Consumers' Perceptions of Fairness and the Resultant Effect on Customer Satisfaction

ABSTRACT This study investigated the effects of interactional, distributive, and procedural fairness on overall fairness and customer satisfaction and of overall fairness on customer satisfaction across a broad spectrum of service encounter outcomes within the service sector, not just in the context of a service failure. Nearly 50% of those encounters recalled represented hospitality and leisure businesses exclusively. The model tested here has been adapted from a larger theoretical model of the customer's path to loyalty which is an adaptation of previous models of the service profit chain, customer satisfaction with service failure and recovery, and complaint handling relationships. This research provides practical information that can lead to a better understanding of customers' evaluation methods and be used to guide the formation of improved service strategies that provide fairness, a key to satisfaction in hospitality, leisure and service sector affiliated businesses.