The Effects of Perceived Justice toward Service Recovery on Electronic Word of Mouth: An Empirical Study of Four and Five Star Hotels in Thailand

Abstract

Service failure has a significant influence on the negative behavior of service users. Therefore, creating a perception of fairness of effective service restoration is the key to reducing negative behavior. Most previous research has concentrated on a singular dimension of emotion and eWOM, while the phenomenon of deadly silence has been overlooked. These factors all have a significant influence on satisfaction and information dissemination. Therefore, this research aims to investigate the relationships among the three dimensions of perceived justice, positive and negative emotions, silence behaviour, and post-recovery satisfaction on positive and negative eWOM. The sample consisted of 400 customers who had experienced service failures and received service recovery from 4 and 5-star hotels in Thailand within one year prior to the survey. Data were collected by online questionnaires. Hypotheses were tested using structural equation modeling (SEM).

The results showed that all three dimensions of perceived justice influenced positive emotions (PEmo), while only interactional justice (IJ) influenced negative emotions (Nemo). Furthermore, other constructs were found to influence eWOM, whereas, satisfaction after service recovery has the greatest influence on PeWOM. These findings are of great benefit to the hotel industry in formulating strategies to create awareness of fairness in proper service restoration, which will help hotels retain existing customers and attract potential future customers.

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