The Effects of Service Recovery Actions on Customers' Post-Recovery Responses to Online Travel Agencies (OTAs): The Moderating Role of Price

Abstract

The main purpose of this study is to investigate the impacts of service recovery actions on customers' post-recovery responses to initial service failure and a double deviation and to investigate the moderating effect of price on the relationship between recovery actions and these responses. The findings show that active recovery actions led to more favorable post-recovery responses than passive actions in both initial and double deviation situations. No moderating effect of price was found between recovery actions and customers' post-recovery responses. From an academic perspective, this study helps researchers understand how customers positively perceive recovery actions that reflect procedural and interactional justice in service failure situations. The findings also suggest that practitioners of OTAs should engage in active recovery actions that include prompt communication on the progress of the incident (i.e., procedural justice) and a sincere apology (interactional justice) to alleviate customers' negative responses due to service failures.