Amity Business School

Amity Business School

MBA Class of 2010, Semester III
Classification of Services
Prof. P K Bansal
 Service Process
A Strategic Insight Amity Business School

• A service is essentially a process and not a

physical product.
• Process is directed at different ends depending
upon the nature of service.
• Some services process people and some may
process objects.
• Service process can be manual or mechanised
or involve both.
• Part of the service organisation that has direct
control and responsibility of the service
processes is called service operation system,
involving interplay of people and equipments.
• A customer because of his physical presence in
the system or factory, is more concerned with
operations happening in front of him unless when
services fail to conform to expectations.
 Amity Business School

• Visible portion of overall service depends on the

nature of service process. It also decides, the
importance of the duration a customer’s physical
presence is required in a service system.

• This leads to an important classification on the

basis of two important dimensions:

1. What is processed? Object or a Person

2. How is it processed? What is the Nature of

Process? Tangible or Intangible actions
 Strategic Classification
People
Services directed at
people’s bodies.
( People Processing )
Tangible  Health Care
Actions  Beauty Salons
 Restaurants
 Public Transportation
Services directed at
people’s minds.
( Mental Stimulus
Intangible Processing )
Actions
 Education
 Theaters
 Information Services
Things Amity Business School
Services directed at goods
and other physical
possessions
( Possession Processing )
 Freight Transportation
 Repair / Maintenance
 Dry Cleaning
Services directed at
intangible assets.
( Information Processing )
 Banking
 Legal Services
 Insurance
 People Processing
Amity Business School

1. Customers must physically enter the system.

2. Sometimes, service provider goes to customer
with necessary tools.
3. People must be prepared to spend time actively
cooperating with the service operation.

• Level of involvement can vary.

• Managers must think about processes /

outputs in terms of what happens to
customers or what benefits are created.

• Identify non-financial costs, time, mental and

physical effort, fear, and pain etc.
 Possession Processing
Amity Business School

• Working to tight deadlines to restore customer’s

possessions to good working order.

• People are less physically involved and

usually, no real need for them to enter the
service; often limited to requesting the service;
explaining the problem or paying the bill only.

• The output in each instance, whether, installing

software or repairing car etc. should be a
satisfactory solution to a stated problem.
 Mental Stimulus
Processing Amity Business School

• Services that interact with people’s mind.

• Anything touching people’s mind has power to
shape attitudes and influence behaviour.
• Customers are in a position of dependency, and a
potential for manipulations. Hence, strong
ethical standards and careful oversight are
required.
• Recipients should spend time but not necessarily
be physically present in a service factory; just
mentally in communication with information being
presented.
• Information based content can be converted to
digital bits, recorded or transformed into
manufactured products viz. CD’s, Video’s, which
can be packed and sold like any physical product.
 Information Processing
Amity Business School

• Most intangible form of service output.

• Customer involvement determined more by

tradition or personal desire to meet face to face
and not by the needs of the operational process.

• Customer / Supplier learn each other’s needs,

capabilities and personalities by personal
meetings, however this relationship can also
be build / sustained on trust or telephonic
contact.