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Purpose: The development of service automation continues to underpin the travel, tourism and hospitality sectors providing benefits for both customers and service companies. The purpose of this chapter is to showcase the practice of self-service technology (SST) usage in the contemporary tourism and hospitality sectors and present a conceptual framework of customer SST adoption.

Design/Methodology/Approach: This chapter offers an examination of theory, research and practice in relation to SST usage in tourism, highlighting the benefits and drawbacks arising for both customers and service providers. Since the benefits are achieved only if SSTs gain effective adoption with customers, this chapter focuses on concepts underpinning the study of customer SST adoption. Drawing on SST adoption factors and SST customer roles, a conceptual framework of SST adoption is discussed.

Findings/Practical Implications: This chapter examines the principles and practice underpinning the usage of self-service technologies in the travel, tourism and hospitality sectors, with specific reference to customer SST roles in co-creation. The customer SST roles provide a more detailed and nuanced picture of the customer perspective on SST usage. These nuanced roles are captured in a conceptual framework which seeks to further refine the understanding of customer SST adoption.

Research Implications & Originality/Value: The framework provides a useful foundation for further research with a focus on customer empowerment in SSTs. The future development of service automation will require a balance between the delivery of a personalised and smarter customer experience and technology applications that are unobtrusive and which do not pose any ethical or privacy concerns.

Using retail banking as a setting and focusing specifically on elderly customers (i.e. individuals aged 60 or more), this study aims to deepen the current understanding of how the physical context and the need for human interaction influence elderly customers' attitudes toward self-service technologies (SSTs) and their behavior.

Using face-to-face questionnaires, a sample of 505 elderly bank customers was collected. Data were analyzed using a multi-method approach, combining a moderated mediation analysis with a fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis.

The findings suggest that a pleasant retail space may result in a positive attitude toward SSTs, which increases their co-creation intention. It also highlights that need for interaction of elderly customers with employees has detrimental effects on their attitude toward SSTs.

The current analysis was carried out among Italian elderly banks' customers. Thus, the results are highly dependent on the context of the analysis. In addition, it does not consider the different degrees of knowledge and experience the elderly may have with technology.

This study suggests that providing access and support for using technology may be essential for banks to facilitate SSTs adoption in elderly customers.

To the best of the authors' knowledge, this study represents the first attempt to examine the influence of the physical context on elderly customers' attitudes toward SSTs and their consequent behavioral intentions. Furthermore, it highlights the importance of the human touch for these particular customers.

Self-service check-out technologies (SSTs) are becoming a trend across different retail settings, allowing companies to gain efficiency and reduce costs. Nevertheless, the success of SSTs implementation is still subject to challenges and uncertainties. This study aims to provide insights for theory and managers on the necessary conditions for the successful implementation of retail SSTs.

Based on an online survey, data from 251 participants were collected to understand the factors predicting SSTs adoption and realise what conditions are mandatory for the adoption. partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) and necessary condition analysis (NCA) were used to analyse the data.

According to the NCA analysis results, 12 latent variables were relevant for predicting SSTs adoption, but only seven were necessary conditions for user adoption.

The complementarity of perspectives for understanding the adoption of SSTs based on the two data analysis techniques provides novel insights into theory and support for retailers' decision-making on self-service technologies (STTs) implementation.

Future service interactions are anticipated to use humanoid robots in a society that is shifting to a digitalized era. Currently, it is evident that many businesses are replacing service interactions with self-service technologies (SSTs). This movement creates substantial societal changes that researchers have not paid sufficient attention to comprehend. In this setting, the purpose of this study is to examine the social drivers that influence customer mobility toward co-creating value via SSTs. The study also seeks to discover variations in customers' willingness and capacity to adopt SSTs.

To fulfill the research aims, a qualitative technique was adopted, with semistructured interviews conducted with 25 SST users from varied demographic backgrounds. To recruit individuals for the study, a nonprobabilistic purposeful sampling technique was adopted, with the goal of employing information-rich instances. The data were analyzed using thematic analysis.

The study identified eight social drivers that are important in the customer transition toward co-creating value with SSTs. According to the study, SSTs are characterized as a social trend in which adoption is accepted (social norm) and modifies social connections in a new direction. Using SSTs has evolved into a socializing tool that gives people social acknowledgment. Some people see SSTs as social pressure, putting them at a disadvantage if they do not adopt. People, on the other hand, acquire sufficient social support and independence to use SSTs. Customers were categorized into four groups depending on their willingness and ability to embrace SSTs: trendsetters, dreamers, old-fashioned and stragglers.

In practice, service providers can use this knowledge to successfully promote their SSTs and create enhanced client experiences through technological interfaces.

The study adds new knowledge by identifying social determinants in customer shifts toward SSTs, a phenomenon that has not been studied previously, and it adds to marketing theory by proposing a typology to group customers based on their ability and willingness to embrace SSTs.

The current study aims to investigate the role of post‐training self‐efficacy in influencing customer perceptions and usage of self‐service technologies (SSTs). Specifically, the aim is to propose that high post‐training self‐efficacy will reduce technology anxiety and hence increase perceptions of ease of use associated with SSTs.

A self‐checkout machine in a library setting served as the study context. A total of 131 subjects were randomly assigned to two training groups (written instructions and a demonstration).

The results partially support the research hypotheses and suggest that post‐training self‐efficacy has a positive impact on customer satisfaction and ease of use. Ease of use, in turn, increased customer intention to reuse SSTs while decreasing technology anxiety.

The study has a relatively small sample size and only two training methods were tested. A control group should be included in future research.

As the first trial, the study investigated customers' post‐training self‐efficacy in SSTs by integrating training theories and SSTs studies. The results suggest service organizations use effective training programs to customers' participation in the service delivery process via SSTs. The study also explored customers' ease of use and technology anxiety in a single research. Different from previous SSTs studies, the current study suggest that ease of use and technology anxiety play various roles in customers' participation at SSTs encounters.

The purpose of this paper is to draw upon the theory of consumption values and the experiential value scale to develop a conceptual model concerning hospitality customer’s use of self-service technologies (SSTs) and their impact on consumers’ service experience.

Questionnaires were administered to 220 hotel and restaurant customers. The researchers tested the hypotheses by using descriptive analysis, confirmatory factor analysis and path analysis.

Both extrinsic and intrinsic attributes of SSTs influence consumers’ satisfaction with SST usage significantly, while the extrinsic attributes play a stronger role. It is worth noting that while the intrinsic attributes have a significant impact on consumers’ transcendent service experience, the extrinsic attributes negatively influence such experience.

The findings help managers create effective strategies to better match consumers’ needs and to deliver more customized self-service experience. The role of SSTs can be expanded beyond functional attributes to satisfy consumers’ curiosity, foster customer–customer interactions and personalize consumer experience.

Although most SSTs research focus on technology adoption intention, features, functionality and benefits to the service provider, this research is among the first attempts to examine the role of SSTs in creating better consumer experience. The bidimensional conceptualization of SSTs experience developed in this research suggests that SSTs in the hotel and restaurant sector should be utilized for reasons beyond their utilitarian attributes: SSTs should be designed to help create a transcendent service experience.

Notwithstanding a significant amount of literature on the technology acceptance model (TAM), past research has overlooked the role consumers' technology readiness (TR) plays in adoption of self‐service technologies (SSTs). This study aims to fill this research gap by developing and testing a model that integrates the role of TR into the TAM.

The study proposes a research framework to suggest the direct and moderating roles of TR in the TAM. Extant research from various research streams is reviewed, resulting in 13 hypotheses. Data collected from customers with SST experiences are examined through structural equation modeling (SEM) and hierarchical moderated regression analysis.

Results indicate that customer TR enhances perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, attitude toward use, and intention to use. Results also show that TR attenuates the positive relationship between perceived ease of use and attitude toward using SSTs.

This research represents an early attempt to explain the role of TR in the TAM in the context of SSTs. Future research directions are discussed, with emphasis on incorporating customer differences and situational factors to better understand this model in various service settings.

Findings show that TR influences perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, attitude toward using SSTs, and behavioral intentions. Therefore, to achieve better SST service outcomes firms implementing SSTs should give increased attention to customer TR. Firms should stimulate the use of technological services by strengthening positive TR drivers (the optimism and innovativeness dimensions) to encourage use of technological services and positive attitudes toward technology, while also reducing TR inhibitors (the discomfort and insecurity dimensions) to lower reluctance to use technology.

This study is the first to integrate the role of TR into the TAM in the context of SSTs.

This paper aims to offer and examine a conceptual model of tourist innovativeness toward self-service technologies (SSTs) to confirm whether tourists prefer service delivery by SSTs over employees in an offline hospitality environment.

Tourists’ perceived usefulness (PU) of SSTs and need for interaction (NI) with service employees have been taken as crucial mediating variables to examine the effects of perceived ease of use and technology readiness index personality dimensions toward SST and employee-based service adoption.

Findings reveal that both “NI” and “PU” play significant roles in Technology Readiness and Acceptance Model (TRAM) when tourists select one of two service delivery options – SSTs and service employees.

The foremost limitation of the study is its dependence on domestic tourist samples. However, such samples were chosen because tourists comprising these samples tend to use similar service delivery options more, in turn increasing their use of SSTs available in sample hotels.

The study gives a deeper understanding of TRAM with an extremely crucial mediating variable (NI) in an offline service context. It also provides useful insights to service providers and policy makers for developing new strategies and policies to enhance user experience.

This study recommends the usage of numerous SSTs by tourists.

During extensive literature review carried out in this research, no study was found that proposed such an effective framework in an offline service context.

Few marketing studies look at service classifications for self‐service technologies (SSTs) and none directly compare consumer‐based perceptions of traditional services to SSTs. To fill this gap, this study aims to examine how customers perceived traditional services and SSTs on service classifications criteria proposed by Lovelock, Bowen and Bell.

In two separate studies consumer ratings for each classification method on each service were obtained. Using multi‐dimensional scaling (MDS), 13 traditional services and 12 SSTs were separately mapped onto a perceptual space of service classifications.

The comparison of the two perceptual spaces reveals that consumers viewed the classifications of convenience, person/object, and delivery for SSTs differently than that for traditional services. The classifications of traditional services were represented by two dimensions of customization/standardization and person/object. In contrast, the classifications of SSTs were represented by two dimensions of customization/standardization and separability/inseparability. Thus the description of the underlying dimensions of services varied by traditional services or SSTs.

It is possible that the results of the MDS were influenced by the use of preset classifications. Results may also be influenced by the authors' choice of MDS method. Further research is needed regarding the classification of SSTs and the use of these classifications for SST design.

This research extends previous consumer‐based classification research by including SSTs. The findings identified separate typologies for SSTs and traditional services. The typologies should be of interest to both researchers and managers who are interested in how SSTs are perceived by consumers.

This study aims to examine how technology readiness (TR) influences customers' perception and adoption of self‐service technologies (SSTs) through development of an empirical model to explore the relationships among TR, perceived service quality, satisfaction and behavioral intentions toward SSTs.

A theoretical framework is proposed to suggest the links between the four constructs. Extant research and concepts from various fields, including marketing, psychology and information system (IS), are reviewed, deriving six hypotheses. Data from SST users is examined through structural equation modeling (SEM).

Results indicate TR influences perceived SST service quality and behavioral intentions, while perceived SST service quality has a positive impact on customer satisfaction and behavioral intentions toward SSTs.

This study represents an early attempt at explaining the role of TR in customer SST usage. Future research directions are discussed, with an emphasis on incorporating attitudinal, behavioral, situational and psychographic factors to improve our understanding of SST usage.

TR should be given increased attention by firms implementing SSTs to improve customer perception and adoption of SSTs. Firms also need to examine all SST service quality dimensions in order to improve customer satisfaction and behavioral intentions toward SSTs. An aggressive approach toward strengthening TR drivers and reducing TR inhibitors will show benefits for both firms and customers.

This paper represents the first study to propose and empirically examine the relationships among TR, perceived SST service quality, satisfaction and behavioral intentions toward SSTs.