Due to the need to upgrade the nation’s English ability, Taiwan’s government started teaching English in elementary schools in 2000. This has resulted in the growth of English after-school tutorial institutes (EASTIs). Due to EASTIs rapid growth, coupled with a decreasing birth rate in recent years, the EASTI industry faces an increasingly intense competitive environment. Therefore, improving service quality and increasing customer satisfaction are crucial if an institute is to remain competitive.
Resolving service problems is one way to increase service quality. This study selects an EASTI located in Tainan as the case study object, and undertakes in-depth interviews and open-ended questionnaires using the saturation method to collect 64 failure events and 99 recovery performances from both 10 parents and 10 employees, and then utilizes the method of grounded theory to analyze and generate the integrated model in order to (1) Explore the relationship between service failure, recovery, postrecovery satisfaction, and parents’ behaviors; (2) Discover the effects of service failure and service recovery on customer’s postrecovery behaviors; (3) Provide proprietors of EASTIs with management implications.
The analysis results indicate that two major failures in teacher’s teaching and student’s learning are indeed a big concern for respondents. These failures belong to teaching-delivery problems and the students’ individual behaviors. However, training and management are found to be the most effective recovery strategies as they have the most positive effect on the parent’s behavior (no parents leaving). Since the performance within these two areas are the most crucial activities within the EASTI, the Institute should pay special attention to the design of the service, the system used to deliver it, and ensuring that employees are capable of producing the results customers expect.
The integrated model this study develops may thus help EASTI businesses determine whether they have certain service failures or ineffective service recovery strategies within their operations, thus improving their overall level of service quality. Having such a model is important as it is often difficult to detect potential ineffective recoveries. Based on this study, its interesting and useful findings, and its limitations, we then provide recommendations for future studies.

Due to the need to upgrade the nation’s English ability, Taiwan’s government started teaching English in elementary schools in 2000. This has resulted in the growth of English after-school tutorial institutes (EASTIs). Due to EASTIs rapid growth, coupled with a decreasing birth rate in recent years, the EASTI industry faces an increasingly intense competitive environment. Therefore, improving service quality and increasing customer satisfaction are crucial if an institute is to remain competitive.
Resolving service problems is one way to increase service quality. This study selects an EASTI located in Tainan as the case study object, and undertakes in-depth interviews and open-ended questionnaires using the saturation method to collect 64 failure events and 99 recovery performances from both 10 parents and 10 employees, and then utilizes the method of grounded theory to analyze and generate the integrated model in order to (1) Explore the relationship between service failure, recovery, postrecovery satisfaction, and parents’ behaviors; (2) Discover the effects of service failure and service recovery on customer’s postrecovery behaviors; (3) Provide proprietors of EASTIs with management implications.
The analysis results indicate that two major failures in teacher’s teaching and student’s learning are indeed a big concern for respondents. These failures belong to teaching-delivery problems and the students’ individual behaviors. However, training and management are found to be the most effective recovery strategies as they have the most positive effect on the parent’s behavior (no parents leaving). Since the performance within these two areas are the most crucial activities within the EASTI, the Institute should pay special attention to the design of the service, the system used to deliver it, and ensuring that employees are capable of producing the results customers expect.
The integrated model this study develops may thus help EASTI businesses determine whether they have certain service failures or ineffective service recovery strategies within their operations, thus improving their overall level of service quality. Having such a model is important as it is often difficult to detect potential ineffective recoveries. Based on this study, its interesting and useful findings, and its limitations, we then provide recommendations for future studies.

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