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LAWYERS' PERCEPTIONS OF CONSUMERS' ATTITUDES: SATISFACTION, QUALITY, AND SELECTION CRITERIA*

Howard G. Schutz, Ph. D. * * Katherine V. Diaz-Knauf, M.P.A.

Debra S. judgg M.S.

The legal profession in the United States has experienced significant growth since the 1950's from less than a quarter of a million li- censed lawyers to well over half a million in 1985.182 This increase in the [legal population] has resulted in demographic and employment pattern changes within the profession, including a rising proportion of female lawyers, a lower median age, proliferation of work settings (i.e., corporate, state, federal), specialization, a decline in the number of private practices and, most recently, the marketing of legal services. Specializa-

* Due to the sociological nature of this article, footnotes have been printed in the original form, i.e. not in legal citation format.

** Professor of Consumer Sciences; Staff Research Associate Department of Con- sumer Sciences, University of California, Davis, California 95616 (916) 752-3043; Post- Graduate Researcher, Department of Anthropology, University of California, Davis, Cal- ifornia 95616 (916) 752-0745.

This research was supported by a grant from the University of California, Davis and by a grant from The Center for Consumer Research, University of California at Davis to HGS.

Reprint requests should be sent to: Howard G. Schutz, Ph.D., Dept. of Consumer Sciences, University of California, Davis, CA 95616.

A mail survey of Sacramento, California lawyers elicited information on satisfaction, and service quality for 10 categories of service providers including lawyers, and the importance ratings of 12 choice criteria for the selection of a legal service provider. There is considerable variation in the ratings for both perceived consumer satisfaction and dissatisfaction among the respondents. Consumers are perceived as being dissatisfied with the average services provided by lawyers. "Consumer previous experience with provider" and "qualifications/training" were the two most important criteria for lawyers and as perceived for consumers by lawyers.

1. Curran, B. A., K. I. Rosich, C. N. Carson, and M. C. Puccetti (1986), Supplement to The Legal Statistical Report: The U.S. Legal Profession in 1985, Chicago, IL: American Bar Foundation.

2. Curran, B. A. and F. 0. Spalding (1974), The Legal Needs of the Public, Chicago, IL: American Bar Foundation.

88 The Journal of the Legal Profession

tion within the legal and medical professions offers the consumer additional opportunities to select among several service providers to best meet consumer needs. Attention has been focused in recent years on the marketing of legal services and its effects in the marketplace. This has been one of the most dramatic changes in the profession resulting from the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Bates v. State Bar of Arizona relaxing the rules on attorney advertising3 A recent survey by the American Bar Association found that since the Supreme Court decision approximately 24% of ABA members use advertising and an additional 18% intend to use one form or another of advertising in the f ~ t u r e . ~ Seventy-one percent advertise their services through the yellow pages, 16% newspapers, 8% magazines or journals, 7% television, 5% radio, and 4% use direct mail. In 1985 lawyers spent $38 million on television commercials, up 36% from the previous year and 3800% since 1977.= Of those lawyers who have tried advertising, 82% were satisfied with the results and plan to continue advertisinge Moreover, the number of lawyers advertising is increasing by more than 5,000 per year.' As a result of these and other changes, the legal profession is undergoing a period of transition in the 1980's.

Contemporary consumers are typically sophisticated, have high ex- pectations, and after selecting a professional service provider few are willing to settle for what they perceive as substandard service. Results of the corporate counsel survey conducted by The American Lawyer indicate that the nation's largest companies consider themselves to be sophisticated consumers of legal services, want to have things done their way and expect service.8 Yet, there appears to be little information available to guide the consumer with the selection process for a professional service provider. Smith and Meyer conducted a survey of practicing lawyers and consumers in the United States to obtain data on the criteria used to select a legal service pro~ ider .~ They concluded that

-- - -- -- - -

3. Bates v. State Bar of Arizona (1977), 97 S. Ct. 2691, 2699, 2700. 4. Curran, B. A., K. I. Rosich, C. N. Carson, and M. C. Puccetti (1985), The Lawyer

Statistical Report: A Statistical Profile of the U.S. Legal Profession in the 7980's, Chicago, IL: American Bar Foundation.

5. "Lawyers Step Up Ads and Marketing as Competition Intensifies: American Bar Association Survey" (1986), Marketing News (August lo), 10.

6. "Lawyers Lean the Hard Sell - and Companies Shudder" (1985), Business Week (June lo), 7@71.

7. See n. 4. 8. "What Clients Want (and are not getting)" (1985), The American Lawyer (No-

vember), 3-26. 9. Smith, R. E. and T. S. Meyer (1980), "Attorney Advertising: A Consumer Per-

Consumers' Attitudes 89

although personal information sources play an important role in the selection process for professional service providers, consumers would like to have additional information describing available options prior to selecting and/or retaining an attorney or legal firm. Schutz and Judge studied selection criteria for choosing 16 occupational service providers including lawyers. They reported that consumers do take a more active role in selecting certain professional service providers and, as a result [they] experience a higher degree of service satisfaction.l0 Other research on consumer satisfaction and dissatisfaction has focused primar- ily on health services or on sets oif services selected by the inve~tigators.~l.l~,l~

Consumer spending for services is expected to triple in this decade since a more mobile population has resulted in an increase in, and de- mand for, professional service providers.14 Competition among the service industries, the legal profession in particular, has intensified in recent years.15,1e For example, consumers may now select from the new types of professional legal service providers currently available in the marketplace, such as specialty law firms, discount law firms, franchise law firms, and even law firms located in shopping malls. Furthermore, the competition within the legal profession for clients and the overabun- dance of lawyers (1 lawyer to 360 Americans) have brought about the adoption of marketing and advertising strategies by lawyers and law

spective," J. Marketing, Vol. 44, 56-64.

10. Schutz, H. G. and D. S. Judge (1986), "Consumer Satisfaction with Physicians," Proceedings, Advances in Health Care Research Conference, American Association for Advances in Health Care Research, 49-51.

11. Hill, D. (1986), "Satisfaction and Consumer Services," Advances in Consumer Research, 13, 311-315.

12. Schutz, H. G. and D. S. Judge (1983), "Selected Evaluative Criteria Importance in the Choice of Service Providers," Proceedings of the Division of Consumer Psychol- ogy, Division 23, 1983 Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association, 111-114.

13. Quelch, J. A. and S. B. Ash (1981), "Consumer Satisfaction with Professional Services," in Marketing of Services, J. H. Donnelly and W. R. George, eds., Proceedings of the American Marketing Association.

14. "Service Industries: Growth Field of '80's" (1980), U.S. News and World Re- port (March 17), 80-84.

15. Lewin, T. (1983), "A Gentlemaniy Profession Enters a Tough New Era," The New York Times (January 16), C-I.

16. "More Lawyers Reluctantly Adopt Strange New Practice -Marketing," (1987), The Wall Street Journal (January 30), 2 1.


firms nationwide as a means of s u r v i ~ a l . ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ It appears that now more than ever, consumers need to know more about the professional services and legal options available to them before they select a lawyer or law firm.

Although lawyers must meet certain requirements before establish- ing a practice, they vary significantly in their skills, knowledge and abili- ties. Clearly, information (and lack thereof) plays a significant role in the selection process for a professional service provider. Previous research on service pr0viders2~21 suggest that additional work is needed in order to explore further the various factors associated with the selection process of a legal service provider, the importance of the selection criteria used in the process, type of information needed by consumers to facilitate selection of a service provider, and the effect, if any, this information has on the selection process and the perceived service quality and consumer satisfaction. One type of additional potentially useful information is the attitudes of providers of legal services toward these issues, in particular, selection criteria where we could find no reported studies on this topic in the literature.

The purpose of this study was to gather data from attorneys in Sacramento, California and to elicit their opinions on the overall quality of services and perceived consumer satisfaction for 10 selected services, as well as to determine the importance of 12 selection criteria for legal services.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

A mail survey of 500 Sacramento, California lawyers was conducted using the California State Bar Association membership listing as the sampling frame and a systematic random sampling procedure. The data was collected during June/july 1985, using a three-wave mailing technique as follows: first, a letter and questionnaire were mailed to each lawyer in the sample; second, a reminder postcard was sent one

17. "'The Old-Fashioned Way' Can Earn Misfortune" (1986), Marketing News (August 1986), 10.

18. "The Blue-Chip Lawyers Discover Marketing" (1983). Business Week (April 25), 89-94.

19. Bernstein, P. W . (1982), "Profit Pressures on the Big Law Firms," Fortune (April 19), 84-96.

20. See n. 10. 21. Schutz, H. G. and M . Casey (1982), "Consumer Satisfaction with Occupational

Services: Quality, Frequency, Attitudes, and Information Sources," Proceedings, Con- sumer Satisfaction, Dissatisfaction and Complaining Behavior Conference, 81-86.


week after the first mailing; and third, another letter and questionnaire were sent three weeks after the initial mailing to those lawyers from whom no response had been received.22 Forty-nine percent of 492 de- liverable questionnaires were completed and returned by using this mailing method. This response rate compares favorably with similar research on l a ~ y e r s . ~ ~ , ~ ~ , ~ ~ It has been pointed out by Leslie that lower response rates for homogeneous populations are less likely to bias results.26 The six-page questionnaire required approximately 30 minutes to complete. Cross-tabulation of 69 selected variables by week of re- turn did not indicate any statistically significant monotonic trend differ- ences over time; evidence that there is minimal non-responder bias.

In an effort to better understand the views of California service providers about service quality and the service transaction, lawyers were asked to provide information about their general attitudes to- wards consumer services including quality, cost and governmental regulation. Ten categories of service providers were listed, and respondents were asked to provide ratings on consumer satisfaction and on the quality of the service. Types of services included repair of goods, personal, professional and home repair. A list of 12 characteristics used by consumers to select a service provider was included, and lawyers were asked to provide importance ratings for each criterion for legal services on a scale of 1 "not important" to 10 "very important." Lawyers were also asked to indicate their perceptions of consumers' ratings for each criterion. After examining the distribution of importance values, the 10 point scale was collapsed to 5 points and the values were r e c ~ d e d . ~ ~ , ~ ~ For example, 1 and 2 were recoded to 1 and so on. A series of state- ments characterizing consumer and service provider transactions elicited information regarding agreement and disagreement levels. Demo- graphic information was requested from each respondent, and information on specialization, clientele, business size, etc. was re-

22. Dillman, D. A. (1978), Mail and Telephone Surveys: The Total Design Method, New York, NY: John Wiley and Sons.

23. See n. 9. 24. Bloom, Paul N. (1977), "Advertising in the Professions: The Critical Issues,"

Journal of Marketing, Vol. 41, 103-1 10. 25. Bloom, Paul N. and Stephen E. Loeb (1977), "If Public Accountants are Allowed

to Advertise," MSU Business Topics, Vol. 25, 57-64. 26. Leslie, L. L. (1972), "Are High Response Rates Essential to Valid Surveys?," So-

cial Science Research, l , 323-334. 27. Nie, N. et al. (1975), Statistical Package for the Social Sciences, New York, NY:

McCraw Hill Company. 28. SPSSX User's Guide, 2nd Edition (1986), Chicago, IL: SPSS Inc.


quested for each respondents practice.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

A. Characteristics of respondents and their legal practice

The distribution of respondents by sex, age, and ethnicity is presented in Table 1. Of 240 respondents, 192 (80%) were male. One hundred and fifty (63%) were 40 years old or younger. Two hundred and eleven (89%) were Caucasian and 25 (11%) were Asian American, Black, Hispanic, or Native Americans.

Lawyers were asked to provide information on the categories of legal services, years in practice, years practicing in current locale, type of yearly service transactions, method of payment, and annual gross income for the service or practice. One hundred and eighty-six (79%) reported providing specialized services, while 49 (21%) provide a fairly wide spectrum of services. One hundred and fifty (63%) have been in practice 1 to 10 years, 89 (37%) 11 years or more. One hundred and forty-six (62%) respondents have been providing legal services in the current locale 1 to 5 years, and 37 (16%) 11 years or longer. One hundred and forty-nine (63%) lawyers in the sample are members of a chain, group, or firm, and 86 (37%) practice "indepen- dently." O f those members who practice in a chain, group or firm set- ting 90 (53%) reported providing anywhere from less than 100 to 250 service transactions during the past year, 60 (35%) 251 to 1,000, and 18 (11%) over 1,000 yearly transactions. The most frequently used method of payment for service transactions was "check" according to 118 (53%) of the sample. One hundred and four (50%) lawyers reported an annual gross income for their service or practice of $25,000 to $74,999, 34 (16%) $75,000 to $224,999 and 57 (27%) over $225,000. These numbers include both individual and group practices; therefore, a cross-tabulation was run for type of practice by income. Forty-seven percent of lawyers who are engaged in individual practices reported earnings of $25,000 to 74,999, and 17% over $225,000.

B. General information

The questionnaire completed by the respondents contained 69 items assessing consumer satisfaction, quality of service, 10 categories of service providers including lawyers, selection criteria, consumer and lawyer attitudes, and demographic characteristics. Fifty-three percent of the sample rated quality of consumers services available in the market-


place as "good" or "very good" (Table 20) Thirty-nine percent of the respondents believe that overall quality of services over the last ten years has "stayed the same," 27% "increased", and 34% "decreased." Cost of services was viewed as "high" by 69% of those surveyed. The preponderance of respondents are satisfied with current levels of regulation for lawyers, and an approximate equal percentage see the need for "more" or "less" regulation (Table 2). Since this question did not request further elaboration on the part of the respondent, we are una- ble to determine what aspect of regulation is considered too little or excessive.

C. Consumer satisfaction

Lawyers were asked to rate 10 categories of service providers including legal services for perceived consumer satisfaction and for the overall quality of the service. There is considerable variation in the ratings for both perceived consumer satisfaction and dissatisfaction among the respondents (Table 3). Lawyers believe that consumers are satisfied with barbers/beauticians and dentists (96 and 95% satisfied, respectively), and least satisfied with real estate and auto repair (43 and 31% satisfied, respectively). Among the three professional services listed, the legal profession ranked the lowest with 53% of lawyer respondents indicating perceived consumer satisfaction. These results are similar to those reported in earlier studies among Sacramento area residents and the general California population for the same services (Table 4).2e,*

Among the various professional groups, lawyers do not enjoy a good public image. According to a recent Gallup Report, they ranked at the bottom of a list of "trusted" professional^.^^ Lawyers, for the most part, agree with the ratings assessed by the general populace (Ta- ble 4). Fifty-three percent of responding lawyers perceived consumers as satisfied or somewhat satisfied with legal services (Table 5). This un- derestimates consumer satisfaction as previously reported by Schutz and Casey of Sacramento area residents.32 Schutz and Casey reported that 77.5% of Sacramento consumers rated legal services as satisfactory

29. See n. 20. 30. Schutz, H. G. (1979), California Consumers' Satisfaction with Goods and Ser-

vices: Problems, Actions and Attitudes (A Report to the Director of Consumer Affairs), University of California, Davis, CA.

31. Gallup Report No. 230. 32. See n. 20.


or somewhat sat i~factory.~~ Attorney perceptions of consumer satisfaction may be colored by the majority belief that 'legal professionals provide only average quality service (Table 6).

D. Service quality

Table 6 presents data on the rating results assessing the quality of service available in the marketplace for each of the ten services and shows that, in general, lawyers are satisfied with quality of services. Seventy-four percent rated the quality of service provided by dentists as "high" to "very high." Barbers/beauticians and physicians received 57% and 48%, respectively in the "high" to "very high" category. Real estate and auto repair ratings were 13% and 8%, respectively in the "high" to "very high" category. However, 56% of the sample felt that quality of service was "average" for auto repair and 46% for real estate. Spearman rank order correlation (rho) of lawyer ratings for the quality of services was correlated with perceived consumer satisfaction as reported by lawyers for three out of ten services namely, pest control (rho = .65, p < .001), real estate (rho = .64, p < .001), and auto repair (rho = .61, p < .001).

Forty-seven percent of the lawyers perceived consumer dissatisfaction with legal service providers, and 57% felt that the quality of service they were providing was "average." Thus, consumers are perceived as being dissatisfied with the average services provided by lawyers. This low level of quality judgment is not a professional bias since both physicians and dentists are viewed as providing higher quality service than are lawyers.

E. Selection criteria

Mean importance ratings on a five point scale of the 12 criteria used by lawyers in selecting a legal service provider range from 2.5 to 4.5, and perceived consumer ratings range from 2.9 to 4.6 (Table 7). The majority of the respondents (67%) rated consumer's previous experience with provider as "very important" when selecting a legal service provider, and 68% said consumers felt likewise. Sixty percent of respondents indicated that reputation/recommendation was "very important", and over half (51%) said consumers also felt that way. Qualifi- cations and training was rated "very important" by 49% of the lawyers and ranked 3rd for importance among the 12 criteria. However, the

33. Id.


lawyer perceived consumer rating was much lower with only 20% of the sample "very important" and ranking 8th for importance among the 12 criteria as perceived by consumers. According to an earlier consumer study, 74% of Sacramento consumers felt that qualifications and training was the most important criteria for selecting a legal service pro- ~ i d e r . ~ ~ Credit availability was the least important criterion to attorneys in the selection of a lawyer; 8% of the respondents indicated "very important." Yet, the lawyer perceived and actual consumer ratings of this criterion was somewhat higher with 15% and 31% indicating "very important."

Price was rated "very important" by only 22% of the lawyers; however, the perceived consumer rating was considerably higher at 49%. Clearly, lawyers sense that price is viewed differently from a consumer perspective, and this was confirmed by Schutz and Casey with 56% of the respondents rating it "very i m p ~ r t a n t . " ~ ~

F. Consumer and legal service provider attitudes

Attorneys were asked a series of attitudinal questions about the relationship between consumers and legal service providers. Forty-nine percent of the respondents "strongly agree" that there is a high risk associated with poor choice of a legal service provider. Over half (53%) of the lawyers in the sample "agree" that there is too little information available for consumers to make a good choice of legal service providers. The majority of respondents feel that there is great variability among legal service providers (97% "agree" or "strongly agree"). Fifty- four percent "agree" that consumers have difficulty recognizing the type of service that they need. Only 35% "agree" that consumers seem to be at ease in complaining to them when dissatisfied with the legal services provided, while 33% "disagree."

G. lrnplications to the legal profession

These results suggest that there is a need for legal service providers to facilitate client communication. This can be accomplished through brochures, informational type meetings such as seminars, workshops, etc. This will obviously benefit consumers who are faced with having to select a legal service provider and will increase consumer satisfaction with their selection decision. Another benefit would

34. Id. 35. Id.


be an improved lawyer-client relationship. Consumers might then experience a higher degree of satisfaction with legal service providers and an improved quality of service by reducing the discrepancy about what they expect and what they experience. One result, for example, might be a reduction in the importance of service price to provider selection. Notably, competition among legal service providers for new clients in recent years has intensified, making it necessary for some firms to adopt marketing techniques in order to capture and retain clients. It is also not uncommon to learn that some law firms are now retaining public relations advisers, while others are using the ultimate weapon of price reduction.

Another finding is the apparent "low self image" of lawyers as compared to their image of other professionals. Our data does not al- low us to determine the root causes of this attitude. Certainly the fact that lawyers think consumers hold a similar attitude may be one con- tributing factor. We are still left with the problem of why consumers hold this attitude. Delineating whether lawyers' attitudes are a reflection of consumer attitudes or are independent is important in evaluating the role of self image in the provider-client interaction.

Additional study is required to determine the effects marketing and advertising have had on legal service providers and consumers. Further- more, an examination of lawyers' attitudes and behavior toward clients, and self image research would be valuable, and, perhaps, might result in suggestions for improving aspects of the lawyer-client relationship.


TABLE 1. Sociodemographic characteristics of sample of California lawyers.

SEX: f %

Male 192 80

Female 48 - 20

240

AGE:

RACE:

White-Anglo 211 89

Other 2 5 11

236

INCOME:

< $25,000 14 7


TABLE 2. General information results rating by lawyers.

Overall Quality of Consumer Services

Very Good 3.9%

Good 49.8%

Fair 42.1%

Poor 4.3%

N = 233

Quality of Services Over the Last 10 Years

Increased 26.6%

Stayed the Same 39.1%

Decreased 34.3%

N = 233

Cost of Services to Consumer

Extremely High 6.8%

High 69.4%

Average 21.3%

Low 2.6%

N = 235

Future Government Regulation of Lawyer Qualifications

More Regulation 25.0%

Same Regulation 45.7%

Less Regulation 29.3%

N = 232


TABLE 3. Consumer satisfaction/dissatisfaction as perceived by lawyers for 10 surveyed services.

Satisfied Dissatisfied Service Category Total Rank Total Rank N

Auto Repair

Barber/Beautician

Dentist

Dry Cleaner

House Painter

Lawyer

Pest Control

Physician

Plumber

Real Estate


TABLE 4. The proportion of 3 respondent groups reporting that they are "satisfied" or "somewhat satisfied" with legal services.

Sacramento Area California2 Lawyers' Sacramento Area1 General

Service Category Perception Residents Population % % %

Auto Repair 30.6 35.6 53.3

Dentist 94.8 76.6 78.3

Dry Cleaner3 84.3 63.9 -

House Painter3 77.6 44.0 -

Lawyer 53.0 50.8 68.6

Pest Control 67.1 44.4 61 .O

Physician 77.4 70.1 74.5

Real Estate 42.8 40.4 61.2

Schutz and Casey, 1982. * Schutz, 1979.

Service not included in the 1979 study.

TABLE 5. Lawyer satisfaction rating by Sacramento area consumers and perceived consumer satisfaction rating by lawyers.

Somewhat Satisfactory Satisfactory

% %

Sacramento Consumers 50.8 26.7 77.5 (Schutz and Casey, 1982)

Attorneys' Perception of 14.0 39.0 53.0 Sacramento Consumer Satisfaction


TABLE 6. Quality ratings of 10 services as perceived by lawyers.

Very Very Service Category High High Average Poor Poor N

% % % % %

Auto Repair 1.3 6.5 55.7 28.3 8.3 230

Barber/Beautician 8.7 48.1 41.1 2.2 - 23 1

Dentist 19.6 54.8 23.9 1.3 .4 230

Dry Cleaner 4.8 31.4 52.4 10.5 .9 229

House Painter 2.0 18.0 67.3 10.7 2.0 205

Lawyer 9.3 23.9 57.5 8.0 1.3 226

Pest Control 2.8 12.7 61.3 18.9 4.2 212

Physician 11.2 37.1 43.5 6.9 1.3 232

Plumber 3.2 22.0 65.1 6.4 3.2 218

Real Estate 2.2 11.1 45.8 28.0 12.9 225

Scale: 1 = Very Poor thru 5 = Very High.


TABLE 7. Mean importances of 12 selection criteria reported by Sacra- mento consumers, lawyers and as perceived for consumers by lawyers. Percentage of respondent groups indicating that the criteria is "very important."

Sacramento1f2 Perceived2 Consumer Lawyer2 Consumer

Very Very Very Important - Important - Important -

Criteria % X N % X N % X N

Location 24.8 3.3 359 16.5 3.2 231 21.6 3.7 227

Range of Service 55.5 4.1 353 12.9 3.1 232 11.0 3.2 227

Ease of Obtaining Appointment 51.4 4.2 356 22.0 3.6 232 27.3 3.9 227

Promptness 58.7 4.3 351 39.8 3.9 231 30.3 3.9 228

Office/Equipment 28.3 2.9 339 8.7 2.9 229 3.1 2.9 225

Friendly 55.1 4.0 356 24.0 3.8 233 28.9 4.0 228

Reputation/ Recommendation 78.5 4.6 368 60.5 4.5 233 51.1 4.4 229

Price 55.9 3.9 358 22.1 3.7 231 49.3 4.3 229

Consumer's Previous Experience with Provider 55.2 4.1 346 67.4 4.5 233 68.1 4.5 229

Qualifications/ Training 73.8 4.7 359 49.3 4.3 229 20.4 3.5 226

Credit 31.1 2.8 341 8.4 2.5 225 15.2 3.4 223

Complaint Handling 55.9 3.8 340 20.3 3.4 231 16.0 3.3 225

Schutz and Casey, 1982. Scale: 1 = Very Unimportant thru 5 = Very Important.

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