For nearly three decades, companies have held a common belief that "recovering" after delivering a poor customer service experience earns stronger customer loyalty than if a company delivered an excellent experience in the first place. This concept is called the service recovery paradox (SRP), relying on the assumption that customers appreciate our fallibility and that the act of "making things right" actually strengthens the company-customer bond. After all, who doesn't like a story of redemption?

While this happy narrative provides comfort, particularly to companies that make a lot of mistakes already, is it indeed true? Do customers really give companies added loyalty when companies deliver poor service, or is SRP actually a myth?