Ralph, I'd be happy to analyze the bid history and see if what you suspect is true, but I'd need the item number.

It is possible that it happened exactly as you describe, that your "security" bid caused the bid price to increment when it would have been a "tie" if you had not entered the second bid. Depending on how much time was left when the other bidder placed his bid, he could have gone in and raised his bid to $15.50 and won it for that price.

Strange, but True!