Switching barriers' influences on service recovery evaluation in the retail banking industry: Construct development and testing

• We determine the influence of switching barriers on service recovery evaluation.
• We develop and test two scales that measure service recovery and switching barriers.
• We show that organizational credibility, value congruency and relational value relate positively to service recovery evaluation.
• We show that difficulties of switching banks are negatively related to service recovery evaluation.

The main goal of the present research was to determine the influence of switching barriers on service recovery evaluation in order to explore ways in which banks can improve their recovery performance. The research develops and tests two scales that measure service recovery and switching barriers and uncovers the existence of a six-factor structure measuring service recovery (reversing bank mistakes, customer compensation, customer time and effort, treatment of customers, complaint handling time and power of bank employees to make decisions). The investigation also confirms the existence of a five-factor structure measuring switching barriers (organizational credibility, value congruency, relational value, difficulties of switching banks and lack of attractive banking alternatives). In addition, the study shows that the dimensions of organizational credibility, value congruency and relational value relate positively to service recovery evaluation, while the dimension concerning difficulties of switching banks is negatively related to service recovery evaluation.

Chinese abstract本研究的主要目的是探讨转换壁垒对服务补救评估的影响，寻求相关方法，以便银行提高其服务补救水平。本研究设定并测试了两套测量服务补救和转换壁垒的方法，从而找出了可测量服务补救的六项因素(撤销银行失误、客户赔偿、客户时间和精力、客户接待、投诉处理时间以及银行员工的决策权力)。本研究也验证了可用于测量转换壁垒的五项因素(组织信誉、价值一致性、关系价值、转换银行的困难以及缺乏有吸引力的替代银行)。此外，本研究显示，组织信誉、价值一致性以及关系价值等因素与服务补救评估成正比关系，而转换银行的相关困难与服务补救评估成反比关系。