So a week or so ago I put a book on my wishlist, and I was at position 91 (approx.). I just looked and now I'm at 102/104. Why is this happening? and has this happened to anyone else?

Welcome to PBS Katlynava!!  There's only a couple reasons to move back in wishlist position:

     1.  Members ahead of you have had the book/their account on hold. 

     2.  Wishes filled ahead of you were lost in the mail or RWAP, at which time the requester is returned to the front of the FIFO line.

With the recent holidays, members are probably taking accounts off vacation hold.  Books don't show on the wishlist when they are on hold, and are returned to their spot in line when the account is again active.

Yes, it happened to me too - after a couple of weeks I stopped moving backwards, and started moving forward.  It seems strange to have that many people on hold, but I guess it does happen.

Pat

I think it's especially bad this time of year because a lot of people had their accounts on hold during the holidays due to travel etc. 

A lot of people put their accounts on hold through the holidays & come back in early to mid-January.  A lot of people travel during the holiday season, and sadly, many people are just too broke to send out a lot of books right around Christmas.  It happens a lot in the summer months too.  Sometimes it works in your favor and you'll get temporarily bumped way up the lists long enough to get a few books you would ordinarily be waiting a while for.

Did someone mention that it could be because people had their accounts on hold for the holidays? hehe

I'm just back from visiting my family in Ireland and picked up several WL books at a used book store.  And, when I collected my mail this morning, there were 5 WL books waiting for me - some from FIFO and some from games.

So I just deleted 11 WL books (all versions) from my list so maybe some member will have moved up a position or 2.  

And now I have sooo many WL books to read 

I just had the same thing happen to me, but I don't know whether or not an "account hold" had anything to do with it (not sure how that would show on the queue). I put a book on my wish list earlier in the week, for which 0 members were wishing. So I've been at position 1/1 all week in hopes of the book being posted. As of this morning, all of a sudden I'm at position 2/2.

Robert: someone who requested the book before you either had their account on hold and just took it off (I just took mine off a one month hold yesterday), or their book went lost, wasn't accepted by the sender, wasn't marked mailed by the sender or was marked RWP by the receiver. All these things would put them on the WL ahead of you because their original transaction started before you put the book on your WL. 

Yeah, I've experienced this. It totally sucks.

Hey, maybe so. Today I'm back at 1/1, and the page states that the book was wish-listed once last week. Lookin' good!

I am still #1 on the Wishlist for the following paperbacks  (have been for some time!):

ATLAS OF UNKNOWNS by James

MIDNIGHT'S CHILDREN by Rushdie

A RAINBOW IN THE NIGHT

Also, I am going on a cruise soon, and am trying to get a copy of FROMMER'S CARIBBEAN.

Maybe someone has these lying around.    Thanks and Cheers !

Sallianne

Personally, when my account is on hold (usually because I've blown my postage budget and don't want any books requested for a while) I keep my WL on auto-request, so I don't miss any WL'd books.

But I think we are seeing a lot more of the "going backwards" on wishlists since PBS put out that individual hold feature on wishlist books. This retains the wisher's place in line but makes their wish invisible to everyone else. So people who are low on credits, waiting for credits to come in, etc. are now able to put the book on hold when they're getting close to #1 to hold their spot in line if they don't have a credit, rather than having to decline wishlist books or let them time out.

Used to be you'd see a lot of people asking about moving back 1 or 2 places--and that was usually from books that went lost in the mail or that were marked RWAP, thus restoring the person to the front of the WL line) or from vacation holds where the person wasn't using auto request. Now that we're seeing these jumps backward of 5-10 places, I think it's got to be primarily from the individual WL holds people are using.

Cheryl