The impact of service failure severity on service recovery evaluations andpost‐recovery relationships

Previous research has found that interactional justice and distributive justice are critical factors influencing customer satisfaction after a service recovery. In addition, previous service recovery research has found that satisfaction is an important determinant of key outcome variables such as trust, commitment, and negative word‐of‐mouth. The current study extends previous research by investigating the role of service failure severity within the existing framework of service recovery research. The results indicate that service failure severity has a significant influence on satisfaction, trust, commitment, and negative word‐of‐mouth. The results also provide partial support for a moderating influence of service failure severity. Implications and areas for future research are discussed.