Driven by technological developments, deregulation, and globalisation the service sector in post‐industrial economies is facing unprecedented change. Utilising a scenario planning framework, the paper examines the impact of such changes on a cross‐section of service categories. Acknowledging...

Purpose – This paper considers the notion of consumer empowerment across the financial, legal and medical service sectors in the UK. Although the advent of the internet is generally seen as potentially enabling consumer empowerment, theoretical papers divide on the question of efficacy. On the...

This paper considers the impact of the Internet on professional services, which are characterised by high levels of interpersonal interaction and where a significant component of the service product is information and expertise. For such services the Internet is primarily an accessible...

This paper considers the impact of the internet on professional services, specifically healthcare services which have been characterised as asymmetrical in information and power distribution. For complex professional services the internet is primarily an information resource offering perceived...