In a competitive business environment, people refrain from purchasing products toward which they are ambivalent or hold negative evaluations. This makes customer satisfaction very imperative. However, in a less competitive environment, the importance of customer satisfaction decreases as the firms have increased bargaining power. For e.g. consider you are dissatisfied with the services of any Airline. However, in purview of your convenience, schedule, availability of seats and substantial difference in pricing you might still opt for the same one.

 

Do oligopolistic and monopolistic firms have a leeway when it comes to meeting customer satisfaction and/or service recovery to pacify the dissatisfied customers?

 

I would say that the Oligopolistic firms may get a leeway depending on the type of product they are providing. For example, if we talk about telecom providers forming an Oligopoly, the customers may have to live with it because it is a service that is a "MUST HAVE" even if they are not satisfied with it. But if the product is not a must have, the customer may just choose not to have the service at all.

 

By textbook definition, Monopolistic competition is a type of imperfect competition where the products are differentiated by branding or quality such as restaurants, clothing etc. Even if the competition is imperfect, a consumer could choose a product where the level of satisfaction is higher and forego some of their requirements.

 

So in my view, not always can oligopolistic and monopolistic firms can overlook customer satisfaction.