The Clute Institute

Clute Institute Complaint

Contact Information for Clute Institute:

***

The Clute Institute has taken $ 225.00 from me over the past 18+ months, and I have received absolutely no goods or services for the money I have spent. There are two instances of this:

1. On 20 November 2018 I submitted a manuscript for review and possible publication to the Clute Institute, and paid $ 75.00 to have this manuscript reviewed; I have the receipts to prove this. The name of the manuscript is “The Marketing Implications of Autonomous Driving Technology (ADT)” and the Clute Institute assigned number *** to the manuscript (which was submitted for possible publication to the Journal of Business and Economic Research).

On 20 November 2018 I received the following email from the Clute Institute:
This is confirmation that your manuscript entitled “The Marketing Implications of Autonomous Driving Technology (ADT)” has been sent to the editor of the Journal of Business and Economics Research for review. You can expect a response in January 2019.
Kindly use the reference number *** in all future correspondence.
Please let us know if you have any questions during the review process.
Today is 17 February 2020 and after having contacted the Clute Institute at least 10 times over the past 454 days I have received no review of this manuscript, even though Clute has had my money for well over 1 year. Here are the dates when I have contacted Clute about this manuscript:

Email on 18 Feb 2019 (3:54 pm)
Email on 25 Feb 2019 (9:45 pm)
Email on 4 Mar 2019 (7:26 am)
Email on 11 Mar 2019 (7:49 am)
Email on 18 Mar 2019 (7:47 am)
Email on 17 May 2019 (10:47 am)
Email on 8 Aug 2019 (7:52 am)
Call to Tracey (Clute Receptionist) on 19 Aug 2019 (10:20 am)
Call to Tracey (Clute Receptionist) on 11 Sep 2019 (11:20 am)
Call on Tracey (Clute Receptionist) on 27 Jan 2020 (12:10 pm)
Email on 30 Jan 2020 (12:34 pm)

I have copies of all of these emails to prove that the contact was made, as well as telephone records.

It is completely unacceptable that Clute would take my money and not provide the services that were paid for well over 1 year ago.

2. On 17 May 2019 I ordered two (2) hardcopies of the Journal of Business Case Studies (Volume 15, Number 1, 2019) from Clute, and paid $ 150.00 for these two hardcopies (and I have the receipts to prove the payment was made). To date, I have not received these hardopies, and have been promised that they would be shipped immediately on multiple occasions:

Email on 8 Aug 2019 (7:52 am)
Call to Tracy (Clute Receptionist) on 19 Aug 2019 (10:20 am)
Call to Tracy (Clute Receptionist) on 11 Sep 2019 (11:20 am)
Call on Tracy (Clute Receptionist) on 27 Jan 2020 (12:10 pm)
Email on 30 Jan 2020 (12:34 pm)

It has now been 276 days since I ordered these two hardcopy journals, which is completely unacceptable.

Overall it is highly problematic that Clute accepts payments from customers, but does not provide the goods and/or services which have been paid for (either 276 day ago, or 454 days ago, and counting). This is ridiculous; it is unethical (at minimum) and possibly illegal.