Benefits Analysis of Live Customer Support Chat in E-commerce Websites: Dimensions of a New Success Model for Live Customer Support Chat

This study investigates an important newly implemented type of customer support in major e-commerce web sites, which is the live service chat feature. The study provides a benefit analysis of live customer support chat. It further reviews solid theoretical frameworks of service quality including the Integrated Gaps Model of Service Quality and the service quality model. The study introduced new dimensions of success for Eservice quality (system quality, system reliability, system availability, information quality, consistency of service quality and online customer feedback). The study also provided a new theoretical framework for e-service quality success (particularly live customer service chat), which provides a solid ground for further research in this new and critical area of customer support.