Q: What should I do if my revised submission's decision is delayed due to a senior editor?

Detailed Question -

I submitted a manuscript in July and got a minor revision decision in August, then re-submitted the revised manuscript immediately. After that, the status remained unchanged at “Editorial assessment” for about 4 months. I sent reminders twice, but received no response.

For my third reminder, I got a reply from the editorial office apologizing for the delay and saying that they had asked the senior editor to process my manuscript on priority but the senior editor hadn't repied yet. It's been one week since, but no progress has been seen so far.

I feel this is insincere on the part of the journal and frustrating for me. As I have already waited for a long time, I want to avoid withdrawing. Is it possible to send another email asking them to change the senior editor?

1 Answer to this question
Answer:

From my understanding, your last communication with the journal was about one week ago where you were informed that the senior editor will be reviewing your manuscript on priority. It is not uncommon for the journal review process to take 3-4 months. In cases when the manuscript is re-submitted after revisions, journal editors usually have 2 options: [1] They can either assess the revisions themselves and decide if they are adequate without sending it to the reviewers or [2] they can send the revised manuscript to the same reviewers who did the first review to check if they are satisfied with the revisions.

It is possible that your manuscript was initially sent to the same reviewers who did the first review and they were unavailable or were not able to complete the review. This could explain the delay of 4 months. After your email, the editor could have reassigned the review to a senior editor to expedite the process. Please do not worry since it has only been a week and the journal is responsive to your queries. I would recommend sending another reminder after 2 weeks requesting the process to be expedited. I would not recommend asking for a change in the senior editor since it might further delay the process. Since your manuscript is so close to getting published, it would not be advisable to withdraw and submit it to another journal as this would mean starting the complete journal evaluation process from scratch.

Since your manuscript only received minor revisions, chances of publication are high. The best thing you can do now is to be patient and follow up with the journal regularly.

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