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Technological developments and new customer expectations of immediacy have driven businesses to adopt on-demand service models. The purpose of this paper is to study the characteristics of a range of on-demand services in order to better understand the meaning of “on-demand” and its implications for service management. This enables the on-demand service logic to be applied to other service contexts, where it may add value for customers.

The study starts with a focused literature review and continues with a multiple case study methodology, as the on-demand service concept is in the early stages of theory development. Seven cases were studied, based on a maximum variation sampling strategy.

The results show that on-demand services are characterized by three interrelated characteristics: being highly available, responsive and scalable. Analysis further reveals that on-demand services display differences within the conceptual boundaries of these characteristics, i.e. they vary in terms of their availability, responsiveness and scalability.

Drawing on these findings, the study contributes to the service literature by being the first to specifically conceptualize and define the on-demand services concept and reveal three key characteristics that clarify the distinctive nature of this service type. Accordingly, on-demand services are clearly differentiated from other services. Additionally, the paper discusses the variety within on-demand services and develops an on-demand service continuum that gives detailed insights into the conceptual variations within such services.

In the literature on complaint management the importance is acknowledged of learning from complaints. Still, the concept of organisational learning has not yet been embedded in the field of complaint management. Therefore, this paper aims to adjust a general model for organisational learning to the concept of complaint management in order to make it operational for this field.

The notion of organisational learning in combination with complaint management is modelled as a system. This system enabled us to analyse the practices of handling and analysing complaints within six Dutch service organisations and to assess the potential of these organisations for organisational learning.

The results of the paper categorise a variety of complaint management practices along two elements of organisational learning: triggers and modes of learning (i.e. informational learning or interactive learning).

Further research should include the applicability of the learning model to different sectors or organisations.

This collection of practices can be used as a managerial guideline for improving the processes of learning from complaints.

This paper contributes to embedding the concept of organisational learning in the field of complaint management.

Using a realist perspective, this paper seeks to investigate how complaining customers want to be treated by frontline employees in personal complaint handling encounters. For this purpose, an exploratory research study using the qualitative laddering interviewing technique was regarded as appropriate as it allows researchers to gain a deeper insight into an underdeveloped research subject. Following realist thinking and terminology, the exploratory study aims to develop a deeper understanding of the so‐called micro structures of complaining customers.

A semi‐standardised qualitative technique called laddering was used to reveal the cognitive structures of complaining customers. In total, laddering interviews with 40 respondents with complaining experience were conducted.

The research shows that the most important attributes for complaining customers are the contact employees' authenticity, competence and active listening skills. These concepts are linked with several consequences and values such as “justice”, “well‐being” and “security”.

Owing to the exploratory nature of the study in general and the scope and size of its sample in particular, the findings are tentative in nature. As the study involved students from one university, the results cannot be generalized beyond this group even though in this case the student sample is likely to represent the general buying public.

If companies know what complaining customers expect, frontline employees may be trained to adapt their behaviour to their customers' underlying expectations, which should have a positive impact on customer satisfaction. For this purpose, the paper gives several suggestions to managers to improve active complaint handling and management.

The findings enrich the existing limited stock of knowledge on complaint satisfaction by developing a deeper understanding of the attributes that complaining customers expect from frontline employees, as well as the underlying logic for these expectations. Revealing the important role of employee authenticity adds to our knowledge on complaint satisfaction. Another strong contribution of this paper lies in the finding that all the identified concepts must not be seen in strict isolation, as in previous research, but have to be understood as a network of interrelated concepts: the attributes of frontline employees have several important consequences for customers (e.g. the feeling of being taken seriously), which are then linked to consumers' personal values and basic motivations (e.g. perceptions of justice).

The study aims to promote the use of qualitative methods in service research by investigating how these methods are reported in service journals, how the level of reporting has evolved and whether methodological reporting influences the downloads or citations received by qualitative articles.

Methodological reporting practices were identified through content analysis of 318 qualitative articles published in three major service research journals and comparison with prior methodological literature. Regression analysis was used to test how the level of methodological reporting influences article downloads and citations.

The study identifies 29 reporting practices related to 9 key methodological reporting areas. The overall level of methodological reporting in published qualitative articles has increased over time. While differences in the level of reporting between service journals persist, they are narrowing. The level of methodological reporting did not influence downloads or citations of qualitative articles.

Service scholars using qualitative methods should pay attention to methodological reporting as it can improve the chances of being published. Factors such as theoretical contributions are likely to have a greater influence on article impact than methodological reporting.

No prior study has explored methodological reporting practices across different qualitative methodologies or how reporting influences article impact. For authors, reviewers and editors, the study provides an inventory of reporting practices relevant for evaluating qualitative articles, which should lower barriers for qualitative methods in service research by providing practical guidelines on what to focus on when reporting and assessing qualitative research.

With the rapid diffusion of the metaverse into all aspects of businesses and the education industry, scholars have predominantly focused on examining its projected benefits and harms, yet have overlooked to empirically explore its unpredictable nature, which offers an exciting realm of unexplored challenges and opportunities.

This research adopts a qualitative research design in the form of 24 interviews from a single EdTech to investigate the possibility of unexpected developments resulting from the integration of the metaverse into its solutions.

Three noteworthy observations have emerged from the analysis: technological obsolescence, resource allocation imbalance, and monoculturalism.

This research pioneers an empirical exploration of the latent outcomes stemming from metaverse adoption within EdTechs, while also introducing a novel theoretical framework termed “meta-governance,” which extends the Edu-Metaverse ecosystem.

Disclosure research has argued that visuals are increasingly used in annual reports as a way to increase readability of the annual report, but comparatively little is known about of diagrams compared to graphs and photographs. The purpose of this paper is to provide a historical account of visuals use in corporate disclosure, with an emphasis on diagrams, to show changes from the 1940s until present-day reporting.

Visual research methods were applied to analyze how diagrams, photographs and graphs were used in 69 annual reports of the Swedish telecom company Ericsson.

Photographs have been used with increasing frequency since the 1950s. Graph and diagram use has increased significantly since the 1990s while photograph use remained stable, suggesting that graphs and diagrams increasingly complement photographs for visually representing the organization in corporate disclosure. Factors explaining the case company’s development include both internal (performance, individual preferences, shifting from a manufacturing-based strategy to a service-based strategy) and external (legislation, transformation of the telecom industry).

Visual elements in annual reports are increasingly oriented toward immaterial representations of the organization’s standings and identity and diagrams are increasingly used and contribute to this. This finding motivates further research about diagram use in corporate communication, such as how different diagram types convey accounting messages, and whether diagrams serve as impression management devices. For regulators, it will be important to follow the emerging trend of diagram use, since it is becoming part of reporting practice.

This paper seeks to use the Kano model to gain a deeper understanding of attributes of effective frontline employees dealing with customer complainants in personal interactions. Previous research revealed that excitement factors deteriorate to basic factors over time. This research aims to investigate whether the same phenomenon holds true for attributes of service employees.

Data were collected using Kano questionnaires from 272 respondents with complaining experience in the UK and Saudi Arabia, these being two countries at different stages of service sector development.

The analysis of the Kano questionnaires for the UK reveals that complaining customers take the contact employee's ability to listen carefully for granted. The Kano results for Saudi Arabia clearly indicate that complaining customers are (still) easier to delight than their UK counterparts.

Even though the study has a sample size similar to several existing Kano studies, future research studies could still use larger probability samples that represent the broader (complaining) consumer population in the selected countries.

If companies know what complaining customers expect, frontline employees may be trained to adapt their behaviour to their customers' underlying expectations. For this purpose, the paper gives several suggestions to managers to improve active complaint handling and management.

The study adds to the understanding of effective complaint handling. The findings are the first to show that employee factors that are performance factors in a highly developed service economy can still delight customers in a less developed service economy.

This study proposes a new framework for business process improvement (BPI) by identifying areas of improvement based on customer complaints.

The proposed framework comprises several stages. The first stage captures the voice of customer (VoC) in the form of customer complaints. The complaints are processed using text mining and sentiment analysis. Negative sentiments indicate areas for improvement by matching words with SERVQUAL dimensions. The FMEA method is used to identify business processes that need to be improved.

The opposing quality dimensions of SERVQUAL can be incorporated into a database for later identifying consumer complaints. FMEA can be used to identify potential failures in aspects that correspond to consumer complaints; therefore, improvement areas can be identified. The proposed framework, applied to a garment manufacturer, shows that the SERVQUAL dimensions, which were originally intended for service companies, can be adapted to manage customer complaints to support BPI in manufacturing companies.

The framework can be used by either the manufacturing or service industries to handle customer complaints and use the complaint analysis results to identify improvement areas to avoid the same complaints occurring in the future.

In this study, the construction of a database based on the SERVQUAL dimension to match sentiment results, where negative sentiment indicates improvement, and the use of FMEA to indicate specific business processes that should be improved is novel and has not yet been proposed by previous studies.

Appropriate management of service failures involves a complex organizational response that allows an effective internal and external recovery, learn from mistakes and introduce future service innovations. Empirical evidence on the organizational recovery practices more suitable to achieve these objectives, leading to superior performance, is limited. The present work seeks to extend the existing literature by identifying the potential dimensions that constitute an integrated service recovery system (ISRS), introducing a strategic, proactive and relational approach to service failure and recovery management, and by proposing a causal model linking the ISRS with performance.

The ISRS dimensions and their attributes are derived from an extensive literature review and suggestions from academics and business experts. Structural equations modeling is used to test a model linking the ISRS (conceptualized as a second order construct), with client, employee and business performance indicators, using data from a Spanish sample of 151 Knowledge‐Intensive Business Services (KIBS).

Results confirm that the firms' ability to approach service recovery from a strategic, proactive and relational perspective allows improving performance among clients and employees, that is, the external and internal recovery to occur, which leads to a superior competitive performance.

The ISRS scale can provide managers with a diagnostic tool to analyze their recovery practices and to further improve their competitiveness in the long term.

The need to assess the integrative nature of effective service recovery systems has been claimed theoretically. An empirical study showing the link between comprehensive service recovery practices and performance was lacking.

The purpose of this paper is to question whether companies follow a deliberate strategic internal pattern while responding to consumer complaints or they always offer consumers a fair redress.

A complaint sample from consumers addressed to the main Brazilian companies in four industries were examined. The responses directly provided to consumers were contrasted to those given after the mediation of Procon‐SP, the main Brazilian consumer protection agency. As an additional source of evidence a documentary research was conducted with other participants of the complaint process.

Results showed that companies retain or postpone the solution of complaints in order to discourage complainants, but once they appeal to consumer protection agencies their demands are satisfied, even when companies do not fully agree with them. This seems to reveal a strategic intent on their part.

Although the sample examined was not probabilistic, the evidence generated by the data collection and also the documents examined confirmed the results, enhancing the findings.

Government and consumer protection organizations could use this information to envision new ways to perfect regulation in order to avoid a complaint increase.

The results call the attention to the ways companies respond to consumer complaints, suggesting they do have a strategic intent regarding the solutions provided that go beyond offering a fair redress, as is recommended by marketing models highlighting market orientation and consumer satisfaction.