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Keywords:
Service failure,
sevice recovery,
justice perceptions,
customer value,
customer loyalty,
customer exit
Francis Buttle
Macquarie Graduate
School of Manage-
ment, Macquarie Uni-
versity, Sydney, NSW
2109, Australia
Tel: +61 (2)9850 8987
Fax: +61 (2)9850 9019
e-mail:
francis.buttle@
gsm.mq.edu.au
ACADEMIC PAPERS
Does service failure in¯uence
customer loyalty?
Received (in revised form): 18th July, 2001
Francis Buttle
is Professor of Managment (marketing, and customer relationship managment) at
Macquarie Graduate School of Management, Macquarie University, Sydney. Francis
has nearly 30 years' experience in marketing management, education, consultancy and
research. He has lived and worked on three continents: Europe, Australasia and North
America and has published nearly 200 items, including three books. His most recent
book is an edited volume on the theory and practice of relationship marketing. He is
currently writing one book on CRM, and co-authoring another on Hospitality
Marketing. He has degrees in management science, marketing and communication.
His PhD is from the University of Massachusetts. His teaching and research interests
include customer relationship management, customer retention, service quality and
management in service industries. He is on the editorial boards of several journals
including the European Journal of Marketing, the International Journal of Customer
Relationship Management and the Journal of Marketing Management. He was a judge of
the ®rst international CRM Industry Awards. He has consulted for some 30 companies
and government agencies and joined Macquarie Graduate School of Management in
August 2001.
Jamie Burton
is the Littlewoods Post Doctoral Fellow at Manchester Business School. He completed
his PhD at Manchester Business School in 2001, having won the Yorkshire Water
doctoral scholarship. His research involves relationship marketing, loyalty and
development of a quality model for `product-dominated' industries that incorporates
product and image quality.
Abstract
There is a general consensus that customer loyalty to service providers is not solely
dependent upon their level of satisfaction or dissatisfaction. However, the identi®ed
antecedents of loyalty remain, at best, highly speculative. The aim of this extensive
literature review is to give some understanding of the nature of customer loyalty and the
antecedent effects of service dissatisfaction.
The research reviewed suggests that customer loyalty is an attitudinal state, re¯ecting
value, trust and commitment within supplier± customer relationships. Satisfaction is one
of several antecedents of loyalty. A key in¯uence on loyalty is the offer of unique value-
delivering advantages not provided by competitors. Thus ®rms need to develop positive
value-based exit barriers to achieve loyalty. When service failures occur, the recovery
process is likely to have a greater impact on loyalty than the original service failure. The
key to successful recoveries was found to be the customer's perception of `fairness'.
Recovery programmes must get it right ®rst time. Customers who remain dissatis®ed after
a complaint has been handled are more dissatis®ed than if no recovery attempt had been
made. Dissatisfaction and customer satiation are major causes of a customer's exit. The
solution to customer satiation is dynamic value creation. Collection and monitoring of
customer data is needed for success and two-way communication is vital.
Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 217±227 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817 217
RESEARCH METHOD
Database searches using InfoTrac in
conjunction with desk research of
existing known papers and media
contributions resulted in over 260
relevant academic, practitioner and
consultancy papers being identi®ed.
Additionally, over 270 market research
organisations with customer satisfaction
experience were approached in order to
request details of any relevant research.
UNDERSTANDING CUSTOMER
LOYALTY
Firms aim to cultivate repeat
transactions (`exchanges of value',
Gummesson 1995, p. 245) with
customers. The repetition of these
interactions over time leads to the
development of relationships between
®rms and their customers. Customer
Relationship Management (CRM) is a
cost/pro®t issue. It is generally believed
to cost more to gain a new customer
than it does to retain an existing one
(Blodgett et al., 1995: ®ve times as much;
Gummesson, 1994: ®ve±ten times). The
CRM agenda brings a long-term focus to
customer management (Gro
Ènroos, 1994,
p. 12) since it aims at generating
enhanced revenue streams from
customers over a lifetime of
transactions. CRM therefore aims to
achieve customer retention/loyalty
(Cross, 1999). Many researchers and
consultants, including Morris et al.
(1999), claim that intimacy,trust and
commitment are the cornerstones of
customer loyalty. To achieve this,
companies must learn continuously
about their customers: `The key to
customer retention is measurement ...
and by focusing on understanding
customer's needs' (Jamieson, 1994).
However, there is no consensus about
what exactly the term loyalty means, or,
indeed, how to measure it. One point of
view is that loyalty is simply another
term for customer retention; a customer
who continues to buy is a loyal
customer. However, Fay (1994) reports
the case of one retail organisation which
found that the customers it retained the
longest were actually the least pro®table
because of their strategic bargain-
seeking behaviour.
A second point of view is that
customer loyalty has an affective or
attitudinal component: `It's about having
had experiences of things that you feel
are important. Putting it in personal
terms, you build loyalty to your friends
through personal experiences you've
shared. Customer loyalty really is like
friendship' Ros Novotny, head of
customer relationship division, BRMB
(Woolgar, 1998). Researchers holding
this point of view point to the fact that
many customers continue to do business
with a supplier despite being dissatis®ed
with service performance. Inertia,
indifference, high switching costs and
the belief that all suppliers are equally
good (or bad) all account for high levels
of customer retention.
The importance of customer retention
is clear. Jamieson (1994) reports that a 2
per cent improvement in customer
retention has an impact on pro®t equal
to a 10 per cent reduction in overheads.
Bain & Co found that a 5 per cent
increase in customer retention raised the
value of each customer by 25±95 per
cent (Reichheld, 1996). Narayandas
(1998) identi®ed six bene®ts of customer
retention when retention is grounded on
strong positive attitudes to the service
provider/organisation: resistance to (1)
counter-persuasion, (2) competitors'
offers, (3) adverse expert opinion,
willingness to (4) wait for products to
become available, (5) pay a premium
and (6) recommend. It does seem that
repeat-buying behaviour grounded in
attitude is more powerful than
behavioural loyalty.
LOYALTY TYPOLOGIES
There have been a number of attempts
to develop typologies of loyalty. Dick
and Basu (1994) take the position that
loyalty has two dimensions: attitude
and behaviour. They identify four
distinct loyalty conditions: `true loyalty',
218 Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 217±227 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817
Francis Buttle and Jamie Burton
`latent loyalty' (low patronage/positive
attitude), `spurious loyalty' (high
patronage/indifferent or antagonistic
attitude) and `no loyalty', each re¯ecting
various mixes of attitude and repeat
patronage. True loyalty exists when
customers have both a positive attitude
to the service provider and exhibit high
levels of repeat patronage. Four
customer types have been identi®ed by
Knox (1998): loyals, habituals (routine
buyers, indifferent to their choice, more
likely to defect), variety seekers
(purchase depending on personal
circumstance/situation/event) and
switchers (no attachment to service
provider, pursue transaction deals/
discounts). The ®rst two are high-share,
generally high-pro®t customers
purchasing a narrow product range and
displaying loyalty. The retail multiple,
Boots, has linked loyalty card and
promotions data to four types of
customer behaviour: `deal seekers',
`stockpilers', `loyalists' who buy more of
an item when on special offer, and `new
market' who try a special offer and
continue to buy after the promotion
ends (Hoare, 2000). Finally, Pugh (1991)
identi®es four desirable characteristics
that make up the loyal customer: repeat
purchasing, cross-product/service
purchasing, referral/word-of-mouth
active and immune to competition.
SATISFACTION AND DISSATISFACTION
Ten years ago, customer satisfaction
was the key objective for marketers.
Oliver (1996, p. 13) offers the following
formal de®nition, which he claims to be
consistent with the theoretical and
empirical evidence to date: `Satisfaction
is the consumer's ful®lment response. It
is a judgement that a product or service
feature, or the product or service itself,
provided (or is providing) a pleasurable
level of consumption-related ful®lment,
including levels of under- or over-
ful®lment.'
Customer satisfaction is recognised
by researchers as a major antecedent of
their general attitude towards
organisations, and this, in turn, is an
important determinant of future
behaviour (Narayandas, 1998; Zeithaml
et al., 1996). Oliver (1999) concludes that
satisfaction is a `necessary step in
loyalty formation'. Bolton (1998)
conducted a very extensive quantitative
investigation of relationship duration
and satisfaction. In her study of the US
cellular telephone industry, she found
evidence that:
Ð supplier±customer relationships are
longer for customers having high
levels of cumulative satisfaction;
Ð experienced customers are less
sensitive to transaction failures
because of high prior satisfaction
levels;
Ð conversely, the positive effects of a
satisfying transaction are reduced if
the customers' historic experience is
of service under-performance or
failure; and
Ð the effect of prior cumulative
satisfaction on the duration of the
supplier±customer relationship is
greater for customers who have
more experience with the
organisation.
She concludes that there is considerable
heterogeneity across customers and that
they will have differing utility levels
associated with a particular service.
Additionally, there appears to be a
clear relationship between customer
satisfaction and word of mouth (WOM)
(Blodgett et al., 1995). In his review of
WOM research, Buttle (1998) identi®ed
one of the positive effects of satisfaction
as advocacy-based referrals of new
customers. Spreng et al. (1995, p. 17),
state that both satisfaction and
dissatisfaction have been found to be
antecedents of WOM.
Many researchers, however, have
identi®ed a discontinuity between
satisfaction and loyalty (Edwards et al.,
1994; Fay, 1994; Romano, 1995; the
Ogilvy Loyalty Centre, UK, cited in
Rosenspan, 1998; Wood, 1998; PA
Consulting, 1999; Harte-Hanks Market
Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 217±227 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817 219
Does service failure in¯uence customer loyalty?
Research, 1999). ` ``Satisfaction is an
inherently unstable and temporary
mental state'' and a poor way of
predicting customer retention'
(Frederick Reichheld quoted in Cash Jr.,
1996).
Romano (1995) suggests that 65±70
per cent of encounters that meet or
exceed the expected threshold of
customer satisfaction merely involve
hygiene factors, having no impact on
customer loyalty. In a business-to-
business survey, Fay (1994) found that
while over 70 per cent of companies
ranked price as the ®rst or second least
satisfactory issue, interviews with
switchers found that no more than 10
per cent had changed suppliers because
of price. Satisfaction, therefore, seems a
necessary, although insuf®cient, cause
of loyalty. Romano (1995), Cash (1996)
and Wood (1998) all claim that
customers may be satis®ed with the
current product/service offering, but
that loyalty is dependent upon the
supplier offering the best overall
customer value proposition (CVP).
VALUE
`We have moved from the phrase cheap
and nasty, through cheap and cheerful,
to cheap and chic as personi®ed by
IKEA. Now we are in the age of cheap
and clever, best illustrated by the
example of EasyJet' John Brady,
Director, McKinsey (Jardine, 1999). The
argument has been made that ®rms
should aim for customer delight rather
than mere satisfaction, through giving
unanticipated rewards. However,
meeting or even exceeding customer
expectations is not a great predictor of
future behaviour. It is suggested that
®rms should be asking customers not
just about their satisfaction perceptions
but also about their value perceptions.
Masciarelli (1998) of Archer Consulting
suggests that the creation of value for
customers is one of three requirements
for long-term customer relationships
alongside communication and trust.
SERVICE FAILURE
A customer's attitude towards a ®rm
depends in part upon this perception of
value. The attitude is likely to
deteriorate if the cause of customer
dissatisfaction is inadequate customer
value. Bolton (1998) found that
consumer perception of losses
experienced during transactions reduce
relationship duration and that the effect,
in absolute terms, of a recent service
failure is greater than a recent service
transaction. The aim of `zero defects',
strived for in manufacturing, is more
dif®cult to achieve in a services context.
Complete standardisation of
interactions is hard to achieve, and
possibly undesirable. Furthermore,
customers acknowledge that in service
encounters which they help to co-
produce their own work may be the
cause of their own dissatisfaction. Many
customers will recognise and accept this
reasoning. Service failures are thus an
important issue, as is how ®rms remedy
them.
THE COMPLAINING PROCESS
Spreng et al. (1995) found that in both
positive and negative recovery
outcomes, recovery can take on greater
importance than the original service
failure (Berry and Parasuraman, 1993).
They state that outcome is the `primary
driver' of consumer evaluations of
service in initial encounters, but process
is more important during service
recovery. Blodgett et al. (1995) identify
two important forms of justice within
recovery: `distributive justice' (fair
settlement) and `interactional justice'
(polite and respectful treatment).
Blodgett et al. (1993 and 1995)
investigated the complaining behaviour
process. The 1995 study found that
dissatisfaction leads customers to seek
redress if they perceive a positive
likelihood of success but only if they are
the type of person who complains.
Stability and controllability of the initial
problem were also found to in¯uence
dis/satisfaction evaluations. Halstead
220 Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 217±227 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817
Francis Buttle and Jamie Burton
et al. (1996) suggest that a single genuine
failure can lead to further complaint on
other issues: a `halo effect'.
DISSATISFACTION Ð THE SILENT
MAJORITY
Even if a service ®rm adopts a policy of
recovery not all dissatis®ed customers
will give them the chance to recover.
Many simply take their custom
elsewhere (Blodgett et al., 1995). High
percentages of dissatis®ed customers do
not complain: 70 per cent (Jamieson,
1994, p. 12); 96 per cent, of whom 63 per
cent defect (Diamond, 1999 and
Michelsen, 1999). Studies suggest that
only 4 to 10 per cent of customers will
give ®rms the chance to correct a service
failure (Zemke, 1994; PA Consulting,
2000). Goodman and Ward (1993) and
Cash (1995) report that the majority of
complaints fail to reach the attention of
senior management. Many consumers
will feel that there is no point in
complaining as they perceive a low
likelihood of complaint success, or
cannot be bothered with the effort and
cost of complaining. In competitive
industries these customers are likely to
exit, and engage in negative WOM
(Blodgett et al., 1993; Etzel and
Silverman, 1981; Fornell and Wernerfelt,
1987; Spreng et al., 1995).
DEFECTION
Goodman and Ward's (1993) study for
the US Of®ce of Consumer Affairs
suggests that for every ®ve customers
who encounter a problem, one will be
lost for good. Non-complainers were
found to be the least loyal customers Ð
even more disloyal than complaining
dissatis®ed customers whose problems
were not resolved. Keaveney (1995)
conducted a study of 500 service
customers using a critical incident
technique (CIT). She identi®ed over 800
service-®rm behaviours that caused
customers to switch service providers.
These issues were coded into eight
general categories: pricing,
inconvenience, core service failure,
failed service encounter, response to
failed service, competition, ethical
problems and involuntary switching.
All except competition and involuntary
switching are directly controllable by
the service provider. Forty-®ve per cent
of switches were due to failure in only
one of these eight areas Ð the most
common being core service failures,
pricing and service encounter failures.
As a consequence of service failure, 75
per cent of customers had told at least
one other person, although only 7 per
cent told the original service provider,
and 85 per cent had switched. Dawe
(2000) reveals that the consultancy
eLoyalty has identi®ed a `churn
checklist' ranging from the obvious
service failures Ð for example, staff
rudeness and product failure Ð to more
relationship-orientated issues including
failure to recognise customers as
individuals or to adapt services to their
speci®c needs. Keaveney's (1995) study
also con®rmed that even satis®ed
customers switch service providers Ð
the main reasons being convenience,
competitor actions or price. Reill (1997)
suggests that 14±15 per cent of
switchers do so because their complaint
was not handled satisfactorily.
DEFECTION MODEL
Stewart (1998) identi®es three dyadic
descriptors of customer exit Ð
revocable or irrevocable, complete
termination or reduction of patronage,
and mutual or unilateral exit. Her
review of research into exit behaviour
suggested that exit is a process whose
nature is best captured by CIT and is
dependent upon a trigger activating the
exit process. Stewart (1998) cites
Andreason's (1988) claim that
consumers only take action over a third
of their problems and that 60 per cent of
this action would be voice as opposed to
exit. She lists a number of possible
explanations: exit may only occur where
dissatisfaction is extreme, customers
may see exit as a last resort, and, if a
relationship is of suf®cient quality,
Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 217±227 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817 221
Does service failure in¯uence customer loyalty?
customers may put up with some
dissatisfaction associated with discreet
incidents. Stewart (1998) suggests that
boredom and satiation may be possible
triggers to exit, but conversely habitual
behaviour can reduce exit risk. She
highlights the key determinants of
switching: a perceived decline in service
and thus satisfaction, the availability of
alternatives, the cost of switching
(barriers) and potential for, and
potential of, alternative behaviour.
CUSTOMER LOYALTY SCHEMES
It is questionable whether retailer
`loyalty' schemes in¯uence purchasing
behaviour and/or loyalty (Rowell, 1998):
`The reward should be the brand: what it
is, how it is relevant to the customer ...
customer loyalty is a by-product of a
robust and dynamic brand relationship,
which is built by rewarding customers
with what they want most: relevant
marketing offers, a satisfying purchase
experience and products or services of
high perceived value. That is better than
cashing in points' Rob Smith, Herndon
Customer Relationship Management
(Loro, 1998).
Tesco relies heavily on price promotions
as well as their loyalty scheme to
generate repeat patronage (Jardine,
1999). Customers may become loyal to
points systems rather than the service
provider (Woolgar, 1998) and senior
marketers' con®dence in such schemes
is falling (Gofton, 1999).
BUILDING CUSTOMER EXIT BARRIERS
One way of promoting customer
retention is to erect relationship exit
barriers. Aldisert (1999) calls for
companies to build exit barriers so that it
`costs' a lot for customers to leave. Firms
are advised to develop the customers'
sense of commitment to the organisation
and the belief that something is at risk if
they switch allegiance (Fisher, 1998).
Unpublished research conducted by one
of the authors suggests that companies
can develop three forms of attachment
which transcend mere satisfaction and
promote long-term relationships.
Instrumental attachment occurs when
customers believe that the organisation
excels at meeting their needs; relational
attachment occurs when customers form
emotional bonds with employees; and
values-based attachment occurs when
customers endorse the values of the
organisation. Exit barriers such as these
are based on positive customer
attachment.
SERVICE RECOVERY
A ®rm's approach to dealing with
consumer dissatisfaction can be
described as `defensive marketing' Ð
the protection of the existing customer
base (Fornell and Wernerfelt, 1987).
Service recovery methods include any
action necessary to return a customer
who has experienced service failure to a
state of satisfaction. Technology may be
a useful tool (Hart et al., 1990; Berkley
and Gupta, 1994).
RESPONSES TO FAILURE
It should be recognised that customers
are not always right (Bitner et al., 1994).
Customers cause 30 per cent of service or
product problems (Zemke and Bell,
1990). Etzel and Silverman (1981) suggest
four possible courses of action for dealing
with complaints (see Table 1). Spreng et
al. (1995) highlight the importance of
adequate service recovery techniques.
`Token' responses can be seen as unjust.
Two studies they cite reveal that only 30 ±
53 per cent and 50 ±67 per cent of
customers questioned were happy with
experienced service recovery.
SERVICE RECOVERY: FROM POTENTIAL
DEFECTOR TO LOYALIST
`More than half of all efforts to respond
to customer complaints actually
reinforce negative reactions to service'
Hart et al. (1990) cited in Spreng et al.
(1995, p. 16). Complaint handling, when
done properly, offers an opportunity for
developing customer loyalty. According
to various studies, the retention rate of
customers whose problems have been
resolved is 50 per cent (Goodman and
222 Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 217±227 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817
Francis Buttle and Jamie Burton
Ward, 1993), 95 per cent (Diamond,
1999), 70 per cent in Canada rising to 95
per cent for swift resolution (Hepworth
and Mateus, 1994).
Smith et al. (1999) concluded that
customers prefer to be recovered in ways
that `match' the failure they experienced,
both in the value and the form of
recovery. They investigated four
attributes of perceived justice Ð
compensation, response speed, apology
and recovery initiation Ð for the
in¯uence they exerted on customer
perceptions of `distributive',
`procedural' and `interactional' justice.
Zeithaml et al. (1996) tested the
conclusion of Bolton and Drew (1992)
that service failure can weaken
customer±marketer relationships even if
the problem is resolved satisfactorily.
Their multi-company study of customer
intention revealed that customers who
had experienced no service problems
had the strongest loyalty intention,
lowest switch and external response
intentions. Customers whose problems
had been resolved satisfactorily
expressed greater loyalty intention,
willingness to pay more and lower
switching intentions than those with
unresolved problems, but these
intentions were not as great as those of
customers who had experienced no
service problems. Similarly, Brown et al.
(1996) discovered that service
consistency had a greater impact on
customer satisfaction than service
recovery. Kelley et al. (1993) investigated
the effectiveness of various service
recovery techniques for customers of US
retailers in the light of identi®ed service
failure issues (see Table 2). Customer
preferences were assessed on a ten-point
scale and retention rates were computed
for each type of recovery. The bottom
®ve recoveries have ratings below the
mid-point of the recovery scale
suggesting their inferiority.
ACHIEVING CUSTOMER LOYALTY
How is customer loyalty, based on
positive attitude, achieved? `82 per cent
Table 2 Recovery strategies and their success
Recovery category Recovery rating Standard deviation Retention (%)
Discount 8.86 1.70 86.4
Correction 8.81 1.70 96.3
Manager/employee intervention 8.42 1.44 75.0
Correction plus28.24 2.63 90.5
Replacement 7.91 2.76 87.8
Apology 6.75 2.99 77.4
Refund 6.48 3.43 81.5
Customer-initiated correction 3.83 2.48 50.0
Store credit 3.36 1.50 36.4
Unsatisfactory correction 2.57 1.50 62.2
Failure escalation 2.36 1.66 42.0
Nothing 1.55 0.94 31.0
Source: Kelley, Hoffman and Davis, 1993, p. 429
2`Correction plus' implies failure correction plus additional customer compensation. The lower rating
for this compared with `correction' only recovery arises because these incidents tended to be more
severe in nature.
Table 1 Complaint handling (Etzel and Silverman, 1981)
Action Scenario
Ignore them Low cost, possible for transient clientele.
Discourage complaints Communicate that service/goods are non-refundable. Possible
for low-priced goods.
Appraise each complaint on its own
merit
Possible where customer±supplier interaction discreet. Could be
used to target only pro®table customers or signi®cant service
failures.
Encourage complaining behaviour Satisfy all customers who complain. High-cost approach to
encourage long-term loyalty among all customers.
Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 217±227 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817 223
Does service failure in¯uence customer loyalty?
of customers whose problems are solved
buy again' (KPMG, 2000). `Only 4% of
dissatis®ed customers typically
complain. Yet, by being able to solve
problems effectively, 80% of customers
will stay, and by solving problems fast
and effectively, 95% will stay, sometimes
becoming more loyal' (PA Consulting,
1999). Geller (1997) identi®es 14
elements important in achieving
customer loyalty. The most signi®cant of
which are the quality/value of the
product and service, the impression or
image portrayed, the dynamism of the
organisation, communication and
achieving the unexpected for customers.
Fredericks and Salter (1995) simplify
these issues further, suggesting that
customer loyalty is determined by the
perception of value offered by the
marketer. They identi®ed ®ve main
components of the CVP: price, product
quality, service quality, innovation and
image. Their model suggests that
customer perceived value is in¯uenced
both by individual customer
requirements and characteristics, and by
the nature of the business environment.
Loyalty is thus not directly controllable
by the marketer. To their list might be
added other elements of the CVP:
process, people, physical evidence,
customer communication, brand and
reputation. Kandampully (1998) cites
Zeithaml and Bitner's (1996) claim that
customers will remain loyal if the
perceived value they receive is relatively
greater than that of competitors'
offerings. Loyalty is a reward given to
®rms that consistently identify and act
upon latent, unexpressed, customer
needs. Firms that ensure they have
accurate two-way communication with
customers will be better positioned to
adapt their offers (Schneider, 1997).
`Companies will never encourage a
relationship with a customer by
consistently getting addresses wrong or
opening their communication with Dear
Homeowner/Occupier' (Rowell, 1998).
Kandampully (1998) concurs that
being one step ahead of customer needs
and competitors is the key to loyalty.
Loyal relationships, where ®rms are
ef®ciently monitoring and collecting
information about customers, give ®rms
the ability to anticipate consumers' future
needs, allowing them to surprise and
delight customers. Delight reinforces
loyalty, thus the key is the dynamic
momentum involved in remaining ahead
of customers' needs (Oliva et al., 1992).
REACTIVATING CUSTOMERS
Geller (1997) suggests that customer
databases should be explored and
scrutinised to determine whether
customers might be considering
defection. Johnson (1994) stresses the
importance of knowing a customer's
repeat sales ratio (the average interval
between purchase occasions). He
claims that customers have a `reverse
horizon' just past the repeat sales ratio,
beyond which they will be lost to
competition if they are not re-activated.
KPMG (1999) see the development of
tools to identify at-risk customers as one
of the critical defensive marketing issues
for successful businesses of the future.
CONCLUSIONS
It is widely believed that achieving
excellent service performance is vital for
the survival of service organisations.
Dif®culties in achieving consistent
service quality, even where
relationships with customers have been
successfully developed, mean that
organisations may need to use service
recovery strategies. The ®rm must
create a powerful belief that, if
customers complain, they will receive
justice. There is scope for research into
how service recovery techniques affect
dissatisfaction and subsequent
behaviour/attitude.
In conclusion, customer loyalty is
thought to be dependent upon customer
perception of value. This will depend in
part upon customers' level of
satisfaction with current service but also
how well the supplier is innovating and
anticipating their next need. Customers
224 Journal of Consumer Behaviour Vol. 1, 3, 217±227 #Henry Stewart Publications 1472-0817
Francis Buttle and Jamie Burton
will evaluate dissatisfaction with
particular incidents with their suppliers
against their overall impression of the
value offered by that supplier, when
compared with competitors and the cost
to them of switching suppliers.
Repeated failures will contribute to a
reduction in value perception. They
may also become the triggers that focus
customers' attention on evaluating
service levels and value more closely.
Dissatisfaction alone, however, is not
the only antecedent of customer exit.
Loyalty has been found to depend upon
consumers' perceptions of value
dependent in part upon
communications leading to increased
trust. These relationships are
summarised in the service
dissatisfaction model shown in Figure 1.
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