Service recovery expectation is defined as “the method by which the subject believes the service failure should be solved” (Harris, Grewal, Mohr, & Bernhardt, 2006, p. 427). In order to provide service recoveries, online retailers should adopt a customer’s perspective and not merely a provider’s perspective whereby adequate service expectations are defined as “the level of service the customer will accept” (Zeithaml, Berry, & Parasuraman, 1993). We inferred that when consumers complain aggressively, they may expect high service recovery efforts (i.e., a remedy) to reduce their dissatisfaction (Yi & Lee, 2005). The following hypothesis was proposed:
Hypothesis 1: More aggressive consumer complaint behaviors would lead to higher expectations for service recovery efforts.

Type A Personality The Type A behavior pattern is characterized by competitive- achievement striving, time urgency, hostility-aggression, and impatience (Keltikangas-Jarvinen & Jokinen, 1989; Nay & Wagner, 1990). Baron and Byrne (1994) found that Type A individuals were easily irritated, highly competitive, always in a hurry, and hence more aggressive than Type B persons. In the complaint behavior context, Bennett (1997) found that Type A people would be more prone to be complainers than would Type B people.

Locus of Control (LOC) The concept of internal/external locus of control was proposed originally by Rotter (1966). People who believe that the events that occur in their lives are consequences of their own behavior and/or ability, personality, or effort are said to have internal locus of control, while individuals who believe that events in their lives are a function of luck, chance, fate, god(s), powerful others beyond their control, or manipulations are said to have an external locus of control. Bodey and Grace (2006) suggested that individuals who maintain a high level of perceived control would be more likely to complain than those who do not. As a result, we expected that consumers’ locus of control would moderate customers’ perceptions of e-service failures. Type A or internally oriented consumers tend to believe that their efforts can achieve goals (Kirkcaldy, Cooper, & Furnham, 1999). They believe their complaints can provide the retailer with opportunities to improve. Furthermore, if they make a complaint, they will want a resolution that satisfied them and makes up for their negative feelings of frustration and loss. The following hypotheses are proposed:
Hypothesis 2a: When e-service failures occur, Type A consumers are more likely to engage in aggressive complaint behaviors than others are.
Hypothesis 2b: When e-service failures occur, internally oriented consumers are more likely to engage in aggressive complaint behaviors than others are.
Hypothesis 3a: When Type A consumers engage in more aggressive complaint behaviors, they tend to expect higher service recovery efforts than others do.
Hypothesis 3b: When internally oriented consumers engage in more aggressive complaint behaviors, they tend to expect higher service recovery efforts than others do.

E-Service failures In e-service failure evaluations, respondents were asked to indicate how they perceived the severity on a 5-point scale ranging from strongly disagree (rated 1) to strongly agree (rated 5); then, they were asked to describe how they generally deal with their concerns in sequential behaviors.

Consumer complaint behaviors The revised form of consumer complaint behavior constructs by Singh (1989) is a 3-item Likert-type scale scored 1 (strongly disagree) to 5 (strongly agree). We constructed an index simply by accumulating scores assigned to consumer complaint behaviors (Babbie, 2004) with higher scores indicating more aggressive consumer complaint behaviors.

Service recovery expectations The service recovery expectation construct was assessed using a 4-item 5-point Likert-type scale, with scores ranging from 1 = strongly disagree to 5 = strongly agree. The most frequently used strategies of service recovery were an apology and a remedy (Kelley, Hoffman, & Davis, 1993; Smith et al., 1999). Customers were offered only an apology in the apology recovery description, while customers were to be given a 20% discount for their next purchase in the remedy recovery situation. Higher scores were indicative of higher service recovery expectations.

Type A Type A was assessed using a modified version of the Friedman and Rosenman (1974) scale. The modified version of the scale consists of 20 items, each rated on five points, ranging from not often (rated 1) to very often (rated 5). The high and low groups were obtained by a split at the overall mean value (M = 61.7). Those who registered high scores were classified Type A, those with low scores Type B. The internal consistency of the modified version of the scale used in this study was .76.

Locus of control Locus of control was assessed using the 11-item Barnett and Lanier locus of control scale (Barnett & Lanier, 1995). This scale requires yes–no responses from participants, with higher scores indicating more internal locus of control. The high and low groups were obtained by a split at the overall mean value (M = 4.7). The internal consistency of this scale has been reported to be .58 (Barnett & Lanier, 1995). Barnett and Lanier indicated that single-factor solutions provided higher internal consistency and easier interpretability. The internal consistency of this scale for the sample in this study was .61.

Control variables Age, gender, educational level, and online shopping frequency were included as control variables. Each demographic variable was measured with one self-rated item.

With regard to personalities, Type A consumers tend to engage in aggressive complaint behaviors because they are competitive, aggressive, irritable, worry about deadlines, and are work- and achievement-oriented. Consequently, they may not tolerate the faults of online retailers. On the other hand, internally oriented consumers believe in their own control of things and that complaints can improve online retailers’ performance. The findings show that individuals’ achievement orientation and perception of control over others will influence their behavior.

Similarly, the effects of Type A and locus of control have significant influences on the relationship between consumer complaint behaviors and service recovery expectations. The results were consistent with our predictions. One reason is that Type A/internally oriented consumers would claim compensation to reduce their dissatisfaction and to retrieve their loss because they believe that by these actions they can achieve what they want (Kirkcaldy, Cooper, Furnham, & Brown, 1993; Kirkcaldy, Furnham, & Cooper, 1994).

Based on our findings, we make the following suggestions to online retailers. Firstly, consumers’ personalities should be taken into account when developing consumer complaint behaviors and service recovery strategies. Previous researchers have discussed such personality characteristics as Type A (Bennett, 1997) and locus of control (Bodey & Grace, 2007) in bricks-and-mortar stores, but the impact upon consumer complaint behaviors and service recovery expectations has been less clearly established in an online setting. Online retailers should be aware of which personality characteristics move consumers to voice their complaints or, alternatively, to remain silent. Online retailers have to be aware that some customers may be uncomfortable with the whole process of complaining, thus choosing to exit rather than voice their complaint. For instance, Type B or externally oriented consumers appear to avoid engaging in aggressive complaint behaviors because they believe that, by doing so, they will face a conflict.

Secondly, we suggest that, because some customers such as Type A and internally oriented consumers are likely to expect high service recovery efforts, online retailers should provide efficient service recovery procedures to meet the dissatisfied customers’ wants and expectations. Finally, during online shopping, a buyer interacts with a mediating environment (Wolfinbarger & Gilly, 2001) that may not detect service failures. When online consumers meet problems in that environment, they may complain by e-mail or by phone to a call center, in contrast to offline dissatisfied consumers. This implies that online retailers should facilitate self-recovery through the engineering of easy-to-use online mechanisms; their customers will thus gain feelings of control over, and − ultimately − satisfaction with, the process.

One limitation of this study is that we used hypothetical service scenarios instead of real failure situations encountered by respondents. Future studies can be extended to include actual complaint experiences. In this study the purpose was to define the relationships among e-service failures, consumer complaint behaviors, and service recovery expectations in one particular industry. The approach outlined in this study should be replicated in other industries to ensure the results are consistent. In addition, in this study two personality traits were discussed in the context of complaint behaviors. We suggest that future research might include more generalized personal antecedents, such as self-confidence (Gronhaug & Zaltman, 1981), self-monitoring (Bearden & Crockett, 1981), assertiveness, and aggressiveness (Slama & Williams, 1991).

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