SERVICE ENCOUNTER ESSAY

 

 

This individual assignment is a formal academic essay, which is worth 90% of the mark for the module and has a word limit of 10 pages (± 1 page), excluding the cover page, reference list, and appendices. The deadline for submission is 28 April, 2020.

 

 

OBJECTIVE:

 

For students to become more aware of critical aspects of the service encounter from the perspectives of 1) customers and 2) service organisations.

 

 

DIRECTIONS AND REQUIREMENTS:

 

One of the aims of this service encounter essay is to analyse service encounters from a customer perspective. Most of us consume many services on a regular basis, but often do not thinking about it in those terms. Examples of service encounters include (but are not limited to: banking (face-to-face, telephone internet, and/or mobile), dining out, buying a holiday from a travel agent, going to a dentist or doctor, having a haircut, getting the car serviced, going to a theatre or concert, having a garment dry cleaned, purchasing an insurance policy (any channel), buying groceries, having a gift delivered to someone.

 

In order to make you more aware of possible sources of customer satisfaction/dissatisfaction, you are asked to keep a Service Encounter Journal as a first step before you can write the essay itself.

 

 

Step 1

 

You are required to complete six service encounters (see below for a blank service encounter form), which should be attached to the essay as separate appendices. Each service encounter entry should be maximum 4 pages long. The service encounters that you enter should be from a variety of types of services (refer to lecture notes and the textbook) that you have encountered during the term, and include examples of good and bad service from your personal perspective.

 

The best way to complete your journal is to make notes immediately following a particular service encounter. If you try to do your entries from memory, or to do too many at one time, the quality of the entries is likely to suffer.

 

You should examine each Service Encounter using the theories discussed in the module. When you have completed your four entries in the Service Encounter Journal, the next step is to analyse the encounters to arrive at the factors that contribute to your satisfaction or dissatisfaction. Consider your own attitudes, behaviour(s), mood and contribution to the outcome when doing so. Then, you are ready to write up a 2-3 page analysis of your encounters, which is important to the quality of the essay in Step 2. The analysis should be attached with the Service Encounters in Appendix 1.

 

 

Step 2

 

Having analysed your Service Encounters, you should generate a list of the three most relevant theories/conceptual frameworks to your service encounters, which are the ones that your essay will be based on. The essay itself is to be written with the dual perspective of services in mind, that is, from the customer and firm perspective.

 

You are now ready to start your research and reading into the selected theories/frameworks. The research process plays an important role, as the quality and relevance of the selected journal articles affects the essay.

 

 

Step 3

 

The Service Encounter Essay consists of the following sections:

 

1. Introduction
   • A general introduction to the essay should be provided, the aims of the essay should be stated and an outline should be provided
   • Max 1 page

 

2. Literature review
   • Review the literature on the three most relevant services marketing theories/concepts based on your analysis of your encounters. For instance
     • Services Marketing Mix
       1. Focusing on the 3 “extra” Ps
          1. People
          2. Processes
          3. Physical Evidence

• Services Marketing Triangle
• The conceptual frameworks for analysing service encounters, select the most appropriate two
  1. Blueprinting (service blueprinting)
  2. Dramaturgical approach
  3. Servicescapes
  4. Servuction
  5. Customer experience
• Service Failure & Service Recovery
  1. You can include literature on the Zone of Tolerance (which is related to Service Quality literature as well), and Service Recovery Paradox in this section
• Service Quality using the Gaps Model (Parasurman et al. 1985, 1988)
  1. Gaps Model as a whole and in more depth any 2 Provider Gaps of particular relevance to your encounters
• Customer Satisfaction
• Relationship Marketing
• Loyalty

 

3. Discussion section
   • In this section, you should apply the appropriate services marketing theories/concepts that you reviewed the literature on. It is imperative that you demonstrate your understanding of these concepts throughout the discussion. Based on your analysis, you need to address the following:
     • Compare and contrast your BEST and WORST service encounters.
     • What are the main factors that contributed to your dis/satisfaction with your service encounters?
     • Based on your service encounters, in your opinion, what are the three most important actions managers should take to improve service quality?

 

4. Conclusion
   • A summary of the main points of the essay
   • Max 1-1.5 pages

 

 

FORMATTING GUIDELINES:

 

Font size and type	12 Times New Roman
Line spacing	1.5 lines
Alignment	Left
Margins	1 inch/2.5 cm all sides

 

Please note that you are required to use the Harvard reference style.