How Do I specify a requirement for a word count?

I experience the same issue regardless of which prompt is used. Earlier this year articles produced were really nice, but now like it don’t respect the prompt. Instead of 1000 words it gives 300, 600 totally random but never correctly. I use v1.1.11.14 ChatGPT 3.5

I was considering to upgrade but this seems more like a ChatGPT issue than the prompt itself? Anyone else with the same issues, is there any way to fix it?