I requested a book and thought it was going to roll over but they finally accepted and now the will mail by date has passed.  I thought the system would cancel.  What will happen?

Hold your mouse over the gray exclamation mark on the request. You'll get a pop-up that will tell you when the system will cancel. The actual cancellation will occur about 4 hours after the time on the pop-up.

If there's another person who has that book on his or her shelf, your request will automatically roll over to that person and the waiting process starts over. If there are no other members with the book, it will go onto your wish list.

Hmmm.  Why do they say will mail by then give 2 more days?   I love PBS but sometimes it kills me!  This is a heavily posted book so I hate that I have to wait so long, you know?  Oh well.

Okay - as I was typing I got the email that it was mailed.  Karma?

They give extra time because they realize that people have lives outside of PBS.  Maybe they clicked the wrong date. The other day I clicked the 3rd day when I meant to click the 5th day offered.  No way to change it afterwards. I went well into that 2 day grace period.  People have car trouble, computers break down, kids get sick etc..,  Some people only have computer access at the library or a friend/relative.  So they give that cushion.

I am grateful for the two extra days as once I mailed a book by the date I said I would but forgot to mark it mailed. I am normally good about it but that day I forgot.

Its not really meant for more time to mail (though some people use it for that), its meant to allow the sender time mark it mailed. Gives people time to come back and mark the book mailed after they have actually done so. Just think of it as a different deadline. The deadline to mail has passed, but the deadline to mark it mailed has not. The book may well be on its way and they just haven't had time to log back in and tell the system they mailed it. I for one do not like to mark my books mailed before they are actually mailed.

Melanie, excellent answer.  I totally agree.

Also, sometimes someone will choose a date, and plan to take it to the Post Office, but the date they chose is a holiday.  I like having a little cushion for cases like that.