The Role of Service Quality Perceptions and Service Failure/Recovery Episodes in the Formation of B2B Loyalty: An Empirical Investigation in the Greek it Industry

The impact of service recovery strategies has attracted increasing research and practitioner interest in recent years. The majority of studies, however, have been conducted in a business to consumer setting, rather than in a business to business (B2B) setting, where customers tend to be more experienced with the service. This paper extends previous work by examining customer perceptions of service recovery in a business market (the Greek IT market), and models the effect of service quality and service recovery perceptions on overall satisfaction and on customers’ behavioural intentions, using key informants who have been involved directly in a service failure incident. Customer perceptions of reliability are found to be critical, with direct and indirect effects on service recovery satisfaction, overall satisfaction and customer loyalty. Service recovery perceptions are also found to have both a direct effect on behavioural intentions, and an indirect effect (via satisfaction).