The role of emotions and trust in service recovery in business-to-consumer electronic commerce

Abstract

This study proposes a service recovery model to describe how cumulative satisfaction, loyalty and word-of-mouth are affected by complaints. The model is based on the role of positive and negative emotions in satisfaction with service recovery processes, with trust acting as a mediator of the relationship between satisfaction with service recovery and cumulative satisfaction, and between positive and negative emotions, satisfaction with service recovery and loyalty. The sample for this study consists of 303 business-to-consumer e-commerce users who made a complaint after an electronic transaction. The results show that positive emotions are a key factor in satisfaction with service recovery processes; this is in contrast to the major role that negative emotions have traditionally played in these models. Furthermore, trust mediates the relationship between satisfaction with service recovery and cumulative satisfaction, and between positive emotions and loyalty. Trust has an important influence on loyalty, and cumulative satisfaction is a strong predictor of word-of-mouth. While prior satisfaction with service recovery studies usually investigated only negative emotions and satisfaction with a specific transaction, this research considers both positive and negative emotions, as well as the mediating effect of trust on the relationship between satisfaction with a specific transaction and cumulative satisfaction.