New consumers have emerged in North America. These consumers have higher expectations and are more demanding than yesterday’s consumers. Businesses must meet these requirements if they are to hold a competitive place in today’s marketplace. The authors report on research that identifies the...

Federal Express has been involved in the customer‐satisfaction process for some 20 years. The company believes that the key to customer satisfaction is satisfying employees. Chris Hargett, manager of marketing research at Federal Express Corporation, describes how the company involves...

There is nothing particularly original about a company making customer satisfaction the centre of its culture. But American Express differs from most others in having an effective system to make sure that everyone buys into the cultural focus.

Purpose The purpose of this study is to propose a framework for the evaluation of the perceived value internal audit functions add to their organisations. The framework is based on service quality measurement principles, specifically SERVPERF, which is applied to internal auditing....

Reports on the way in which TNT Express Worldwide is using TQM to bridge the culture gap created by the amalgamation of three branches of the business. Looks at Internal audits carried out to assess levels of Service quality and efficiency of internal communications on a global scale,...

Purpose Via an experimental approach, this study therefore seeks to examine the effects of outcome valence upon service perception in the higher education setting where academic services form the core service element. To further extend this inquiry, the purpose of this paper is to explore the...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to propose a framework based on customer journeys for a structured portrayal of service delivery from the customer’s point of view. The paper also introduces customer journey analysis (CJA) for empirical investigation of individual service experiences in a...

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the antecedents of word-of-mouth (WOM) in long-term service settings. Specifically, the authors examine the moderating role of action inertia in the relationships between satisfaction and repatronage intention, satisfaction and WOM, and repatronage...

Purpose – Providing high service quality is a necessary but insufficient criterion for success. Service quality must be sustained longitudinally. The purpose of this paper is to propose a sustainable e-service quality model by presenting results from a mixed-method study conducted in the...

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to analyse the possible influence of internal marketing (represented by internal market orientation (IMO)) on external customer outcomes (perceived service quality and customer satisfaction) through the mediating role of employees’ attitudes (job...