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The critical role of customer forgiveness in successful service recovery

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  • Harrison-Walker, L. Jean

Abstract

Service failures occur when the service provided is less than adequate or fails to live up to the customer's expectations. When service failures inevitably occur, providers implement recovery strategies such as apologizing, offering compensation, or allowing customers to voice their concerns. However, such strategies do not always lead to desired outcomes such as repatronage intentions, reduced negative WOM, or reconciliation. The current research explores the very rich concept of forgiveness with regard to service recovery and empirically examines the links among recovery strategies, customer forgiveness and recovery outcomes. Although differences in terms of optimal recovery strategies depend on industry type, forgiveness is demonstrated to mediate the relationship between recovery strategies and desirable outcomes, suggesting that forgiveness be included in all future models of service recovery.

Suggested Citation

  • Harrison-Walker, L. Jean, 2019. "The critical role of customer forgiveness in successful service recovery," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 376-391.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jbrese:v:95:y:2019:i:c:p:376-391
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jbusres.2018.07.049
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    15. Harun, Ahasan & Rokonuzzaman, Md, 2021. "Pursuit of loyalty in service recovery: The roles of brand equity and cognitive reappraisal as moderators," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    16. Bozkurt, Sıddık & Gligor, David, 2021. "Distinguishing between the impact of social media public and private compliments on customers’ future service recovery expectations," Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services, Elsevier, vol. 60(C).
    17. Hyun-Kyung Choi & Sang-Soo Kim & Bum-Seok Kim, 2023. "Perceived Justice and Customer Loyalty in the Situation of Beauty Service Failure," SAGE Open, , vol. 13(4), pages 21582440231, December.
    18. Wei, Chuang & Liu, Maggie Wenjing & Keh, Hean Tat, 2020. "The road to consumer forgiveness is paved with money or apology? The roles of empathy and power in service recovery," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 118(C), pages 321-334.
    19. Koc, Erdogan & Hatipoglu, Sercan & Kivrak, Oguzhan & Celik, Cemal & Koc, Kaan, 2023. "Houston, we have a problem!: The use of ChatGPT in responding to customer complaints," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 74(C).
    20. Shuqair, Saleh & Pinto, Diego Costa & Mattila, Anna S., 2019. "Benefits of authenticity: Post-failure loyalty in the sharing economy," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 1-1.
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