Is it time to address the state of editorial care at Frontiers?

Our team recently submitted a manuscript to Frontiers in Medicine (Translational Medicine section). Instead of a meaningful editorial assessment, we received an automated prompt requesting a desk transfer to Frontiers in Digital Health—a completely different scope for our work.

To make matters worse, it appears the Specialty Chief Editor of the section was not even notified about this decision.

Frontiers publicly claims that active scientists and editors manage their editorial decisions and content. But if the Chief Editor isn't even in the loop, who is actually making these calls?

It raises serious questions about their process:

Automated Triage vs. Scientific Oversight: Is content being evaluated by domain experts, or are algorithms and administrative staff overruling editors to shuffle papers around?

Value for APCs: Open-access giants charge thousands of dollars in publication fees. Authors deserve transparent, expert editorial oversight—not robotic shuffling between journals without the editors' knowledge.

Respect for Researchers' Time: Arbitrary, automated transfers waste months of authors' time just to keep submission metrics moving.

When profit margins and automated workflows take priority over real scientific evaluation, the whole academic community suffers.

Has anyone else noticed a sharp drop in editorial care and an over-reliance on automated desk transfers at Frontiers lately? How are you handling these issues?

#AcademicPublishing #PublishOrPerish #Frontiers #PeerReview #ResearchIntegrity #AcademicChatter