The effect of channel quality inconsistency on the association between e-service quality and customer relationships

Purpose – Based on prior studies, the performance of customer relationships depends highly on the characteristics of the e‐service. However, the strength of this association can be impacted when businesses employ multichannel services (e.g. offering online and offline services). With multichannel services, any inconsistency in perceived quality across channels may result in customer distrust toward a service provider. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of inconsistent quality on the association between e‐service quality and customer relationships in a university context.Design/methodology/approach – This study conducted a web survey and 318 respondents who have both physical and e‐service experiences were collected. The inconsistent quality across channels was divided into three groups by k‐means clustering approach. Next, the hypothesized associations were analyzed using regression analysis based on three groups.Findings – The results show that inconsistent quality has different impac...

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