When people hear the word services, they often think about offerings that are “neutral” or “routine.” They conjure up familiar experiences that they navigate regularly — for example, dry cleaning, haircutting or lawn care. Such services are distinct from the types of services people aspire to use, such as those associated with travel and entertainment; for classification purposes, these might be labeled “positive” services. However, there is a third type of service, which is not often considered or particularly well understood. We refer to these as “negative” services because they deal with events most people hope they will never have to deal with — things such as toothaches, leaky roofs or collision repairs.1 Whereas much of the writing about services has looked at the nature of the activity (for example, whether it is tangible or intangible) or has examined the activity from the provider perspective (for example, in medicine, whether the need is acute or chronic), we take a customer viewpoint. (See “About the Research,”p. 70.)
Most people feel confident in describing common problems and the routine services they require. They have no trouble identifying qualified service providers in these areas. But negative services are different: Customers are not able to evaluate the content of the service — only the process (and then only after the service has been... To read the complete article, login or sign-up using the form below.
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