Alert Email Timings?

[Ahhzz]

A quick question, if I may. Thanks to those that helped me set up my alerts when I first started. But my "instant" alerts, don't seem to be that 'instant' :) Is there a specified time period between when a thread gets posted, and when an email alert is actually sent out? My intent in setting up the global (read as :Spam me with anything even RESEMBLING an alert heheh) was to allow me to actually get work done, instead of spending all day nonstop refreshing the pages on each forums :) Unfortunately, I'm still missnig some deals, not just by the mass SD'ers quicker to the trigger then me (which I FULLY expect heheh), but by the simple time delay of sometimes more than an hour or two between initial post, and actual alert arrival in my email :(. So, is there some setting I can change, or is it built in? Or am I getting too many alerts, and the system is "Wait-listing": my alerts?

thanks for any info :)

[Qaid]

it's every 5 minutes....at least for PMs. good enough for me most of the time...but sometimes I miss a really hot deal...but that's usually because of thumbs downers (ebayers/etc) or lack of voting activity

[redsolar]

Quaid is correct, new deal alerts are checked for approximately every 5 minutes. Instant PMs are indeed instant.

The emails may be delayed for many reasons, usually normal delivery timing issues.

Some email providers (yahoo.com) have been known to delay SlickDeals.net emails for 4+ hours... Gmail occasionally gets a few emails late here and there, but normally you should be getting a deal alert for any thread that matches your within 10 minutes of thread being posted.