Can the Retailer’s ICT Enhance the Impact of Service Recovery Efforts on Customer Satisfaction?

Abstract

Service recovery remains a topic of considerable interest for both academics and practitioners. This paper aims to explore the relations between recovery efforts and causal attributions, satisfaction, and both conventional and online word-of-mouth, as well as the moderating role of information and communication technologies (ICT) on the relationship between retailer’s efforts and satisfaction with the service recovery. On a sample of 336 retail customers who experienced service failure, we use SEM and multigroup analysis. As a result of the data analysis, there is evidence supporting the positive impact of attributions and recovery efforts on satisfaction, and the influence of the latter on both conventional and online word-of-mouth. Furthermore, the moderating influence of technology in the “recovery efforts-satisfaction” relationship is evidenced. Practical implications for retail managers and further research are presented.

Keywords:

• Service recovery efforts
• attributions
• ICT
• satisfaction
• word-of-mouth

Additional information

Funding

This research has been financed by the Vice-chancellorship of Research and Science Policy of Universitat de València (Project ref.: UV-INV-PRECOMP13-115370), and by the Spanish Ministry of Economy, Industry and Competitiveness’s R&D Program (Project ECO2017-83051-R).