1. 1
SM 4 th
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

2. 2
SM
Chapter 12
Customers’ Role in Service
Delivery
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

3. 3
The importance of customers
SM
in service delivery
 Customer participation at some level is
inevitable in service delivery.
 Services are actions or performances, typically
produced and consumed simultaneously.
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

4. 4
The importance of customers
SM
in service delivery
 In many situations employees, customers and
even others in the service environment interact to
produce the ultimate service outcome. Because
they participate, customers are indispensable to
the production process of service organizations,
and they can actually control or contribute to
their own satisfaction.
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

5. 5
The importance of customers
SM
in service delivery
1. Customer Receiving the Service
2. Other Customers
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6. 6
The Importance of Customers in
SM Service Delivery
Level of Customer Participation:
Low: Consumer Presence Moderate: Consumer Input High: Customer Co creates the
Required during Service Required for Service Creation Service Product
Delivery Client inputs customize a standard Active client participation guides the
service customized service.
Products are standardized
Provision of service requires customer Service cannot be created apart from the
Service is provided
Purchase customer’s purchase and active
regardless of any individual participation.
Customer inputs ( information materials)
purchase Customer inputs are mandatory
Are necessary for an adequate outcome,
Payment may be the And cocreate the outcome.
but the service firm provides the service
Only required customer
Input.
Haircut
End Consumer Examples Marriage Counseling
Annual Physical exam
Airline travel Personal training
Full-service restaurant
Motel stay Weight reduction program
Fast-food restaurant Major illness or surgery
Agency created advertising
Business–to Business
Campaigning
Customer Examples Management consulting
Payroll service
Uniform cleaning service Executive Management seminar
Freight transportation
Pest control Installation of computer network.
Interior greenery maintenance
service
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

7. 7
SM Other Customers
 There are direct customers and other customers.
direct customers directly receive the services and
other customers are present in the service
environment and can affect the nature of the
services outcome or process.
 Other customers can either enhance or detract
from customer satisfaction and perceptions of
quality.
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

8. 8
SM Other Customers
 Some of the ways other customers can
negatively affect the service experiences are by
exhibiting disruptive behaviors, causing delays,
overusing, excessively crowding, and
manifesting incompatible needs.
 Crying babies, smoking patrons and loud unruly
groups.
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

9. 9
SM Customer Roles
1. Customers as productive resources
2. Customers as contributors to service
Quality
3. Customers as Competitions
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

10. 10
Customers as productive
SM
resources
 Partial employees
 Effort, time & other resources
 Customer input
 Qualities of (input) & quality of output
 Two issues
1. Delivery system should be isolated from inputs due to
uncertainty of customers’ uncontrollable actions.
2. Can be delivered efficiently if customers are viewed as
partial employee.
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

11. 11
Customers as Contributors
SM
to Service Quality
 Health care, education, personal fitness and
weight loss.
 Performing roles effectively
 Influence quality of outcome
 Satisfaction
 Productivity
 Variation in participation, variation In quality
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12. 12
Customers as Contributors
SM
to Service Quality
Situations
 What they did- Technical quality of customer
inputs
I clearly explained what I wanted the bank
employee to do.
 How they did it- Functional quality
I was friendly to the bank employee.
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

13. 13
SM Customers as Competitions
 Customers become competitor of company by
performing self services, such as child care or
marriage counseling.
 Internal exchange or external exchange
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

14. 14
SM Customers as Competitions
 In house or outsourcing production depends on:
1. Expertise capacity
2. Resource capacity
3. Time Capacity
4. Economic rewords
5. Psychic rewards
6. Trust
7. Control
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

15. 15
Self Service Technologies- The
SM Ultimate in Customer
Participation
 Self Service technologies are services produced
entirely by the customer without any direct
involvement or interaction with the firm’s
employee.
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

16. 16
Self Service Technologies- The
SM Ultimate in Customer
Participation
 A proliferation of New SSTs
12. Self-scanning at retail stores
1. ATMs 13. Internet banking
2. Pay at the pump 14. Vehicle registration online
3. Airline cheek-in 15. On line auctions
4. Hotel cheek- in and cheek out 16. Home and car buying online
5. Automated car rental 17. Automated investment
6. Automated filing of legal transaction
claims 18. Insurance online
7. Online driver’s license testing 19. Package tracking
8. Automated betting machines 20. Internet shopping
9. Electronic blood pressure 21. Internet information search
machine 22. Interactive voice response
10. Various vending service phone systems.
11. Tax preparation software 23. Distance education.
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

17. 17
SM Success with SSTs
 Strategy (cost saving, revenue, growth or
competitive advantages)
 Benefits and customer’s capacity to receive
benefits
 Motivation, roles and capacity to perform roles
 Technology readiness
 Customer involvement
 Customer education
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

18. 18
Strategies for Enhancing
SM
Customer Participation
 Define customers’ job
1. Helping oneself: through active
participation, customers may become
productive resources.
2. Helping others: mentoring programs in
university.
3. Promoting the company: recommendation
4. Individual differences: not every one want
to participate
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

19. 19
Strategies for Enhancing
SM
Customer Participation
 Recruit, educate and reward customers
1. Recruit the right customers who are comfortable
with roles and communicate responsibilities.
2. Educate and train customers through socializing
org. values, abilities and skills, customer orientation
(universities), customer education (hospitals) and
customer information (McDonald's)
3. Reward customers for their contributions
4. Avoid negative outcomes of inappropriate customer
participation
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies

20. 20
Strategies for Enhancing
SM
Customer Participation
 Manage the customer mix
Compatibility management: a process of first attracting
homogeneous consumers to the service environment, then
actively managing both the physical environment and
customer to customer encounters in such a way as to
enhance satisfying encounters and minimizing
dissatisfying customers.
Strategies:
1. Homogeneous customers
2. Locational proximity
3. Codes of conduct ( dresses and smoking attitudes)
McGraw-Hill © 2000 The McGraw-Hill Companies