“Culture shocks” in inter‐cultural service encounters?

Service customers perceive quality in the moment of interaction with the service provider. In times of globalization, it is important for a growing number of service companies to ask if the perceived service encounter quality differs among customers from different cultures. Particularly needed is information about whether problematic “culture shocks” occur in service encounters due to culture‐bound expectations and perceptions. To answer this question, a model of inter‐cultural service encounter quality is presented. In order to test the assumption of “culture shocks” in inter‐cultural service encounters, an empirical study applying the critical incident technique (CIT) was conducted. The unexpected results of this study lead to a further development of the model presented. This gives insights into why, and under which circumstances, inter‐cultural encounters are perceived as less problematic than intra‐cultural encounters. Finally, managerial implications and open research questions are discussed.

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