Citation
(2014), "Executive summary of “The CURE scale: a multidimensional measure of service recovery strategy”", Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 28 No. 4. https://doi.org/10.1108/JSM-06-2014-0199
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Executive summary of “The CURE scale: a multidimensional measure of service recovery strategy”
Article Type: Executive summary and implications for managers and executives From: Journal of Services Marketing, Volume 28, Issue 4
This summary has been provided to allow managers and executives a rapid appreciation of the content of the article. Those with a particular interest in the topic covered may then read the article in toto to take advantage of the more comprehensive description of the research undertaken and its results to get the full benefit of the material present.
Even the best of companies are likely at some time to let down their customers with a service delivery mistake. They may do all within their power to avoid it, but failure often happens to even those with the best of intentions. So it is imperative that every company has a successful service recovery strategy in place. But how do you prepare for the unknown?
Successful service recovery may rely on a number of individual strategies, such as facilitating the lodging of complaints, ensuring rapid response in addressing the failure and resolving the problem. Although firms widely implement some service recovery strategies (such as apology or compensation), several others (such as explaining the source of failure or following up on the resolution of the customer’s problem) are less known, and therefore seldom implemented. This is unfortunate, as a company could harness these seldom-used courses of action as sources of differentiation, making the company noted for its unique and superior service delivery, and, in particular, its customer complaint handling.
Understanding the full spectrum of service recovery actions that are part of the overall service recovery strategy is important in helping employees to decide on an effective course of action. Often, however, firms carry out ad hoc responses which are not based on an overall recovery strategy, and as such are not as effective as they could be. In addition, the actions the companies currently use are not necessarily the least expensive ones. The use of other equally effective but less-costly courses of action would help firms in planning their cost management.
Compensation does not appear to be as important in successful service recovery as previously argued. Consumers do not feel satisfied by mere compensation, but instead want firms to respond to their complaint and explain what happened. Compensation is probably insufficient because compensation does not mean that companies will change the way they treat people or change their practices. Compensation might be seen as more of a short-term solution that will not necessarily prevent the same failure from happening again.
In “The CURE scale: a multidimensional measure of service recovery strategy” Dr Rania Mostafa et al. develop a comprehensive, valid and reliable measure – the CURE scale – of all the major courses of action available to a company. They conclude that service managers need to answer several questions to guarantee that service failures and subsequent recovery are successfully managed, namely:
Do the company’s employees keep the customer informed of each step of the recovery process?
Do the company’s employees try to pacify the customer as soon as possible with the first available recovery action? For example, is compensation used as a short-term solution to the problem as a way of silencing the customer, instead of dealing with the problem and its causes in the long run? Or alternatively, a systematic approach is in place?
Do the company’s employees take responsibility for the problems created, and apologize for mistakes that were the company’s fault?
Dr Mostafa et al. demonstrate that, although such a range of service recovery actions are available, only a few of them really make a difference in the case of a service failure in the telecommunication industry which was the focus of their study. Findings reveal that problem solving, speed of response, effort, facilitation and apology are the ones that have an impact on the customer’s satisfaction with service recovery and thus should be the ones that should be prioritized by having resources allocated to them. The study, therefore, recommends managers of mobile phone companies to allocate capital to these five strategies instead of allocating resources to other strategies such as compensation which ultimately do not impact on satisfaction.
Results also show that actions speak louder than words. No matter how courteous the service employee may be, good manners are of no use if the service employee does not solve the problem. This means that firms should not only train their employees to take immediate action, but also empower them with the tools to do so.
Another finding is that, although customers may appreciate a follow-up, this will not contribute much unless the company solves the problem in a quick and an efficient manner. Instead of, for instance, writing follow-up letters or making follow-up phone calls, companies can use resources better by solving problems efficiently, facilitating the lodging of complaints, making sure the frontline employees make an effort while handling a complaint and apologizing to customers for the failure.
To read the full article enter 10.1108/JSM-09-2012-0166 into your search engine.
(A précis of the article “The CURE scale: a multidimensional measure of service recovery strategy”. Supplied by Marketing Consultants for Emerald.)