Elsevier Reviews 42

I paid a lot of money for a text book that advertised access to an enhanced digital version; however, when I entered the access code from the inside cover of the book, I received an error message indicating "Sorry--this code is no longer recognized". Unacceptable!

Where do you even start with a company this bad. The product that students have to use is just terrible, the support is aggressively bad, the prices are inflated for books that haven't changed in almost 20 years except for the edition number. Elsevier is bad for the very science written about in the pages of the overpriced textbooks.

The customer service quickly helped resolve my issue of accessing the online copy of a textbook I purchased.

Ordered a book that I needed for my studies and was told when I ordered that it was a print on demand title and would be ready to ship within 10 days.

10 days come and go and I query the status of my order to be told that it's actually on back order and out of stock and I will have to wait a further 2 weeks which is subject to change.

At no point is it made clear when ordering that items are out of stock, they will happily take your card details and issue your invoice but not communicate with you that the item is actually not in stock? When the agent told me this I checked the book on the shop again and, again, there was no information that it was out of stock.

Overall, very misleading shop. Absolutely no clarity about stock yet happy to take your order anyway. I won't be using them again.

cant seem to understand why there are bad reviews, but let me give them 5. no hate cause I was able to receive a good service from them.

Absolutely terrible company and customer support. Misleading access code support, would never recommend to anyone wanting to buy books. Purchased new book with access code that does not give you access to ebook, only useless summaries and a few practice questions. And the company is full of apologies but no help. Want another $150 to get access to an ebook when spent $150 on new book with access code that was expected to include the ebook. No where on the book or description does it say it does not include ebook. Miserable experience with this company. Full of misleading and false advertising and company does not care, just lip service, almost laughing in your face apologies. Horrible company

Absolutely amazing and understanding customer support. High quality, would recommend to anyone wanting to buy books.

company with two philosphies
First earn money - then, create barriers for science distribution as much as possible.

Pre-ordered a medical book Elsevier online in the UK at the beginning of March 2025 to be published in May 2025 … then delayed until 5 June 2025 … now towards the end of June 2025 Elsevier UK are unable to tell me when the book is to be available in the UK … meanwhile on amazon.com I could have the book (same ISBN) in stock sent to me in the UK by Thursday (2 days time) … what is their problem? … when asked, they apparently don’t know … big company … little substance … pull your finger out Elsevier!

Absolutely horrible company. They will take your money and run with it. Other reviewers concur.

Elsevier is a terrible company. It has taken over good products and Journals and made them unusable by non existent support services.
I use Compete Anatomy - an excellent program but since elsevier became involved cannot launch program.
The 'chat bot' does not work -ever. And the sign in system does not work at all. AVOID if you can

Bought books at Elsevier's bookstore at eu-elsevierhealth-com. Two days after purchase came extra bill to pay 25% moms/VAT. All other webshops in the EU have to advertise prices that include moms/VAT of the destination of the order. Unbelievable that a company of this size can be so unprofessional.

Terrible customer service and terrible decision to stop publishing Practice Update permanently. This keeps vital medical updates from lay citizens who have been benefiting from vital insights into medical developments!!! Shame on you Elsevier.

Bad customer service. Ordered a bundle of books for $475.00 there was no email saying order when through so ordered again the following day. Then all of a sudden both order when through. Call customer service Jennifer told me since it was an accident I would get a refund but since the books were on their way I’d have to send back( at my expense). They got the books back and only refunding me a partial refund because several books were ebooks. Jennifer didn’t tell me I wouldn’t be refunded for the ebooks, she failed to tell me that, she said since it was by accident that I wouldn’t get a refund not a parcel refund

I purchased Naturheilpraxis Heute - Lehrbuch and Atlas" from Elvira Bierbach , 7. Edition because it was advertised as usable both as a printed book and an e-book. While the content of the book is helpful, the e-book functionality falls far short of expectations.

The e-book code provided was invalid. Despite reaching out to the retailer, the publisher, the issue remains unresolved. Even after providing proof of purchase, the only response I received was vague statements like, “We would like to assist you further however,” followed by no real solution. Their only advice was to keep replacing the book—an impractical and frustrating approach.

The customer service was unhelpful, offering no meaningful support to resolve the issue. It appears I am not the only customer experiencing this problem, as similar complaints can be found on platforms like Amazon. If the e-book functionality is important to you, this issue and the lack of adequate support could be particularly disappointing.

We recently had a disappointing experience with the journal Energy. After submitting a manuscript that required only minor revisions, we chose not to include a particular author initially, in order to expedite the review process. Knowing that many colleagues have successfully added authors at later stages, we didn't foresee any issues. However, after resubmitting the revised version with the additional author, the journal rejected our paper outright, without any prior communication or explanation from the editorial team.

This decision, made solely on their judgment, felt unjust and unprofessional. We dedicated months to producing a high-quality piece of research, only to have our efforts dismissed in an instant. Furthermore, when we reached out to the editorial office for a clear explanation, they failed to provide a satisfactory response. This experience has left us questioning the professionalism of Elsevier's editorial practices and the transparency of their policies. We believe their management should reconsider such rigid policies that overlook the time and dedication researchers invest in their work.

Can't publish on any of their journals because most of their editors (from certain ethnicities I'm not gonna mention) don't forward my manuscripts.

Tried several times with them and either they reject paper in two days (can't believe they had time to read my 30 page manuscript and send me their template of "lacks technical depth"); or the paper is with editor for months, with any communication request I made being replied with bots that did not understand what I was asking for. Basically, I couldn't withdraw my paper to send it to other places...

When you sign up to publish with them, you are asked to input your nationality and such for buzzword purposes, but it's clear now they don't want to maintain ethics and equity, only filter out authors with legit works.
I can understand giving preference to minorities, but just straight ignoring the rest of authors is plain unfair, no matter how you try to justify. Any request I make to them requesting explanation as to why my work and messages are being ignored without explanation are not answered.

I'm seriously considering publishing through predatory journals, they seem more ethic in comparison to Elsevier.

BTW, their Data Protection page to request stuff like deleting your data (GDPR), accessing your data, or opting-out from spam is not working.

Don’t know why the reviews here are mostly so bad .
I ordered Anatomy book for my daughter which I have to take to Prague for her . I was so worried that I might not receive it before my flight after looking at the very negative reviews here . I called the customer service . My phone was attended immediately and the customer service representative, Michael, assured me I will get it in two days .
He was right , received my book today .
Amazing staff and service

dont order from here seems like a scam i ordered a book and it said order confirmed , weeks later it has still not arrived . i even received a tracking email, but could not find my order. tried emailing no reply , tried calling someone answered but didnt bother talking on the phone so i hung up. not happy