Four items capture the degree to which a customer perceives that changing service providers would mean forfeiting particular privileges, benefits, and preferential treatment built up through the existing relationship. The items frame switching costs as foregone relational gains rather than acquisition costs -- what would be given up rather than what would need to be learned or paid. The scale is one component of a broader multi-dimensional switching costs framework.
Full scale items shown. Always cite the original source when using this scale in research.
Items were originally developed by Jones, Mothersbaugh, and Beatty (2002) using 'hairstylist/barber' as the service provider reference. Nagengast et al. (2014) used a generalised version substituting 'provider' for the specific service type, making the scale applicable across service categories. Item 4 contains minor grammatical imprecision ('I would lose preferential treatment if changed providers') -- this phrasing should be reproduced exactly as it appears in the version used by Nagengast et al. (2014) if scale fidelity is important; researchers may choose to correct it ('...if I changed providers') if naturalness of language is a priority, though any modification should be disclosed. The scale was used in Study 2 in a European banking context; generalisability to other service categories should be verified. AVE of .78 exceeds the .50 threshold.
Nagengast, L., Evanschitzky, H., Blut, M., & Rudolph, T. (2014). New insights in the moderating effect of switching costs on the satisfaction-repurchase behavior link. Journal of Retailing, 90(3), 408-427.
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