The Impact of Unfair Business Practices on Bank Customers: An Experimental Study

Ethics has become an attractive research topic in the business literature. However, experimental studies probing the relation between business ethics and perceived firm value are relatively scarce. Accordingly, in this study we examined how unfair business practices affect customers’ perceptions about and intentions towards a company. For this aim, we conducted an experimental study on 406 university students. We used an excerpt to manipulate the information about a hypothetical bank’s way of treatment to its customers (neutral vs. unfair). Than, we examined how different types of information do affect prospective customers’ evaluations of firm reputation and their intentions to purchase services from the narrated bank. Data analysis revealed that, providing information about unethical business practices of a firm significantly decreased the perceived firm reputation and intentions to purchase services.