Ethical Issues in Service Quality

Dr Arvind Kalia
• Maintaining ethical standards in Service
marketing Mix
 What is Ethics?
• Ethics or moral principles is a branch of
Knowledge that involves systematizing,
defending, and recommending concepts of right
and wrong conduct.
• For Example – Hitler vs Gandhi concept of right
and wrong. OR Natural Law or Divine Law..
• The field of ethics, along with aesthetics,
concerns matters of value, and thus comprises
the branch of philosophy called axiology.
 Types of Ethical issues
• Truthfulness -
• Public morality – Right social conduct Or
should we show private things in public?
• Intrusion – Privacy issues
• Other Issues – many as given in the coming
slides…
 Other Issues -
• Integrity – two meanings –
– the quality of being honest and having strong
moral principles.
– the state of being whole and undivided
 Other Issues -
• Trust – two meanings –
– firm belief in the reliability, truth, or ability of
someone or something
– an arrangement whereby a person (a trustee)
holds property as its nominal owner for the good
of one or more beneficiaries
 Other Issues
• Integrity and trust –
• Idea of conducting your business affairs with
honesty and a commitment to treating every
customer fairly..
• When customers think a company is exhibiting an
unwavering commitment to ethical business
practices, a high level of trust can develop
between the business and the people it seeks to
serve. A relationship of trust between you and
your customers may be a key factor in your
company's success.
 Other Issues
• Market research:
• Invasion of privacy (e.g. obtaining research
data without permission)
• Stereotyping – drawing unfair or inappropriate
conclusions
 Other Issues
• Target customers and market:
• Targeting the vulnerable (e.g. children, the
elderly)
• Excluding potential customers from the
market (e.g. discouraging demand from
undesirable market sectors or simply refusing
to sell to certain customers)
 Other Issues
• Pricing
• Price fixing
• Price wars
• Price collusion (agreeing with other
competitors to set prices in a market to the
detriment of competition and consumers)
 Other Issues
• Advertising and promotion
• Issues over truth and honesty
• Issues with violence, sex and profanity
• Taste and controversy
• Negative advertising
• )
 What is Ethical Quality
• When most people in health care think of quality, they
think of technical quality (e.g., clinical indicators) and
service quality (e.g., patient satisfaction). But ethics
quality is equally important. For example, let‘s say a
patient undergoes a surgical procedure. From a
technical quality perspective, the operation was
perfectly executed, and from a service quality
perspective, the patient was perfectly satisfied with the
care he received. So the care was of high quality, right?
Well, not necessarily. Imagine that the patient was
never really informed—or was even misinformed—
about the procedure he received. This would indicate a
problem with ethics quality.
Charters of patient rights
SHOCKING_ In an unethical advertisement, hospital offers vacations for bringing in patients - YouTube (360p).mp4