SERVICE MANAGEMENT

CIA 1, COMPONENT 2

SUBMITTED BY:
Nandini Agarwal
1720650
4 BBA F
 ARTICLE REVIEW

“Role of customers in Service Delivery”

Introduction

Priya Chetty in this article named “Role of customers in service delivery” tells us that customer
participation at some level is inevitable in service delivery. Services are actions or performances,
typically produced and consumed simultaneously. In many situations’ employees, customers and
even others in the service environment interact to produce the ultimate service outcome. Just as
the customers receiving the service participates in the service delivery process, he or she can
contribute to the gap through appropriate or inappropriate, effective or ineffective, productive or
unproductive behaviors.

Critical Analysis

The author tells us that the satisfaction of the customer plays a very important role in providing
appropriate and quality service to the public. She states that if the customer is dissatisfied by the
service, he or she might file a complaint against the company which leaves the company with a
bad name and hinders its growth. However, satisfied customers always bring much revenue to the
company by suggesting the company providing the service to the other people as well hence
increasing the customer base of the company.

As analysed from a recent survey conducted, some of the major reasons for potential dissatisfaction
among the customers are calls that are left unattended, longer waiting time to avail the service, no
after service facility, poor employees and behavioral problems of the service providers whereas,
the major areas that gain the attention of the public to the company are- prompt service, empathetic
employees, low cost and good quality service and after sale services.

According to the author, service customers are referred to as “partial employees” of the
organization. They are human resources who contribute to the organization’s productive capacity.
In other words, if customers contribute effort, time or other resources to the service production
process, they should be considered as part of the organization. Therefore, the success of the
organization depends majorly on the customer satisfaction.
Conclusion and Findings:

In this article the author has mainly talked about the various roles of a customer namely: (1)
Customers as a productive process in which service customers are referred to as “partial
employees” of the organization, (2) Customers as quality contributors to service delivery and
satisfaction in which the role the customers plays in service delivery is that of the contributor to
their own satisfaction and the ultimate quality of the services they receive and (3) Customers as
competitors in which the final role played by service customers is that of a potential competitor as
they can partially perform the service or the entire service for themselves and may not need the
provider at all.

This article is a great way to realise and learn that the business is only existent because of its
customers, be it a product or service. Customers play a very important role in the success of the
business and are much more than just someone who avails the service in exchange for money.
Thus, all the companies should make sure that their services are much more than just the service
itself and more of involvement with the customer to provide them with best of the company’s
capabilities.