Journal title
Dur. 1st rev. rnd
Tot. handling time
Imm. rejection time
Num. rev. reports
Report quality
Overall rating
Outcome
Motivation:
I think the decision was a bit too drastic. Perhaps a proper review process would have help to improve the manuscript and its content. The positive point is that the decision took only a few days.
Motivation:
I found the entire process with this journal timely and reasonable. Although we had a positive outcome for the paper, if we had not had such an outcome, I could have easily revised and submitted elsewhere without losing much time because of their quick turnaround.
Motivation:
Initial review time was reasonable, but each subsequent period, which required evaluation of only the changes, was far too long. The 2nd revision required the addition of one panel to an existing figure and could have been evaluated in minutes to decide if it was satisfactory - instead, we waited 9 weeks. After the first 4 weeks, I made several inquiries to the editorial office (PNAS does not reveal the editor of the paper so there is no way to contact him/her directly) who told me they were following up. This went on for 4 more weeks (emails and eventually phone calls, trying to get a decision. Finally, in frustration, I contacted an editorial board member with whom I have a professional relationship and asked for advice on how to get a decision; he contacted the Editor in Chief and within 10 minutes I got a message telling me that the Board accepted the paper, and that the original editor would be informed of the decision. While we were obviously happy with the final outcome, the process took far longer than it should have based on the modest nature of the corrections made at each stage, and created significant anxiety due to uncertainty and concerns that we might get scooped due to the delay.
31.3 weeks
31.3 weeks
n/a
2 reports
Accepted
Motivation:
I think everything went well apart from the rather long wait for the first review response. Usually VSD does it within 2 months in my experience. One of the reviewers didn't leave any comments, but the other submitted a page of useful comments. Please be aware of word and figure limits when you publish with VSD as they might object to any exceedance in these respects if you don't give a motivation. On the other hand I managed to exceed the figure limit grossly as long as I gave a motivation.
Motivation:
This journal requires scripts of high quality. I suppose the rejection is because the script was not well-written and the most interesting point was not highlighted, so that the script seems not attractive. After a major revision, the work was published finally in Nonlinear Analysis, TMA.
Motivation:
rejected by the editor with no review. Rejection email written from a non-institutional email address (but rather a private company email address) with no relationship with J. Controlled Release, using subject line 'your submission'.
Email signed 'Editors, Journal of Controlled Release' (which editor??????).
I first thought this email was a prank.
Email signed 'Editors, Journal of Controlled Release' (which editor??????).
I first thought this email was a prank.
6.4 weeks
19.3 weeks
n/a
2 reports
Rejected
Motivation:
I submitted the manuscript in September and it went through two revisions before letting me know that is was not acceptable in March since it was not registered . This is something they could have put in their instructions for authors (like other journals) or they could have even have informed before sending it out to the reviewers or even after the first review (since I told them at this time that we did not register the study). We chose this journal since it did not state that this was a requirement for the journal. To take 7 months of time and 2 revisions is totally unprofessional and unacceptable. This was not a trivial waste of my time. I will not submit to this journal ever again. One of my friends had a similarly unprofessional experience.
Motivation:
The managing editor was professional, courteous and fair, the reviewers tough and demanding but the experiments they requested substantially improved my paper.
Motivation:
Three high-quality reviews (a bit delayed over christmas).
Friendly and responsive reviewer.
Friendly and responsive reviewer.
Motivation:
The decision was disappointing, and I do not agree with a large part of the reviewers criticism, but the Journal was fairly fast and professional on handling the MS.
Motivation:
This was an editorial board process rather than external reviewers. Reason for rejection was weak and showed ignorance about theoretical approaches.
Motivation:
Two reviewers finished the first reviewing process and created two reports within 3 months. These reports are nice, pointing out a serious problem and improving the quality of the script.
The revised version was sent to the same reviewer, so that the second reviewing process was fast.
The revised version was sent to the same reviewer, so that the second reviewing process was fast.
Motivation:
No reason was given for why it took four weeks to reject without sending to any reviewers. The manuscript was a good fit for the journal. Upon submission to a comparable journal, it was reviewed with minor edits and accepted for publication within a month.
Motivation:
Editors were polite in their rejection, but a 6 week wait time significantly affected my research time line.
Motivation:
We sent another manuscript and the immediate rejection time was 11 days.
Every time after 7 days I was sent an email where they apologised for a delay to the initial evaluation of our article and that they were working with the editors to ensure further delays to be minimised.
For me 11-13 days for an immediate rejection is an unnecessary time loss.
Every time after 7 days I was sent an email where they apologised for a delay to the initial evaluation of our article and that they were working with the editors to ensure further delays to be minimised.
For me 11-13 days for an immediate rejection is an unnecessary time loss.
Motivation:
Extremely fast and comprehensive review.There was a problem with the second reviewer and the Editor-in-Chief called time on this and have carried this out himself as Reviewer #2.
Motivation:
Though I hope this is not a common practice, I think nobody should experience such an unbelievable ignorance of managing editor to the mails asking about what's going on with the paper (mails sent 4 times after 6 months of silence) which ended with a short justification of rejection.
Motivation:
Timely response with valuable comments
Motivation:
I received three reviews, more or less dealing with different aspects of the manuscript so the review was very complete and helpful. Some of the comments came from more than one referee. I was positively surprised by the speed of the whole process, which took 5 weeks. I would definitely consider submitting again to this journal.
Motivation:
The reviews covered the whole acceptance spectrum, all mostly helpful. One suggested minor revision, another rejection (but actually suggesting some changes), the third one major revision but with only three comments, one of them we did not agree and justify it in the letter to the editor. We did the changes and got it accepted without major issues.
Motivation:
Responsible and timely handling of the manuscript.
Motivation:
It took more than a month to come up with
"This work
does not seem appropriate for a combinatorial journal and
in particular for JCTA
No explanation was given.
"This work
does not seem appropriate for a combinatorial journal and
in particular for JCTA
No explanation was given.
Motivation:
Had a profoundly terrible experience with the editorial process. The review took a long time because the editors wanted a reviewer with a lot of knowledge of the language - this is an excellent idea, and as such I really didn't mind the long turnaround time for the review. The decision was 'accept with minor revisions'; the one review could have been more rigorous, I felt, since it seemed to focus mostly on formatting and typos.
What made the experience unsatisfying was that the editor gave us many additional detailed comments, but only AFTER we had made the necessary revisions and submitted the revised version. These post-hoc comments were extremely unhelpful. As a result, it was 5 months between when the article was accepted and when it finally made it to the copy editor. I will probably end up submitting to the journal again in the future, but I'm already not looking forward to it.
What made the experience unsatisfying was that the editor gave us many additional detailed comments, but only AFTER we had made the necessary revisions and submitted the revised version. These post-hoc comments were extremely unhelpful. As a result, it was 5 months between when the article was accepted and when it finally made it to the copy editor. I will probably end up submitting to the journal again in the future, but I'm already not looking forward to it.
Motivation:
almost 50 days to rejection based on only single review
Motivation:
In the past couple of years many journals are finding it harder to find reviewers, especially in interdisciplinary subjects. Although almost all of them have jumped on the Open Access bandwagon to raise funds, they have cut back on the processing time by having junior and/or unqualified associate editors make quick decisions about whether to even send out papers for external review. This is not good for Science.