"
- fill out all fields in red and submit for registration. keep in mind, your individual san user name can not contain any spaces, double quotes, or the following characters; #, %, & and +.
- sign in using the username and password you created.
3. scroll to the sam houston philatelics auction on the main page you have been directed to.
you will not be able to bid until your registration is approved. please wait up to 24 hours for your account to be approved, at which time you will be assigned a customer number.
4. once your account has been approved, choose the search/bid option at the top of the san menu on our san site.
5. this will take you to a list of our lots, sorted by category.
note:the column to the left lists lots by the quantity of lots in that category.
6. choose the category of the stamp you would like to bid on.
7. as you scroll through the lots, be sure to type your bid amount in the box marked "bid". 0.00 is the system default, which you will replace with your desired bid.
8. when you reach the end of the page, be sure to click the button 
. this will ensure that we recieve your bids.
9. this will take you to a page that lists all bids you have at this time. here, it is important that you check all of your bids to make sure that they are correct. if you want to change any bid amounts, do so here.
the following are the instructions you will see again on the stamp auction network site once your bids are placed.
bidding instructions:
bid amounts in green indicate you are currently the
highest bidder.
you may still be outbid, either
at public auction or by late absentee bid forms that have not been entered.
bid amounts in red indicate
you are not the highest bidder (see "pending final...").
if your bid ties the opening or the sold price and it is in red, it means that
you were a tie bidder, an earlier bid of the same amount beat you.
you may not lower your bid once it is made. bids are
adjusted to the proper increments. bids may not be deleted. "watch" bids allow you to put a bid in your
"my bids" bucket without placing a bid. you can then change your watch bid to a bid later by entering
a bid amount. bids placed on
"watch" may be deleted. you cannot enter a watch bid for a lot you have already submitted
a bid. tie bids are awarded to the first bidder. "up to" or "ceiling" bids
may be placed by entering a higher bid in the "max bid" input box. stampauctionnetwork does not
execute bids on your behalf, it passes your bids over to the auction firm. to increase your bids,
enter new bid amount and press the "update all bids on this page" submit button.
opening bids: stampauctionnetwork provides you with dynamically
calculated opening bids. an opening bid is the amount the lot is currently selling for.
in most cases, it is calculated to be an increment above the next highest bid. if your
bid is above the opening, you should see your bid in green
indicating that you are winning the bid. if your bid is at the opening and it is not
green, it is because you are the tie bidder and the other bidders' bid was entered before
yours. bids entered below the opening are accepted.
if the high bidder is a or bidder, the lot will be sold to the
next bidder.
in some cases, other bids may be
rejected or lowered by the auction firm. in other cases, consignors may be convinced to
lower their reserves. allowing bids to be entered below the opening also prevents some
types of bidder collusion occasionally found at other internet auction sites.
dynamic bidding: most of the auction firms here at stampauctionnetwork
receive bids by telephone, mail or at public auction. those bids are entered into their
office auction management systems. here at stampauctionnetwork, you are bidding interactively
against other internet bidders. when you bid against another internet bidder, or if they
bid against you, the change in the opening bid will be immediate. you are also bidding
against the bids entered in the office auction management system, however, those bids are
not reflected until they are transferred to stampauctionnetwork. there can be some delay, if
for instance, you send bids to the auction firm by mail, before they appear at
stampauctionnetwork. similarly, if you enter bids via stampauctionnetwork, and then
call the auction firm, your bids may not have reached the auction firm by the time
you call them. this transfer of bidding information between stampauctionnetwork and the
auction firms' auction management system happens very regularly and when close to auction
closing time, almost real-time.
entering "or" bids: in many cases, you may want to bid on one or
more items, yet if successful, only win one of them. or bidding allows you to do this. you
indicate an or bid by placing the same identifier (usually a letter) in the or input box
for each bid that comprises the or bid group. for instance if you wanted to win either lot
23 or 24 but not both, you might enter "a" in the or input box for each of the lots 23 and
24. you may make an or group bid on as many lots as desired. if you need more groups, use
another letter, for instance use "b" to enter an or bid on lots 30, 31, and 35. or bids are
generally executed in lot number order.
"pending final auction results"
if your bid is in green and there
is a "pending final auction results" message, it means that you were the high bidder
when the auction was closed to internet bidding. san is waiting for the auction
firm to post prices realized before it can notify you whether you won or lost
the lot in question.
bid amounts in red indicate either that
you are not the high bidder or that san can not determine whether or not you
are the high bidder. until the auction firm posts prices realized, san can not
be certain whether you have won the lot or not. other high bids could have dropped
due to limit or "or" bids. floor bidders can beat out san bidders. in some cases,
busy auction firms do not get last minute bids entered via san. when prices
realized are posted, most auction firms post the identity of the winner bidder
internally to san so that san can correctly identify you as the winning bidder. some
auction firms do not post the winning bidder, in those cases, your bid may be higher than the realized
the price realized or opening and yet san can not determine that you were the winner. when san
can not determine absolutely that you are the winner, it will still show in red.
