What does the Research Status in the Referee Management Tool mean?

What does the Research Status in the Referee Management Tool mean?

The Research Status, which is displayed for each practice area and location you have submitted for on the homepage of the Referee Management Tool, reflects what stage we are at in relation to our research. There are three statuses that can be displayed in the tool: 

  1. To be startedyou will see this status before the Research Start Date. This means that research has not yet started for this section and that a researcher has yet to be assigned to it. At this stage, submissions and referees can still be amended or re-uploaded until research commences. Once a researcher is assigned to start work and is ready, they will move the section to ‘In Progress’ and no further changes can be made after this point. 

  1. In Progressyou will see this status appear on a section at any time after the Research Start Date, but before the Research End Date for the section. This status means that a researcher is assigned to the section and they are actively conducting research. This means they are reviewing submissions, emailing referees and conducting interviews and surveys. Research will remain in progress until the researcher has collected all the information they can in the time allotted. During the ‘In Progress’ stage, customers are encouraged to monitor the status of their referees and any actions that may be required to help Chambers reach them. You can inform your referees when Chambers has reached out and also check the statuses weekly or halfway through to send reminders to any referees that have not yet responded. 

  1. Completethis status will appear after the Research End Date for the section. It means research has finished for this section. The section will move to the Historic area of your RMT 20 days after the Research End Date shown. The researcher has completed their attempts to contact and collect feedback from as many referees as possible and has now moved on to a different section/research project. We cannot go back and conduct further interviews or request feedback at this stage, so we encourage customers not to follow up with their referees further after this point. The final status of referees will change to either ‘Contacted’ or ‘Unable to contact’ to give you a clear indication of the final results of our outreach to your referees.