Customer Satisfaction in the Property and Casualty Automotive Insurance Industry

Abstract

This study addresses the important issue of service quality and customer satisfaction in the highly competitive property and casualty (P & C) insurance industry. Automotive dealers and related customer groups were surveyed about their perceptions of the service quality they received from their P & C insurance companies, and about their intentions to change carriers.

Strong relationships were found between intention to change the carriers and all dimensions of service quality. No statistically significant relationships were found between the length of coverage and service quality dimensions. The findings suggest that consistent delivery of high quality service is imperative to retain customers and that the customers' loyalty toward the company is short lived at best.     

Diagnosing service quality using customer reviews: an index approach based on sentiment and gap analyses

Recognizing the importance and potential benefits of customer reviews as a source of the voice of customers, this study proposes an analytic framework and procedures for analyzing customer reviews—termed a customer review-based gap analysis—that are tailored to diagnosing service quality. To this end, we conduct sentiment analysis on customer reviews to capture customers’ perceptions and expectations at the service-feature level, which are not expressed explicitly in their reviews. A case study of a mobile navigation service shows that the customer review-based gap analysis can provide the practical information required to diagnose service quality from customer review data. The suggested indexes for capturing customers’ perceptions and expectations reveal quality strengths and drawbacks at the service-feature level. In addition, incorporating these indexes into those for quality performance and objectives based on a service-feature hierarchy provides a diagnostic tool capable of examining service quality in both overall as well as detailed aspects.     

The Effect of Cultural Distance on International Marketing Strategy: A Comparison of Cultural Distance and Managerial Perception Measures

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this article is to examine whether service convenience increases customer satisfaction that fosters customer loyalty in Indian commercial banks. A cross-sectional study of 352 retail banking customers through questionnaires was conducted. The population of the study is retail urban customers of banks in Rajasthan. Responses are analyzed using structural equation modeling. Dimensions of service convenience are decision convenience, access convenience, transaction convenience, benefit convenience, and postbenefit convenience. Decision convenience was found to influence customer satisfaction more than the other dimensions of service convenience. Customer satisfaction furthers customer loyalty. The article emphasizes the significance of SERVCON on customer satisfaction for the Indian banking sector. The direct impact of SERVCON on customer loyalty is also studied.     

Hospice Informal Caregivers' Perception of a Good Death Experience: A SERVQUAL Analysis

ABSTRACT

This research study explores hospice informal caregivers' perceptions of service quality and a good death experience during end-of-life care. It demonstrates how service dimensions of the SERVQUAL analysis affect overall customer satisfaction. This study addresses contrast and dissonance theory as relative to marginal gaps in actual service performance and the effect on overall customer satisfaction. The research indicated that while reliability was the core of the service outcome, peripheral variables (e.g., assurance, empathy, responsiveness, and tangibility) integrated emotions and feelings into the hospice service process that equated to a positive disconfirmation of expectations and a good death experience.     

The development of service quality dimensions for internet service providers: Retaining customers of different usage patterns

This study examines the relationships among relevant service quality dimensions of Internet service providers (ISP) and their customers’ perceived value, trust and commitment. Data was collected from residential Internet users in Thailand. The final usable sample size was 1507. The analyses include segmenting ISPs’ customers on the basis of their usage pattern and evaluating their perceptions of Internet service quality dimensions. In addition, several alternatives models were compared using structural equation modelling to confirm the mediation effects. An ISP’s service quality is influenced by the following four dimensions (a) network quality, (b) customer service and technical support, (c) information quality and (d) security and privacy. The findings reveal that while all dimensions have positive effects on trust, only network quality, information support and privacy influence customer value significantly and information support is the only dimension which is directly related to commitment. Additionally, the effects of customer service and information support on value vary across customers of different Internet usage patterns. The contribution of the present paper stems from the simultaneous modelling of a range of mediation effects which can better help explain the impact of service quality dimensions on customers’ cognitive and affective evaluations in high-tech service settings.     

Validating Restaurant Service Quality Dimensions

Abstract

Service-based industries such as hotels and restaurants are spending a tremendous effort to measure and improve the service quality of their businesses. Service quality is one of the key factors in achieving competitive advantages in the restaurant industry since high service quality presumably results in increased customer satisfaction, and thus increased future patronage. The purpose of this study was to examine the two generic service-quality dimensions: physical quality and staff behavior/attitude in restaurants by employing the confirmatory factor analysis approach. The findings indicated that the two-factor model of restaurant service quality was successfully validated and also, the predictive accuracy of the model was established.     

Are Variety-Seekers Bad Customers?

SUMMARY

Variety-seeking behavior occurs if customers derive utility from a change of service providers. It has negative consequences for the firm's profits, because it functions as a moderating factor in the relationship of customer satisfaction and customer loyalty. Even by offering high service quality variety-seekers cannot be retained. Therefore variety-seekers are often seen as “bad” customers, because they are not loyal to the firm. This article will show variety-seeking behavior in a more positive light. Variety-seekers are satisfied customers and therefore they are likely to engage in positive word-of-mouth communication. Recommendations will help to attract new customers and thus increase profits.     

Service Quality Perceptions of Customers About Mobile Telecommunication Services: A Case of India

ABSTRACT

 Because of the intangible nature of services, there is always a challenge in front of service providers to find out which dimensions of service quality are more important for customers. The author presents the results of a study in India that assesses the service quality perceptions of customers about mobile telecommunication services. EFA explained 69.694% of variance and extracted eight service quality dimensions. The results of a multiple regression analysis show that customers attributed the highest importance to employee performance followed by transmission quality, competitiveness, support attributes, reliability, credibility, operational efficiency, and convenience. The sample consisted of 411 respondents.     

服务质量构成要素对顾客满意影响力差异研究--现有顾客同潜在顾客间的比较

本研究通过对银行服务业现有顾客样本和潜在顾客样本的比较分析发现:两种不同类型的顾客样本分析结果都显示服务互动质量和结果质量要素对顾客满意都有显著正影响,顾客满意对(重复)购买或口头传播等行为意向有积极效应。物理环境质量对顾客满意的显著影响效应只是在潜在顾客样本中发现,而在现有顾客样本中并不显著。现有顾客样本的分析结果显示三方面服务质量要素对顾客满意的影响力是有显著差异的,而对于潜在顾客样本,三方面的服务质量要素对顾客满意的形成所起的作用没有显著差别。     

Minding the competition: The drivers for multichannel service quality in fashion retailing

PurposeConsumer purchasing behaviour has changed substantially in the light of recent developments in E-Commerce. So-called ‘multichannel customers’ tend to switch retail channels during the purchasing process. In order to address changing consumer behaviours, multichannel fashion retailing companies must continue to learn how to provide excellent service to such customers. Drawing on expectation confirmation theory, this paper investigates drivers for service quality from the perspective of multichannel fashion customers.Design/methodology: This paper approaches the topic of multichannel service quality by adopting a social constructionist research paradigm, utilising an abductive approach and an embedded case study research strategy. It aims to explore the lived experiences and perspectives of individuals in the context of an evolving complex and multidimensional phenomenon. The paper seeks information-rich cases and therefore views service quality through the eyes of experienced German multichannel customers. A customer perspective helps to explain the phenomenon of multichannel service quality and helps to disclose the meaning that these customers give to it. The sample size for this research consisted of 18 in-depth interviews and two focus groups including ten focus group participants. As such, a process of methodological triangulation was followed.FindingsIntegration quality is identified as the essence of competitive advantage for multichannel retailers. The paper conceptualises integration quality as a catalyst, which plays a supporting role in reinforcing the reactions of the physical and electronic service quality in order to provide an optimised service quality experience.Originality/valueThis paper looks at retailer/customer interactions in the context of purchases of a fashion product at a retailer using different retail channels. It highlights the distinctive requirements of multiple-channel systems within which the focus should not only be to enhance and improve physical and/or electronic service quality, but must also be about the integration of the service offers of each channel. The paper contributes to the interpretation of multichannel service quality with a new concept that explains the phenomenon from the perspective of customers.     

Examining the Customer Experience of Using Banking Chatbots and Its Impact on Brand Love: The Moderating Role of Perceived Risk

In today’s digitally enabled world, banks offer chatbots to improve customer service. This research looks at chatbots as a form of an information system. It observes the effect of the three quality dimensions of the information system success model on customer experience, further leading to love for the bank brand. As chatbots are a new technology platform, consumers may find some risk in its use. Hence, the moderating role of perceived risk between the three quality dimensions and customer experience is also observed. The survey method was employed to conduct the study. Data were collected from 258 respondents. The results provide a definite direction for banks to strengthen the consumer–brand relationship by offering chatbots suiting their customers’ expectations.     

Customer Orientation of Service Employees—Toward a Conceptual Framework of a Key Relationship Marketing Construct

Abstract

Although customer orientation is a core element of the marketing concept and is especially crucial to the concept of relationship marketing, no widely accepted conceptualization of the construct exists. In the context of service organizations, the fulfillment of customer needs and wishes by customer-contact employeescan be seen as crucial for gaining a high degree of customer orientation. This paper develops a conceptualization of service employee customer orientation which is presented as a three-dimensional construct, the interrelated dimensions being the employee's motivation to serve customers, his or her customer-oriented skills, and his or her self-perceived decision-making authority. Implications are drawn out for relationship marketing of services organizations and relationship marketing theory.     

Differences in Customers’ Online Service Satisfaction Across Cultures: The Role of Thinking Style

ABSTRACT

Online retailers constantly strive to improve customer satisfaction. However, satisfaction levels can vary significantly across cultures when customers experience mixed quality services, that is, services with a mixture of high and low quality service attributes. Based on two studies, we find that Westerners (e.g., European Americans) react more negatively than East Asians (e.g., Chinese) toward mixed quality online services. Our findings show that due to differences in thinking style, Westerners (analytic thinkers) are more likely to focus on negative service attributes than East Asians (holistic thinkers), who tend to consider the amalgam of high and low quality service attributes as an integrated whole when forming their overall perceptions and levels of satisfaction. Moreover, the results suggest that for online retailers marketing across cultures, providing superior quality on each individual service attribute may be more important to achieving satisfaction for customers from Western rather than Eastern cultures.     

Receiving,Recording, and Responding to Customer Complaints: The Effects of Formalizing Customer Complaint Handling Policies in Retail Firms

ABSTRACT

Given the critical need for retail firms to provide high quality customer service and satisfaction, this article investigates the importance of formalizing customer complaint handling policies and procedures with regard to its relationship to the ways in which retail companies receive, record, and respond to customer complaints. A survey of 184 firms from the retail environment of a midsized community reveals that the existence of such formalized procedures is significantly associated with firm size, better channels of communication with customers, mechanisms of recording customer feedback, and better-trained employees, which have been shown to relate to higher firm performance.     

The Climate for Service

SUMMARY

We develop a framework in which internal employees' diagnoses of their firm's service climate determine their role behavior towards customers and, ultimately, customer satisfaction, loyalty, retention and shareholder value. Elements of the framework include: (1) foun dation issues (fundamental human behavior issues like the presence of necessary resources and the quality of leadership), (2) internal service (the quality of service employees report they receive internally from others), (3) service climate (the degree to which management emphasizes service quality in all of its activities), and (4) customer-focused service behavior. How this research is done is reviewed and research supporting elements of the framework is described. How the approach can be adapted for promoting CLV goals is explicated and answers to some frequently asked questions about change to an organization with a service quality and CLV focus are described.     

Zone of tolerance for banks: a diagnostic model of service quality

Service quality has become an increasingly important factor for success and survival in the banking sector. Provision of high-quality service aids in meeting several requirements such as customer satisfaction and its consequent loyalty and market share, soliciting new customers, financial performance, and profitability (Cui, C.C., Lewis, B.R., & Park, W. (2003). Service quality measurement in the banking sector in South Korea. International Journal of Bank Marketing, 21(4), 191–201.). This paper presents the bank service quality measurement in its extended form. It deals with the concept of ‘zone of tolerance’ in judgments of service quality proposed by Zeithaml, Berry, and Parasuraman (1993, The nature and determinants of customer expectations of service. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, 21(1), 1–12.). The ‘zone of tolerance’ is recognized in the service quality literature as representing a range of expectations and an area of acceptable outcomes in service interactions. The present study describes the zone of tolerance for young customers’ service expectations and determines the customer satisfaction level for banks. The study focusses only on the youth market to formulate long-term strategies because young customers tend to keep themselves up to date with latest technological developments. A conceptual model BANKZOT is presented in this study, and the results demonstrate that evaluation of services can be scaled according to different types of expectations – ‘desired' and ‘adequate’ – and that customers use these two types of expectations as a comparison standard in evaluating bank services. The findings reveal that young customers have a narrow zone of tolerance with regard to the services provided by the banks. The results with respect to gap analysis reveal that there was a shortfall in the service quality provided by the banks in the sample, with the largest gap being found in tangibles and empathy of service quality dimensions. The results of exploratory factor analysis reveal that the SERVQUAL model is found to be uni-dimensional in this study. The results, managerial implications, and future research implications are discussed in detail.     

Customer Satisfaction with Consumption Systems

ABSTRACT

Purpose: This research examines how satisfaction toward a product and its associated services offered together by a single provider jointly affects behavioral intentions toward the provider.

Design/methodology/approach: In this study, empirical tests were conducted using longitudinal data spanning 5 years from a multinational company that offers both products and associated services as part of a consumption system to their customers.

Findings: Results show a joint congruent effect of product and services satisfaction on behavioral intentions is linear and positive. It appears that offering great service cannot compensate for less-than-adequate satisfaction toward the product. The results further highlight decreasing customer sensitivity to improvements in both sources of satisfaction and imply that focusing on too high levels of one type of satisfaction for their customers can actually be counterproductive for firms.

Research Limitations: Our model was tested using the data obtained from a single firm. Future research could test this model with data from multiple firms in various different industries and establish broader generalizability to the findings.

Practical Implications: Findings provide managers with insights on how to allocate resources across product and service spaces and to manage product and services revenues over time. Results also indicate that customer behavioral intention ratings are more weighted on product quality over the service received by them. However, mere improvements in the product cannot provide the highest desired results and therefore quality improvements in the product need to be complemented by improvements in service quality.

Originality/Value: There is a rapid emergence of the phenomenon of manufacturers providing both products and services as an integrated consumption system to their customers. While the provision of both product and service subsystems by the same firm leads to certain synergies, there are obvious costs to the development of new service capabilities and coordination with existing product capabilities. Our research intends to address this issue.     

Predicting satisfaction and intentions to use online food delivery: What really makes a difference?

ABSTRACT

Online food delivery (OFD) is no longer a new concept for the majority of Americans. Large food delivery companies make millions in revenues and those numbers are expected to increase. This study was conducted to investigate customer intentions to use OFD services through the evaluation of satisfaction, food quality, and OFD service quality. The OFD service quality was assessed via e-SELFQUAL dimensions, and included perceived control, service convenience, customer service, and service fulfillment. The study determined that food quality, control, customer service, and service fulfillment affect customer satisfaction in online food delivery services. Customer satisfaction showed a strong positive impact on behavioral intentions to use OFD.     

A New Look at the Antecedents and Consequences of Relationship Quality in the Hotel Service Environment

Abstract

As economic conditions improve, hotels are investing in new ways to improve service quality and perceived value that hopefully will lead to better customer satisfaction and loyalty. This study took a new look, with newly developed scales, at the antecedents and consequences of relationship quality in the hotel service environment to shed new light on the factors hotels have to deal with to achieve their objective of satisfied and loyal customers. Using a structural equation model, it was determined that the tangible and intangible factors of perceived value, timeliness, and hotel facilities are antecedents of hotel quality. Hotel quality, subsequently, is a determinant of both customer satisfaction and loyalty. However, consistent with previous research, customer satisfaction is not a guarantee of customer loyalty.     

Empowerment and Customer Satisfaction Strategies in Multi-Cultural Hotel Restaurant Environments

ABSTRACT

The paper addresses empowerment issues for hotel restaurant managers, as they affect: (a) quality service, (b) customer satisfaction, and (c) financial implications. It investigates empowerment in restaurant management in Dubai five star hotels, how managers operating in Dubai's multi-cultural environment perceive empowerment in their operations, and how this perception relates to their organization's quest for service quality, customer satisfaction, and financial return. Primary data was collected in focus group interviews with (n = 24) managers. Findings suggest managers are well informed, see empowerment as beneficial, support its application, but harbour some concerns, and as literature suggests, there are ambiguities and disagreements over its application.