International Comparison Analysis of Attitudes in Complaint Handling

― Survey of Customer Service Professionals in Japan, the U.S., and the U.K. ―

Abstract

The entire Japanese tourism industry is welcoming more and more international tourists again, with Japan gradually easing visitor restrictions since April 2022. As a result, responding appropriately to complaints from international customers has become increasingly important. However, no studies have been conducted to reveal and compare how customer service representatives in Japan, the U.S., and the U.K. handle complaints. Based on the results of the previous study by the author, the attitudes toward complaint processes in those three countries are compared in this paper. The survey included more than 300 customer service professionals from each country. It elucidates differences in how those countries handle complaints: When addressing complaints, Japanese respondents try to use psychological service recovery, that is, apologize properly, whereas Americans and Britons try to meet the needs of customers with economic service recoveries, such as compensation and gifts. Differences also exist in the awareness of difficulties when responding to complaints: Americans and Britons are more likely than Japanese to feel confident when resolving customer complaints. Furthermore, this study reveals differences in attitudes toward foreign customer complaints in each country. Finally, based on the findings of this study, this paper proposes a complaint resolution model for these three countries, which can provide useful suggestions for how Japanese customer service professionals can effectively handle complaints from international customers.