• Asia Marketing Journal
• /
• v.9 no.3
• /
• pp.75-115
• /
• 2007

This study investigated the effect of service provider's recovery effort and pre-failure customer-employee rapport on post-recovery consumer response such as satisfaction, purchase intention, and positive Word-of-Mouth communication. First, this study explored the interaction effect of recovery effort and customer-employee rapport on post-recovery consumer response. The result shows when the level of pre-failure customer-employee rapport is high, customer's positive responses decreased slightly even though they perceived low recovery effort. However, when the level of pre-failure customer-employee rapport is low, customer's responses were decreased considerably in case of low recovery effort. Second, this study examined 'service recovery paradox' which is post-recovery consumer's satisfaction is greater than the case of no service failure. The result shows recovery paradox was not supported in all samples regardless of the level of recovery effort and customer-employee rapport. Synthetically, customer-employee rapport took a buffering role in customer response after service failure although it's not the same as error-free state.