Many companies have introduced self-service technologies (SSTs) although not every customer wants to use or is able to use new technologies. This study aims to explain the actual use of SSTs by analysing a framework based on antecedents derived from the social cognitive theory, such as role clarity, perceived crowdedness, and need for interaction, and technology readiness dimensions.
Survey data were collected from 525 passengers (40% response rate) at a European airport. The passengers choose between a self-service check-in and an interpersonal check-in counter. Perceived crowdedness appears to have the strongest impact on the customers' decision to use SSTs. In addition, need for interaction and role clarity seem to have a significant impact on the actual use of SSTs. The results indicate that technology readiness does not have a significant impact on the use of SSTs. These findings contribute to the domain of knowledge concerning the implementation of SSTs and consumer behaviour, providing important implications for academia and practice.
The increasing use of information and communication technologies in the service industry has resulted in a revolution in the interaction between service providers and their customers. Service providers introduce self-service technologies (SSTs) to improve their productivity and efficiency and to serve customers via new channels to increase customer satisfaction and customer loyalty (Meuter et al., 2003). A SST is a technological interface that enables customers to produce goods and services without a direct contact with the service provider (Meuter et al., 2000). Examples of SSTs are: Internet banking, self-scanning possibilities in warehouses and supermarkets, paying bills by mobile phones, the airline check-in via Internet, check-in booths at airports, interactive kiosks, interactive phone/voice systems, ATMs, package tracking, tax preparation software, electronic retailing, and Internet shopping (Lu et al., 2009, Auh et al., 2007, Eriksson and Nilsson, 2007, Liljander et al., 2006, Lin and Hsieh, 2007 and Van Beuningen et al., 2009). Customers of service providers become co-producer of such a service.
The most important obstacle for the providers of such SST applications is to trigger customers to try to use such a SST for the first time (Bitner et al., 2000) otherwise known as the initial trial decision (Meuter et al., 2005).
Despite the rapid increase of the use of SSTs, the literature on the antecedents that influence the use of these SSTs by customers is rather limited (Bolton et al., 2007, Lin and Hsieh, 2007 and Meuter et al., 2005). The success of technology-based self-services depends significantly on whether or not customers have the capability to use the new information technology (Wang and Shih, 2009). Parasuraman (2000) introduced the technology-readiness construct, referring to a person's predisposition to use new technologies. The use of SSTs is likely to be influenced by technology readiness (TR), which reflects the consumer mental readiness to accept new technologies (Tsikriktsis, 2004). So far, little academic research has been done on the impact of TR on consumer behaviour (Lin and Hsieh, 2007). In addition, some recent studies show ambiguous relationships between TR and the use and appreciation of SSTs (Liljander et al., 2006 and Massey et al., 2005). There are also questions on the impact of situational factors on the actual use of SSTs (Eriksson and Nilsson, 2007, Lin and Hsieh, 2007 and Lin et al., 2007). People are driven not only by personal factors (Zhen et al., 2007) but also by situational factors (Oyedele and Simpson, 2007). The actual use of an SST is likely to be impacted positively in a crowded environment (perceived crowdedness; Machleit et al., 2000) and in situations where customers know what is expected from them (role clarity; Lee and Allaway, 2002). The literature provides theories and other contributions to analyse antecedents of usage intentions, usage or satisfaction with SST's (e.g. the technology acceptance model, the innovation diffusion theory or the SERVQUAL approach; see for instance Dabholkar, 1996, Dabholkar et al., 2003 and Anselmsson, 2001). However, while these contributions include general perceptual variables, this study focuses on individual differences and situational factors.
In addition, research is foremost limited to behavioural intentions, in many cases using student samples (Chen et al., 2009), instead of the actual behaviour of a representative sample of customers that need to make a choice between using a self-service technology or not (Cunningham et al., 2009, Robertson and Shaw, 2009, Meuter et al., 2005 and Tsikriktsis, 2004). While most studies try to explain the “intention to use” self-service technologies, we have used a powerful design in a real-life setting in which customers had to make a choice between an interpersonal encounter and a technologically based encounter (i.e. an SST; analogous to Reinders et al., 2008).
The aim of this study is to analyse the effect of attitudes toward technology (technology readiness and need for interaction) and situational factors (perceived crowdedness and role clarity) on the selection behaviour of customers, regarding their actual use of an SST or a traditional service interaction with an employee interaction. We have constructed a theoretical framework that incorporates explanatory factors, from which a number of hypotheses were derived. The hypotheses are tested, using survey data which were collected from passengers of international flights at a Dutch airport. Passengers had the choice between a check-in at the counter and a self-service kiosk.
