The notion that a consumer will have pre-purchase expectations about the online
service experience and post-purchase perceptions of that experience follows from
Parasuraman et al.’s (1985) original SQ model, which is based on the
expectancy-disconfirmation paradigm whereby a consumer’s expectations are
confirmed if their perceptions match them and they are thus satisfied. Consumers’
expectations and perceptions are exogenous to the retailer. Consumers are unable
to “see” the retailer’s “back room” operations; thus there is a line of visibility separating
the consumer from the retailer whereby activities beyond the line of visibility are
endogenous for the retailer. The customer service goal of any firm is to match or manage
expectations through ensuring proper SQ of endogenous variables and operations to
minimise any gap or disconfirmation between a consumer’s expectations and
perceptions (Grant, 2007).