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The study aims to investigate the illegitimate customer complaining behavior (ICCB) in the hospitality industry from the perspective of frontline employees. In particular, this study identified ICCB incidents, ICCB triggering factors and inhibitors in the hospitality industry.

A qualitative research approach was adopted in this study by using in-depth personal interviews. Twenty-six semi-structured interviews were conducted with frontline employees who had first-hand experiences with ICCB in the hospitality industry. The interviews were transcribed, coded and analyzed following the procedures of open coding, axial coding and selective coding.

Analysis of the qualitative data has revealed 7 types of ICCB incidents, 11 ICCB triggering factors and 3 ICCB inhibitors in the hospitality industry, as perceived by frontline employees. The study also proposed a multiple-layer model of ICCB triggers and inhibitors based on the results. Four propositions are developed delineating three layers of driving forces and the dynamics between ICCB triggers and inhibitors that exert joint effects on ICCB.

Impacts of various cultural settings, different hospitality business settings (hotels vs restaurants) and profile information of frontline employees on ICCB need to be examined in future research.

Findings of this study contribute to the customer complaining literature and the hospitality service management literature by offering the frontline employees’ perspective of ICCB. Hospitality businesses can benefit from this study by using the research findings to develop more effective company policies and training programs to recognize, monitor and resolve ICCB incidents.

The current study aims at exploring China’s tourism sustainability issues as indicated in magazine articles related to China tourism. China’s environmental, socio-cultural and economic sustainability has been frequently discussed in Western media.

Both qualitative and quantitative research methodologies were used to content analyze the textual data in one of the most popular US travel magazine – National Geographic in the past ten years (2003-2012).

This study presents the changes of topics on China tourism image conveyed by Western media in the past ten years (2013-2012). In addition, themes on China tourism sustainability issues are extracted from the China tourism image messages. The results reveal China tourism sustainability issues in two levels: sustainability issues directly related to China tourism with two dimensions of environmental sustainability and socio-cultural sustainability, and sustainability issues indirectly related to China tourism with two dimensions of economic sustainability and socio-cultural sustainability. Furthermore, the results delineate both positive and negative observations on environmental, socio-cultural and economic sustainability.

The findings of the study highlight challenges and successful practices of the sustainable development in China tourism destinations and the importance of incorporating tourism image in sustainable practices, as well as a need of better communication with foreign media.