Gallant Pig

Recently a few titles I'm interested in jumped into these two statuses. Is there any way around it? If I call CS will it help? It seems like if they are at the top of your list they just skip right around those, but am I at the top of the list if they are at the top of my list?

Very frustrating!

Movie_Man

As has been brought up before, the less you rent, the more likely you are to get those "long wait" titles. My only advice is to keep them up there at the top of the queue and hope that one day they will magically ship.
Whether or not you like it, the waits are one of the "features" of Netflix. Just keep your queue fully loaded so you'll always have something coming.

rich-y

I actually found that the only way for me to get a "Long Wait" title was to remove everything else out of my que. After a short wait, I was mailed the DVD I wanted since there was nothing else on my list to choose from.

I did this because NetFlix would ALWAYS send me one of my movie choices from WAY down on the que. It seems they always send the first available movie regardless of how you have prioritized your list. So, remove the movies on your que and then add them back after you get your "Long Wait" DVD.

tonyc3742

If something is at the top of your queue, and is in wait status, they're 'supposed to' look for it for about 1 business day, if it becomes available, they'll send it to you; if not, they'll send the next think on your queue that is available. You can have it sent to you even if the status says Wait, because it might be checked in, then immediately sent to someone who shows it in Wait status. I generally check my queue when I'm expecting something, and if something is on Wait status, I'll move something else to the top, I usually don't want to wait, and there's enough stuff on my queue that's Available that's not a problem.
I don't know, if there are say 100 people with Movie X that's VLW, when a copy gets checked in, how NF decides who gets it. It might be random, or more likely, they give it to the person who's rented less stuff recently [that would be more 'fair' in my mind.]

Chew

I've been with Netflix under the "8 out at a time" plan for nearly a year and never have a problem getting anything. I think I've had about a half dozen titles over the period that have been anything but "available now". And it only lasts 3-4 days tops. We're talking main-stream releases too, not obscure "b" titles.

Does being in the upper Midwest have something to do with that? Not nearly as many customers in my area maybe?

Gallant Pig

I'm in Minneapolis close where the Minneapolis hub is.

It's weird, seems pretty title specific. I always get new releases, sometimes on the tuesday they come out if I time it right.

The ones I'm speaking of are the video compilations that have just come out, The Work of Director Chris Cunningham, Spike Jonze, etc.

When they first came out they had them in right away. I figured, "nobody will rent this right?" and saw them go from short delay to very long wait in a matter of days.

I might try the trick about only having them in, but it'd be a pita since I have like 100 things in my queue, it's just I'm most interested in seeing those right now.

Other oddball stuff has been "very long wait" for quite a while, like "holes" and Pride FC: Grand Prix Finals: Disc 1.

Estimated

Here is a theory floated around these parts resently. Basically it asserts that new members get better access to popular titles than longer term members.

http://dvd-rent-test.dreamhost.com/