THE EFFECT OF SERVICE QUALITY AND EXPECTATIONS ON CUSTOMER COMPLAINTS*

A-Tier
Journal: Journal of Industrial Economics
Year: 2008
Volume: 56
Issue: 1
Pages: 190-213

Score contribution per author:

4.022 = (α=2.01 / 1 authors) × 2.0x A-tier

α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count

Abstract

Customer complaints measure consumers' dissatisfaction with the quality of a product or service. If product quality is unobservable ex ante, customer complaints may be driven by expectations as well as by the actually experienced quality level. I test whether the level of quality that could be expected prior to consumption affects the number of customer complaints after controlling for–ex post observable–actual quality, using data from the U.S. airline industry. I find that there are fewer complaints when actual quality is higher. Controlling for actual quality, a higher level of expected quality leads to more complaints.

Technical Details

RePEc Handle
repec:bla:jindec:v:56:y:2008:i:1:p:190-213
Journal Field
Industrial Organization
Author Count
1
Added to Database
2026-01-25