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I'm a bit worried because one of my papers have been more than 2 months "with editor" status. It's a science journal (field: drug residue, food), from a famous editorial and impact factor 3.3. I'm used to 48h desk reject and I was wondering about the options of being so long with this status 1) very busy editor 2) my paper was forgotten 3) there is a mistake on the website

Oh, normally we have the option to send an e-mail to the assigned editor, but in this case there is only "view your submission".

Edit:

At the end it took 2 months but... We are under review!

Cape Code
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user11683
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  • It's possible your paper got stuck in the system, or it's just not updating properly. Talk to others who have submitted to that specific journal. If this is an anomaly you should contact the journal. – Daisetsu Feb 07 '14 at 05:01
  • The problem is that I have no others to ask ^_^U – user11683 Feb 09 '14 at 15:10

1 Answers1

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Times vary a lot between journals and, I believe, disciplines. Two months seems like a relatively long period to me but not unheard of. Out of your three reasons I would not opt for 2 or three depending, of course on the form for submitting manuscripts. If it is digital I am sure 2 and 3 would not be high on the list, if it is manual, by post or e-mail, then the likelihood is higher.

I think a busy editor is one possibility. It is not clear from your question if this is "with the editor" after submission or "with the editor" after review. If we consider the former, the most likely reason, in my experience, is that it has proven hard for the editor to get reviewers to accept to review. This occasionally happens to me and I can say that it has no clear relationship to the possible quality of the paper. In the case of the former (after review), the busy editor becomes a more likely candidate since the editor should study the reviews, decide on the faith of the paper, and possibly provide guidelines for your revisions.

If you have any indication, from for example peers, what typical handling periods are in the journal where you submitted your manuscript, you should definitely contact the journal to ask about the status of your submission. Such requests are commonplace (too common in fact) so try to assess if the two months is long or normal in the case of this particular journal before contact.

Peter Jansson
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  • Thank you very much for you quick answer, we are "after submission". Unluckily we don't have peers, it's first time in our department working in the field we submitted the paper my research is in the middle of 3 fields so, we just can wait and see how it goes! At least now I know that other people in other journals have been waiting for this period. – user11683 Feb 06 '14 at 12:47
  • Perhaps you could state the general field(s) in your question so that someone familiar with it/them can provide more of inside experience? – Peter Jansson Feb 06 '14 at 12:51