Consumer forgiveness an examination of select antecedents and consequences for consumers and employees of service providers

Abstract

Service providers covet consumer forgiveness as an effective means of restoring the strained relationship between a service provider and a consumer after a service failure. Consumer forgiveness is a consumer s willingness to give up vengeance, retaliation, alienation and other destructive behaviours towards the service provider to maintain a harmonious relationship with the service provider. This research effort includes two studies, viz., the qualitative study for exploring frontline employees perspective of consumer forgiveness and the quantitative study for examining the consumers perspective of consumer forgiveness. Study one conducted qualitative research using the critical incident technique, and the interview method was employed for collection of critical incidents from frontline employees. Study two employed retrospective experience sampling and used the survey method for the collection of data from consumers through a mixed-mode approach. Study two empirically examined three conceptual models, viz., the conceptual model of antecedents of consumer forgiveness, the conceptual model of consequences of consumer forgiveness, and the conceptual model of effects of perceived employee behaviours on consumer forgiveness. Study one exploring frontline employees perspective of consumer forgiveness provides. newline