UNDERSTANDING SERVICE EXCLUSION THROUGH VALUE CO-CREATION PARADIGM

Abstract

Given the emerging demographics of ageing populations, changing family structures, global migration and social recognition of various disabilities, the phenomenon ‘service exclusion’ remains a serious problem that is rarely discussed in service management literature. Though the transformative service research (TSR) stream calls for in-depth understanding of how services can create uplifting changes and improvements to the wellbeing of individuals and collectives (Ostrom, Parasuraman, Bowen, Patricio, & Voss, 2015), the detrimental effects of service exclusion on wellbeing, especially for the deprived consumers remains a barely investigated issue. To mitigate the unequal division of service resources and to achieve the goals of TSR, a better understanding of factors impacting the access and utilization of services by deprived individuals is needed. Service exclusion is a useful vantage from which to gain such understanding, as it can be deliberately driven by service exchange logics put in place by organizations to serve one type of customer to the exclusion of others. However, at times service exclusion is unintentional and overly perceived by victimized customers. Such service exclusion is a wicked problem in service management and is rarely discussed in the service literature.