Online service qualities in the multistage process and patients’ compliments: A transaction cycle perspective

Abstract

This study examines patients’ use of different compliments for healthcare service quality through a three-stage process in the transaction cycle: pre-, during-, and after-sale. Based on the transaction cycle framework, we explore how a patient’s choice for psychological and material compliments is affected by service quality received at different stages, and how the effects vary depending on the service price. Using data collected from an online health community (OHC) in China, we reveal several important findings. First, service quality at each stage is an important driver of patient compliments. Second, high service quality at the pre- and after-sale stages motivate patients to give material compliments rather than psychological compliments, whereas psychological compliment is more likely to be triggered for high service quality received at the during-sale stage. Third, service quality at one stage enhances the effect of service quality at its subsequent stages on compliments. Fourth, service price increases the influence of service quality on compliments, and patients tend to give material returns over psychological returns for doctors charging high service price. This paper extends prior research on service quality from a transaction cycle perspective and provides OHCs with implications for theory and practice.