Virtual services impact the concept of service

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Virtual services impact the concept of service

• Helena Tuorila, Senior Researcher
• National Consumer Research Centre

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Contents

• What are services?
• The six criterias of good perceived virtual
  service quality.
• Different operational cultures related to the use
  of services.

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National Consumer Research Centre in brief

• The National Consumer Research Centre carries out
  societally significant, top-quality consumer
  research.
• The primary purpose of the National Consumer
  Research Centre is to produce and disseminate
  research data that can be used to enhance the
  well-being of consumers and households and
  strenghen their influence and decision-making.
• The Centre carries out research in the following
  areas of expertise
• Household activity and changes in consumption
• Quality on products and services
• Market functionality and price structures

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What is a service?

• A service is an activity or series of activities
  of more or less intangible nature that normally,
  but not necessarily, take place in interactions
  between the customer and service employees and/or
  physical resources or goods and/or systems of the
  service provider, which are provided as solutions
  to customer problems.

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What are services? Some common characteristics

• Physical goods
• Tangible
• Homogenous
• Production and distribution separated from
  consumption
• A thing
• Core value produced in factory
• Customers do not (normally) participate in the
  production process
• Can be kept in stock
• Transfer of ownership

• Services
• Intangible
• Heterogenous
• Production, distribution and consumption
  simultaneous processes
• An activity or process
• Core value produced in buyer-seller interactions
• Customers participate in production
• Cannot be kept in stock
• No transfer of ownership

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What are virtual services?

• Virtual services dont differ from services as
  described in previous slide.
• Virtuality wont change the concept of service.
• Virtual services are very much self-service.
• Virtual services create the digital divide.

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Customers role in virtual services

• The customer forms a part of the production
  process, and individuality and successful
  interaction bring added value to the service.
• The customers have more responsibilities in
  virtual services.

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The moments of truth and quality in virtual
services

• Each customer contact is a moment of truth in
  virtual services.
• The more customers accept self-service activities
  or other production-related routines they are
  expected to perform themselves, the better they
  will consider the service.
• Good perceived quality is obtained when the
  experienced quality meets the expectations of the
  customer, the expected quality.

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The six criterias of good perceived virtual
service quality

• Professionalism and skills
• The customers realize that the service provider,
  its employees, operational systems, and physical
  resources, have the knowledge and skills required
  to solve their problems in a professional way.

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• Attitudes and behavior
• The customers feel that the service employees
  (contact person) are concerned about them and
  intrested in solving their problems in a friendly
  and spontaneous way.

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• Accessibility and flexibility
• The customers feel that the service provider, its
  location, operating hours, employees, and
  operational systems, are designed and operate so
  that it is easy to get access to the service and
  so that they are prepared to adjust to the
  demands and wishes of the customer in a flexible
  way.

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• Reliability and trustworthiness
• The customers know that whatever takes place or
  has been agreed upon, they can rely on the
  service provider, its employees and systems, to
  keep promises and perform with the best intrest
  of the customers at heart.

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• Recovery
• The customers realize that whenever something
  goes wrong or something unpredictable
  unexpectedly happens the service provider will
  immediately and actively take actions to keep
  them in control of the situation and find a new,
  acceptable solution.

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• Reputation and credibility
• The customers believe that the operations of the
  service provider can be trusted and gives
  adequate value for the money, and that it stands
  for good performance and values which can be
  shared by customers and the service provider.

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Different operational cultures related to the use
of services

• Families with children have taken into use
  different automatic terminals, the Internet and
  self-service machines, in going about their daily
  business.
• Older people prefer to take care of their
  business in person with customer service staff.
• It will take time before eletronic services
  become a natural part of the daily lives of all
  citizens, because the ageing population of today
  do not have the natural relationship to
  information technology that todays families with
  children have.

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Self-service or personal service?

• Factors related to the person in need of the
  service such as age, physical factors,
  attitudes, experiences and willingness to exert
  ones influence have a considerable effect on
  whether the user wants personal service or
  whether he/she will settle for self-service.

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Age

• Young and old people have adopted different
  service cultures.
• Young people trust computers and Internet whereas
  old people consider personal service more
  reliable than self-service.
• The social dimension of services is very
  important to the old people.

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Physical factors

• Visual and physical handicaps can cause such
  problems in self-service that people either
  choose or are forced to choose personal service.
• Different automates, keyboards and displays are
  simply difficult to use.
• During past years the technical development has
  made it easier for physically handicapped to live
  in information society. At the same time the
  situation of visually handicapped has become more
  difficult.

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Attitudes

• If a customer is used to personal service the
  adoption of self-service is difficult, because of
  changes in service behavior.
• Customers compare old and new lines of action.
• The adoption of new line of action must give not
  only pleasure but some concrete benefits.
• Self-service is often quicker and cheaper than
  personal service.

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Experiences

• Experiences have both positive and negative
  influence on the adoption of self-service.
• A person who feels that automates are difficult
  or unpleasant to use, wont adopt self-service if
  personal service is available.
• Mere views of difficult automates and uncertainty
  of own abilities can lead to refusal of
  self-service.
• On the other hand because of long queues in
  personal service a person may learn to use
  automates if there are no queues.

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Willingness to exert ones influence

• Customers have better possibilities to
  participate in the production process in
  self-service than personal service.
• Some customers may experience the possibility to
  exert their influence so important that they
  prefer self-service even though it isnt quicker
  or cheaper than personal service.
• The pleasure of being able to satisfy own needs
  is part of the possibility to exert ones
  influence.

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Attitudes towards self-service
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Conclusions

• Virtual services are a step towards self-service
  society.
• The development of virtual services must take
  notice of the special needs of older people.