Managing Critical Frontline Agent–Customer Interactions: The Role of Service Recovery Explanations Across Artificial Intelligence and Human Agents

Responding to service failures represents an acid test at organizational frontlines, where human service agents, alongside a growing share of artificial intelligence (AI)-powered service agents, engage in service recovery. Particularly when recovery outcomes are only partially favorable, customers may perceive these decisions as unclear or difficult to understand, potentially impairing their evaluation of the service encounter. This raises the question of whether explanations of service recovery decisions should be provided and, if so, how and by whom. Addressing this practical need and the related research gap, the article examines the effects of service recovery explanations on customers’ post-recovery reactions. Across three main studies and three supplementary studies spanning multiple service industries, the authors demonstrate that service recovery explanations can enhance customer satisfaction and choice by fostering perceptions of agent competence and warmth. These beneficial effects, however, depend on key contingencies: rationales outperform excuses and justifications, specific explanations tend to be more effective than general ones, and explanations provided by AI service agents can be more impactful than those delivered by human service agents. Overall, the article advances understanding of service recovery communication and offers actionable guidance for managing both AI- and human-mediated service recovery.