The clock is ticking—Or is it? Customer satisfaction response to waiting shorter vs. longer than expected during a service encounter
研究发现，服务等待中，等待时间短于预期能大幅提升顾客满意度，而长于预期仅轻微降低满意度，但若预期来自零售商或等待过长则此不对称效应减弱。
Customer waits are commonplace in retail settings. To develop efficient wait management strategies, retailers need insights into how customers respond to waiting during service encounters. An intuitive insight supported by extensive research is that a longer wait duration decreases customer satisfaction. However, the same wait duration might have different effects on customers depending on whether it is shorter or longer than what customers expected. To address this question, we draw upon the research on time value and predict asymmetry in the customer satisfaction response to waiting shorter versus longer than expected: Though the clock is often said to be ticking, waiting longer than expected leads to a minor decrease in satisfaction, whereas waiting shorter than expected substantially increases satisfaction. We provide evidence for this asymmetric effect across three studies and identify two boundary conditions: if the source of the expectation is external (e.g., wait time estimate provided by the retailer) or if the wait is much longer than expected. Overall, our research encourages retailers to put the customer response to waiting into perspective: Customers will tolerate waiting longer than expected, up to a certain point.