Internet service providers' service quality and its effect on customer loyalty of different usage patterns

•Investigating the ISP’s service quality, and their effects on customer loyalty.•Data was obtained from 1231 internet users.•Performing bias corrected bootstrap and SEM with multigroup invariance testing.•Network quality, information quality, and security can influence customers’ loyalty.•Service quality effects on loyalty varied across various usage groups of customers.

This study attempts to investigate the dimensions of an ISP's service quality, and their effects on customer loyalty in high-tech services. Data was obtained from 1231 internet users. The analyses include segmenting ISPs' customers on the basis of their usage pattern and evaluating their perceptions of Internet service quality dimensions. Through the use of structural equation modelling and bias correct bootstrapping techniques, the study confirms that service quality dimensions can influence both attitudinal and behavioural loyalty. These effects, however, are different across different groups of ISP customers. The contribution of the present paper stems from the modelling of mediation effects and the incorporation of Internet usage that can help better explain the impact of service quality dimensions on customers' loyalty in high-tech service settings.