Posted By:
Aaron"I would take the fact that Doug Allen took the time to respond to a complaint on the board as a positive. So what if he looked up your phone number in the data base (if he in fact did that). He saw an unhappy customer and he wanted to rectify the situation."
Hardly. If he wanted to "rectify the situation" he could have merely e-mailed me about my concerns (by listing my e-mail address when I log-in, I'm consenting to anyone here doing so).
His using the MastroNet database to find my contact information (which is exactly what he did) was an invasion of my privacy, unethical (possibly illegal) accessing and misuse of my account information, cold-calling me at work was meant, IMO, in no uncertain terms to express to me that I should watch what I say about Mastro because they know who I am and are watching me. It was a very threatening phone call on the part of Doug Allen and, at minimum, meant to silence criticism. (And if he's accessing my account information without my permission, how do I know he's not doing so again, and giving it to others?)
I'm sure Richard's situation was very similar. (And whoever else Allen has done this to.)
Honestly though, to me, all it proved was that Mastro made no bones about accessing its customers account information whenever it wanted to and for whatever reason, and could do the same to find out our bidding history. So, while Mastro may contend they don't practice shill bidding (and I have no evidence they do), certainly they have the capability of doing so (which can be said for most of the major auction houses).