Customer Rage: Triggers, Tipping Points, and Take-Outs

The article presents the results of a study of customer rage, which involved 50 interviews with enraged customers from the U.S., Australia, Thailand and China. It focuses on the psychological processes underlying incidents of customer rage. These are defined as cases where customers become so infuriated at a perceived lack of customer service that they may verbally or physically attack employees, or damage corporate property. It was found that such incidents typically were the result of escalating anger, rather than an immediate reaction. They usually were preceded by a series of interactions with the firm which were perceived as insulting or threatening by the customer.