Stories of Service Slip‐Ups: Judgments of Pre‐Service Deservingness Shape Reactions to Service Failures

Consumers frequently share service, often leading to brand avoidance. Existing research focuses on service‐related factors that emerge during or after the encounter, leaving a critical gap in understanding how pre‐service factors influence reactions. This study reveals that consumer actions before the service—despite being entirely unrelated to the failure—significantly influence third‐party responses. Across four studies, including a consequential choice‐based experiment, it is shown that consumers perceived as undeserving of the service do not trigger typical negative reactions when they complain. Interestingly, these deservingness perceptions, formed before the service encounter and based on factors unrelated to it, drive a shift in third‐party reactions. Moreover, third parties shift the blame onto the complainant and actively support the brand due to justice‐restorative motives instead of just dismissing the complaint. Theoretically, this study introduces pre‐service deservingness as a previously unexplored factor, demonstrating that fairness heuristics shape marketplace behavior even when events are unrelated and temporally distinct. Additionally, it uncovers a shift from skepticism to active brand advocacy, where third parties intervene to restore justice rather than merely discount complaints. From a managerial perspective, brands can strategically navigate service failures by leveraging third‐party justice perceptions to influence consumer advocacy and brand defense.