Timer Solution

From time to time the server on which you’ll host your auction site might respond slowly, taking up to 3 sec to display a bid.
That would cause the timers on the site to jump forward (we’ve modified them not to jump back)
For example, a typical request from Jerusalem to US is taking 0.5 sec. When we update the timer with 1 sec period, it becomes more stable.
But from time to time the request will take as long as 3.5 sec. In other words, the server response for the same request takes much longer.

We can advise you to ask your host to setup a “mysql slow log” with 1 sec period. That might give us a clue.

Beyond that, unfortunately, we have no way to affect this issue since it’s a system administration issue. There is a person who is called “system administrator” or sometimes “database administrator” that looks over the database and tunes up memory consumption, hard disk speed and location, network flow etc. It is not possible for the software to provide smooth data flow. Check whether your contract with your host includes this service, it’s typically included in “managed hosting”, but to “some extent”.

To give you a sense of proportion: even swoopo, one of the biggest auctions in the world, also lags from time to time.