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1 

Provide clear and effective privacy statements

2 

Follow privacy and consumer protection guidelines in all local markets

3 

Make security of customer data a priority

4 

Use independent certification bodies

5 

Emphasise the excellence of service quality in all communications.

Empathy

Although it might be considered that empathy requires personal human contact, it can still be 

achieved, to an extent, through email. Chaffey and Edgar (2000) report that of the responses 

received, 91% delivered a personalised human response, with 29% passing on the enquiry 

within their organisation. Of these 53, 23 further responses were received within the 28-day 

period and 30 (or 57%) of passed-on queries were not responded to further.

Provision of personalisation facilities is also an indication of the empathy provided by the 

website, but more research is needed as to customers’ perception of the value of web pages 

that are dynamically created to meet a customer’s information needs.

An alternative approach for considering how service quality can be delivered through 

e-commerce is to consider how the site provides customer service at the different stages 

of the buying decision shown in Figure 9.4. Thus quality service is not only dependent on 

how well the purchase itself is facilitated, but also on how easy it is for customers to select 

products and on  after-  sales service, including fulfilment quality. The Epson UK site (

www.

epson.co.uk

) illustrates how the site can be used to help in all stages of the buying process. 

Interactive tools are available to help users select a particular printer, diagnose and solve 

faults, and technical brochures can be downloaded. Feedback is solicited on how well these 

services meet customers’ needs.

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Chapter 9  Customer relationship management

These SERVQUAL elements have been applied to online banking by Jun and Cai (2001) 

in a detailed study. This supports the importance of the original SERVQUAL elements in 

an online setting. For example, it highlights the importance of a timely, accurate response 

to customer queries. It also uncovers a particular feature of online service – that customers 

expect to see a continuous improvement to site services, and suggests their satisfaction will 

be reduced if positive changes are not made.

In summary, it can be suggested that for managers wishing to apply a framework such as 

SERVQUAL in an e-commerce context there are three stages appropriate to managing the 

process.