The effect of intangible service quality on retailing during the COVID-19 pandemic in Saudi Arabia

• Main Author: Alzaydi, Zyad
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Growing Science 2021-01-01
• Series: Management Science Letters
• Online Access: http://www.growingscience.com/msl/Vol11/msl_2021_57.pdf

The purpose of this study is to investigate how online to offline service quality influences the customer’s perceived risk and trust towards the retailer and how these factors impact customer satisfaction and intention to revisit. The present study incorporates intangible service quality offline aspects, such as empathy, and online aspects, such as mobility. The objective of the research is to examine the integration of online to offline service quality models in Saudi Arabia during the COVID-19 pandemic, using key aspects of offline, online and mobile service quality. The data was collected using an online survey of 289 respondents from Saudi Arabia. The analysis was conducted using partial least square and structural equation modelling. This study finds that the intangibility of service quality has a positive impact on perceived trust; however, the direct relationship between the intangibility of service quality and perceived risk is not supported. The study’s results support the hypothesis that customer satisfaction has a positive impact on the intention to revisit and that received trust positively affects satisfaction. The results have implications for service managers in the retailing and e-commerce sectors and offer a better understanding of how different channels of service affect customers’ perceptions and intentions to revisit.