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This study aims to develop a set of dimensions for measuring the service of moneychangers.

Attributes for measuring the moneychanger service were created from exit interviews and a review of the literature, and then administered a survey to consumers who had just completed a currency exchange. Respondent feedback was factor analysed, creating six service dimensions: “appearances of the tangibles”, “cost of service”, “interpersonal skills”, “service delivery”, “administrative matters” and “display board”.

The “service delivery” and the “cost of service” dimensions exceeded customer expectations; the “appearances of tangibles” and the “interpersonal skills” dimensions fell short of expectations; “administrative matters” and the “display board” dimensions merely met expectations. A general finding of this study is that moneychangers, even though they are small businesses, are able to effectively compete with corporate giants (i.e. banks) in exchanging currencies; they achieve this through more than meeting customer expectations in respect of their service delivery and costs.

Based on this research, it is recommended that researchers who conduct studies in service areas might first take steps to identify measures which are specific to the type of business being investigated.

From a practical viewpoint, if the proprietors of moneychanger businesses want to improve their service, they should take steps to upgrade the interpersonal skills of the staff who serve customers and the appearances of those tangibles which are visible during service encounters.

Develops a set of dimensions for a specific type of business.

This study seeks to identify the types of incidents which cause consumers to switch between banks, the weighting of each incident on the switching decision, whether single or multiple incidents influence switching decisions, and the extent to which switchers explain the problems they have faced prior to exiting. The key findings show that bank switching is strongly influenced by three types of incident: service failures, pricing and inconvenience, with pricing being more influential. Seventy‐five percent of bank switching is caused by more than one incident, and some 7 percent of respondents said they had spoken to bank staff in the period before exiting. The implications of these findings are presented.

Undergraduates constitute an attractive segment of customers for retail banks in many countries of the world, including Singapore. This study, using a sample of Singapore’s undergraduates, sets out to establish a ranking of the various dimensions which influence their bank selection decision and seeks to determine how homogeneous undergraduates are in relation to their selection decision. Seven bank selection dimensions were identified, the most important being undergraduates should “feel secure”, while the least important dimension was “third party influences”. Responses between those “attending engineering courses and non‐engineering courses” were compared, as were those between “males and females” and “single and multiple bank users”. More significant differences were found when engineering undergraduates were compared with non‐engineering undergraduates. Irrespective of these differences, the sequencing of the seven selection dimensions was invariably in the same order.

This paper illustrates why consumers are resistant to using internet banking.

A survey was used to acquire data from 127 consumers who were not internet bank users.

Using a content analysis procedure, eight factors were identified which explain why consumers are not using internet banking. In order of frequency, the factors are: perceptions about risk; the need; lacking knowledge; inertia; inaccessibility; human touch; pricing and IT fatigue.

A list of those consumers who were not internet banking users could not be sourced, meaning that a random sample could not be carried out. The factors which emerged, however, appear to provide a comprehensive understanding of why certain consumers are not internet banking users. The factors provide a useful basis for researchers to conduct studies to better understand what influences a consumer decision not to use the internet as a means of sourcing banking services.

The findings provide a framework for creating a strategy to enhance adoption rates.

The findings create an awareness of the various reasons explaining why consumers are not becoming internet banking users. The various reasons provide scholars with an opportunity to conduct further research in this area and practitioners with an opportunity to enhance adoption rates.

Hotels can be classified as a type of business which not only uses large amounts of capital, but also employs relatively large numbers of people. The present study sets out to establish how Singapore’s Gazetted hotels (i.e. those hotels which have met certain minimum criteria as laid down by the Singapore Tourism Board) select their bank. The study also sought to establish how satisfied these hotels were in relation to the various selection criteria, the range of bank and non‐bank financial products they used and the extent to which they engaged in multiple banking and why. The results showed that pricing and geographical proximity were very important when selecting a bank. Generally, banks were found to more than satisfy the respondents in relation to the selection criteria, especially in regard to geographical convenience and accuracy of bank statements. The Gazetted hotels used a range of borrowing and non‐borrowing products, indicating that they are generators of both fee and interest income for banks. A majority of the respondents engaged in multiple banking and mainly did so in order to seek out the best borrowing rates.

This study, using a sample of adult Singaporeans, established that 76.8 per cent of its respondents engaged in multiple banking. The Post Office Savings Bank was main bank to 61.3 per cent of the respondents, while the local full licence banks were main bank to 35.1 per cent of the respondents. These same banks held 27.6 per cent and 66.1 per cent respectively of subsidiary bank relationships. Multiple bank customers were typified as being people who were tertiary educated, were Chinese and were paid an income of $2,000 p.m. and above. No significant differences were found upon comparing single and multiple banking customers based on five psychographic characteristics.

Internet banking is a form of self‐service technology, costing millions of dollars, which leading retail banks have made available in the recent past. An understanding of why users are more accepting of Internet banking services should help bank managers implement this self‐service technology. This study identifies eight characteristics which influenced the rate of adoption. Two of these characteristics, namely accessibility and confidentiality, are new to the literature. The results show that adopters of Internet banking perceive the service to be more convenient, less complex, more compatible to them and more suited to those who are PC proficient. Adopters were also found to be more financially innovative. The perceptions that adopters had about social desirability, confidentiality, accessibility and economic benefits were viewed no differently when adopters were compared with non‐adopters.

Managers and entrepreneurs are increasingly being challenged to respond to a world where it is harder to effectively make and implement their decisions. Over half the decisions managers make are never implemented. We have observed entrepreneurs and managers in a wide range of situations in various countries, who illustrate a different set of assumptions for making decisions. They illustrate an entrepreneurial logic, a process of creatively defining and taking action to make sense out of situations which require new frameworks, assumptions and understandings. They assume that many challenges are not predictable and controllable. Certain control‐oriented attitudes and behaviors inhibit people from thinking this way, such as attempts to make decisions without fully understanding the right question, and overly relying on statistics. Certain reframing attitudes and behaviors – diversity in thinking, asking the right questions, and reframing and adapting quickly – illustrate ways to make sense of the paradoxes and uncertainties in the new economy.

Establishes that, in Singapore, which has a minority of Muslims in its population, both Muslims and non‐Muslims are generally unaware of the culture of Islamic banking. Also the two separate groups have different attitudes towards the Islamic banking movement, with the degree of difference depending on the nature of the respective matter put to them. For example, when asked what they would do if an Islamic bank did not make sufficient profits to make a distribution in any one year, 62.1 per cent of Muslims said they would keep their deposits within the Islamic banking movement, while 66.5 per cent of non‐Muslims said they would withdraw their deposits. In relation to bank selection criteria, there was general accord as between Muslims and non‐Muslims on the rating of the various criteria. Five significant differences were noted, the most relating to “being paid higher interest on savings”. The desire to be paid higher interest was far stronger with non‐Muslims.

Banks' service failures are a major determinant of bank customers' switching behavior, which ultimately affects the profitability and stability of banks. Guided by the expectancy violation theory (EVT), this study aims to examine whether and how bank reputation influences the relationship between service failure and customers' switching behavior in the Malaysian banking industry.

By distributing questionnaires to Malaysian bank account holders, the authors gathered 320 usable responses, which were subsequently subjected to explanatory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, Logit regression, Probit regression and independent-variables T-test to identify and elucidate the relationship existent between the dependent and independent variables.

This study discovered that bank reputation affects the bank customers' switching behavior directly and indirectly via banks' service failure, thereby verifying the application of EVT in the context of customer management.

Although the profile of respondents in this study presents a reasonable representation of the Malaysian population, the use of convenience (non-probability) sampling method via online survey may not provide generalizable results.

This study empirically revealed that bank reputation plays a moderator role between service failure in banks and customers' bank-switching behavior. This observation offers useful insights to bank managers into the role of bank reputation in managing customers' switching behavior.