Latest review
First review round: 8.0 weeks. Overall rating: 1 (bad).
Outcome: Rejected.
Motivation:
At first, I was impressed by how quickly the review process appeared to be moving. However, I noticed that only one reviewer report had been provided in the first round. Following the major revision, I could see on the submission platform that the manuscript had been resent out for peer review and accepted by two reviewers this time.
As the journal is managed through the Springer platform, I was also able to see that neither reviewer had submitted their reports by June 18th. I contacted the editorial office to politely inquire whether a reminder could be sent to the reviewers. I received a generic response, and then, four days later, the manuscript was rejected without any reviewer reports or explanation being provided.
I am therefore confused about how the rejection decision was reached if the manuscript had been sent out for peer review and the reviewer reports had not yet been received. If the manuscript was ultimately considered unsuitable for publication, it seems that this decision could have been made before initiating another round of peer review which wasn't finalized.
