Award Date

12-2007

Degree Type

Professional Paper

Degree Name

Master of Hospitality Administration

Department

Hotel Administration

First Committee Member

Seyhmus Baloghu, Chair

Number of Pages

54

Abstract

The interactions between customers and service organizations, known as service encounters, have generally been between front-liner and consumers. Gradually however, these encounters are changing with the introduction of self-service facilities that are quickly replacing service staff. The use of self-service technology has seen an incredible amount of growth globally over the last few years. Self-service technologies are currently being used in more diverse ways for new services than once thought possible. The expenditure on self-service kiosks is expected to rise by 88% and the dollar value of transactions taking place through self-service technology should exceed 1.3 trillion by 2007 (Avery, 2007).

Consequently, self-service technology is affecting today’s service encounters. This has come about as a result of innovations in modern technology and increased labor cost (Dabholkar & Bagozzi, 2002; Honebein & Cammarano, 2005). The possible reduction in human contact may affect consumer commitment and satisfaction, making it indispensable to examine self-service technology usage, particularly in the long-term (Beatson, Lee, & Coote, 2007).

The area of self-service technology has recently drawn much attention from not only practitioners but also academic researchers who are trying to understand how consumers interpret a self-service experience (Curran, Meuter, & Surprenant, 2003; Dabholkar & Bagozzi, 2002; Kincaid & Baloglu, 2005; Meuter, Bitner, Ostrom & Brown, 2005). Essentially there have been more qualitative studies on self-service technology experiences to determine what factors influence a satisfactory or unsatisfactory experience, and relatively fewer quantitative studies to support why consumers use self-service technology over a full-service option.

At present, there is a lack of empirical data about the attributes of self-service technology that will draw customers away from a full-service option and encourage them to become partial employees by using a self-service technology to facilitate a service transaction. Conversely, understanding the attributes of self-service technology that discourage customers from staying with a self-serve option is also extremely important. Therefore, comprehension of the positive and the negative elements of selfservice technology can provide insights into customers' attitude and intentions to use self-service technology.

Keywords

Customer services; Singapore; Technology – Psychological aspects; Technology – Social aspects

Disciplines

Business Administration, Management, and Operations | Hospitality Administration and Management | Technology and Innovation

File Format

pdf

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

Comments

UNLV Singapore Campus

Rights

IN COPYRIGHT. For more information about this rights statement, please visit http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

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