비용 - 편익 관점에서 본 서비스 산업에서의 고객 만족도 분석

Abstract

Customer satisfaction is the ultimate fulfillment in the service industry. Nearly all service providers have struggled to identify the critical factors to achieve customer satisfaction. This study examined the determinants of customer satisfaction and developed a service assessment model under the assumption that consumers perform a cost/benefit analysis when they decide whether or not to buy. First, the model proposes that service quality and perceived value influence customer satisfaction. Second, it hypothesizes that service quality as defined here is related to the service delivery process experience by the consumer during their use of service before, during, and after the purchase of service. Third, perceived value, which has an effect on satisfaction, is considered in the context of a cost/benefit approach which consists of monetary costs, non-monetary costs, service process benefits, and service results benefits. The four service categories, termed here as hospitals, call centers, online-shopping malls and discount stores, were selected on the basis of different dimensions, such as whether or not the service is delivered in person. The measured data for National Customer Satisfaction Index (NCSI) was utilized as the secondary data for the study. The model was evaluated using Structural Equation Modeling (SEM). The findings from the study can be summarized as follows: Firstly, upon examining the effects of benefits on the overall level of satisfaction, the effects of results benefits and process benefits are almost identical for hospitals, shopping malls and discount stores whereas for call centers, the effects of process benefits were found to be bigger than those of results benefits. Call centers as the point of contact service, take on the role of solving the problems the customer face, a step forward from a mere reception. In addition, like the hospital service,the problems are usually solved during the service process, not after the use of service,which indicates the process benefits affected the customer satisfaction more. Secondly, upon examining the effects of costs on the overall level of satisfaction, in case of hospitals, shopping malls and discount stores, the effects of the monetary cost affected the overall level of satisfaction more than the time costs while for call centers, time costs affected more. This could also be due to the distinguishing characteristics of the monetary cost used in the call center, which is at the mere level of call charge. Though the effects of monetary costs were found to have bigger impact than those of time costs for hospitals, shopping malls and discount stores, the effects of time costs were especially less and those of monetary costs the biggest for the discount stores compared to the hospitals and shopping malls. This could be interpreted by the fact that the customers visiting the discount stores are willing to take time to purchase in person because they expect more economic price than other distribution companies such as the department stores. Thirdly, comparing the effects of benefits and costs, it was found that in the service for the purpose of problem solving(call centers or hospitals), benefits had more impact on the satisfaction than costs in general whereas in service for purpose of purchase(on-line shopping malls or discount stores), the monetary cost had more impact on the satisfaction than benefits. Lastly, upon examining the effects for stage of service process, the early, middle and late stages of service had almost similar level of effects on the process benefits. For call centers,the importance of middle and late stages is found to be especially high and this may be due to the fact that the late stage corresponds to the problem solving stage. Based on the above results, this study is significant for the following reasons: First, it proved that the satisfaction was affected by the perceived value, and the value consist of benefits and costs. Especially for the costs, it empirically proved that the non-monetary costs in addition to monetary costs would have to be considered. Second, by specifying the factors affecting the satisfaction, more practical implications were provided for forming strategies for raising customer satisfaction. That is, by finding out the effects of the service quality according to the stage during which the service was provided, from what the satisfaction and perceived value originate, can be examined and based on this, practical feedbacks can be given. Third, depending on the nature of the service industry, it was found that the antecedents affecting the customer satisfaction could vary. If the unit for analysis can be subdivided into the level of individual company based on the characteristics for each service industry specified in this study, more practical and useful strategic proposal for the decision maker of the company would be possible. Based on the results of this study, the following will be suggestions for the researches to come: First, in addition to the process quality of the service, a variety of qualities may be required. By adding the psychological costs such as perceived risk to the monetary and time costs, the future studies will be able to provide results more useful for the person in charge on-site. Second, as for the customer satisfaction, the linear cause-effect relationship was hypothesized for the components affecting the customer satisfaction. The discussion for the possibility for an asymmetric relationship between these factors will be able to raise the possibility for the application of the study.