#3383. Knocking sovereign customers off their pedestals? When contact staff educate, amateurize, and penalize deviant customers

October 2026publication date
Proposal available till 23-05-2025
4 total number of authors per manuscript0 $

The title of the journal is available only for the authors who have already paid for
Journal’s subject area:
Social Sciences (all);
Arts and Humanities (miscellaneous);
Strategy and Management;
Management of Technology and Innovation;
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Abstract:
Promoted by marketing discourses, customer sovereignty is characterized by the cult of the customer and the belief that contact staff have to serve the customer. However, research shows that customers adopt improper conduct, such as fraudulent or aggressive behaviors. While largely tolerated, these behaviors prove damaging for contact staff and could eventually lead them to react. The scholars use Becker’s interactionism approach to deviance, and investigate how frontline actors in five organizations deal with customer complaints they consider as ‘deviant’. Our results show that when faced with behaviors that they no longer wish to tolerate, contact staff educate, amateurize, or penalize the customer. This research contributes by conceptualizing three alternative forms of relations to customer sovereignty, which contact staff attempt to legitimize through internal and external resources.
Keywords:
complaint; customer relations; customer sovereignty; deviance; frontline staff; service work

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