Service Encounters

1. Introduction

This report has been written as an assessment item for the Swinbourne University of Technology Service Marketing unit MAR260. The purpose of this report is to gain an understanding of the nature of services and service customers by applying marketing theories to service encounters.

This report focuses on six documented service encounters illustrated in appendices one to six. The report provides a detailed classification of the service encounters according to the level of customer contact, continual uses of the service and processing direction. Uncertainty avoidance (pre purchase), script theory (purchase) and disconfirmation of expectations (post purchase) have been explained and supported by the service encounters. Two recommendation have also been made in support of the theories to assist managers in maintaining their strengths identified in the service encounters.

2. Service classification

2.1 Degree of tangibility or intangibility

There are many different ways that services can be classified, however it is the perceived degree of intangibility or tangibility that dominates the marketing literature (Miller & Foust, 2003). The levels of tangibility and intangibility have been categorized according to the physical nature of the offering, apparent in service encounters one, two and four, compared to the more information dominated encounters of three, five and six (Lovelock, Patterson & Wirthz, 2010).

2.2 Level of customer contact

Bowen and Bowers (as cited in Miller & Foust, 2003) were the first to accept this proposition of tangibility and intangibility, combining this system of service classification with the degree of customer involvement (Miller & Foust, 2003). Customer involvement has been cited as a distinctive characteristic of a service and refers to the degree of contact between customer and service provider (Lovelock et al., 2010). A matrix of high and low intangibility and tangibility was devised to determined the amount of interaction and input the customer has with the service, figure 1 provides a clear explanation of high and low customer contact. (Miller & Foust, 2003).

2.3 People or possession processing

Lovelock (as cited in Miller & Foust, 2003), added to the concept of tangibility and intangibility, by determining wether the service was directed at people or at their possession. People processing involves tangible or intangible (information processing, service encounter three) actions delivered at peoples bodies and requires their physical presence during the service delivery so that the desired benefits can be received (service encounters two, three and four) (Miller & Foust, 2003). Possession processing services involve the service