Can Corporate Fairness towards Public Authorities Enhance Customer Loyalty? A Multi-Sectorial Investigation in a Developing Country

Ovidiu Moisescu (), Oana A. Gică, Victor O. Müller and Camelia Ancuța Müller
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Oana A. Gică: Faculty of Business, Babeș-Bolyai University, 400174 Cluj-Napoca, Romania
Victor O. Müller: Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Babeș-Bolyai University, 400591 Cluj-Napoca, Romania
Camelia Ancuța Müller: Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, Babeș-Bolyai University, 400591 Cluj-Napoca, Romania

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 12, issue 1, 1-14

Abstract: This paper investigates how customer loyalty can be enhanced by improving customers’ perceptions of corporate fairness towards public authorities, taking into account the mediating role of customer-company identification, in a multi-sectorial context, in a developing country in Central and Eastern Europe. The investigation is conducted comparatively within four main industries (telecom services, retail banking services, dairy products and personal care products) and depicts the particular impact these perceptions have on customer loyalty in each domain, with practical implications concerning corporate social responsibility (CSR) communications. A consumer survey was designed and implemented among a sample of 1464 customers from Romania. The collected data was analyzed by means of partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM). We found that customers’ perception of corporate fairness towards public authorities has a significant and positive impact on customer loyalty in all investigated industries, both directly and indirectly via customer-company identification, with a higher impact for services, especially for retail banking services.

Keywords: CSR; corporate fairness; public authorities; customer-company identification; customer loyalty; structural equation modeling; PLS-SEM (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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