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Desk-rejection, or not?

In our newest "how can we help you?" thread, a reader asks:

I don't know if I got a desk reject. I submitted to a journal that uses email submission, so no way track. They replied with a receipt acknowledgement and then said due to volume they can't comment on all submissions. Then, there was a lengthy restatement of journal policy (from the website) about maximum word count, which didn't apply to my submission since it was below that word count.

That was about 5 months ago. The issue is, according to the APA Journal Survey, they tend to make decisions within 4 months. 5 months isn't unheard of for them, but it is fairly rare.

I'm wondering if they kindly desk rejected me and I didn't realize it. I don't really want to contact the journal, because I'm a firm believer in contacting the journal is a very quick way to get rejected.

Any thoughts?

This seems like a boilerplate acknowledgment of receipt of the paper. Although some journals can have relatively consistent turnaround times, it's entirely possible to be an outlier. If I were the OP, I'd either wait to send an inquiry to the journal. Finally, while I too have worried whether contacting a journal may lend itself to rejection, I've heard from others that this worry may not be apt–so I'm not sure whether it's right to be a firm believer that contacting a journal is a quick way to get rejected.

What do readers think?

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4 responses to “Desk-rejection, or not?”

  1. Corvus splendens

    I’d agree with Marcus that what OP received was a standard acknowledgment of receipt, based on the info we have. I also use the APA survey to look at decision times, but generally only for comparison between journals as the absolute numbers can be so coloured by reporting bias etc.
    I’ve never found that chasing a submission has (obviously) led to its rejection. But if that worry persists for OP even after discussion here then why not leave it another month before chasing; 6 months seems like a juncture most people would say it’s acceptable to chase at.

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  2. anon

    I would encourage the OP to reach out before too long. While I’ve had good interactions with one journal that runs things by email, I’ve had multiple other ones “lose” submissions, which has caused me to learn towards journals that use editorial management websites.
    (Not that these ones never loser papers, sigh/lol, but it seems a little better.)

    Reply
  3. Markos Valaris

    What a stressful situation!
    Although I don’t know what journal you are talking about, it’s extremely unlikely that an enquiry as to the current status of the submission would lead to rejection. In all likelihood you query would be handled by an editorial assistant anyway, without anyone in a decision-making position involved at all. If it’s been five months with no decision definitely contact them.

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  4. vote for emailing the editor

    For what it’s worth, in the past few years I’ve had I think 3 different papers that were unusually delayed at various stages of the process. In each instance I contacted the editor/journal, sometimes multiple times. In each case I ultimately received a message from the editor apologizing for the delay and explaining that some type of internal issue or oversight occurred. Each of these papers is now published at the same journal.
    I do think one should contact the editor if a paper reaches the 5-6 month mark without an initial decision. Just write a quick polite note to make sure your paper hasn’t gotten lost. Journal editors often seem to be overwhelmed and sometimes submissions get lost or they forget to send a notification.
    It could be that people have received desk rejects after making such inquiries, but I’d assume that’s because the editor had decided to desk reject and forgot to send the message. I personally find it doubtful that editors are rejecting papers merely because the author made use of the contact form.
    I also agree that what the poster received was not a desk reject based on the provided description. Rejections are usually short and always include “we regret to inform you” type language.

    Reply

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