Quality of Feedback to E-Mail Requests - An Explorative Study in Alpine Tourism Destinations

This study explores the state of response behaviour to e-mail enquiries in alpine tourism destinations by e-mailing a typical room request with some specific questions to a random sample of 65 tourism offices. One of the striking results was that one third of those electronic enquiries were not answered at all. In addition, many other unexpected results emerged, especially relating to the service quality of replies and to the quantity of answers. Neglecting their actual responsibility as an information provider, the tourism organisation often forwarded the enquiry. As a result, the tourism organisation obviously lost control of the enquiry process and for a single e-mail, numerous answers from different hotels were sent back. Altogether, many responses had to be rated as more or less unsatisfactory which gives rise to the question how a better e-mail customer service may be achieved.