Institute for Management, Business, and Accounting Studies Institute for Management, Business, and Accounting Studies

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Digital Self-Service Business Systems: A Scoping Review of Customer Autonomy, Service Efficiency, and Managerial Control
Digital self-service systems have become central to contemporary digital business, reshaping how customers access, perform, and evaluate service tasks. Across retail, hospitality, banking, healthcare, transport, and platform-based services, organisations increasingly rely on kiosks, mobile apps, chatbots, online portals, and automated interfaces to move routine activities from employees to customers. This shift changes the service encounter from an employee-led interaction into a digitally mediated process in which customers are expected to participate more actively. The objective of this scoping review is to map the literature on digital self-service business systems through three interconnected dimensions: customer autonomy, service efficiency, and managerial control. Rather than treating self-service technologies only as technical tools, the review frames them as business systems that redistribute work, responsibility, and decision-making among customers, employees, and managers. The review therefore focuses on how digital self-service systems create value, where they create friction, and how firms attempt to govern service quality at scale. The review follows a scoping synthesis approach informed by PRISMA-ScR principles. Some peer-reviewed journal articles were included to capture recent developments in self-service technology, service automation, customer participation, chatbot service, frontline technology, service robots, and scoping review methodology. The synthesis charts dominant technology types, service contexts, customer outcomes, operational claims, and managerial control mechanisms. The review contributes a structured map of the digital self-service literature and identifies gaps in how autonomy, efficiency, and control are studied together. Existing research is rich but fragmented, with many studies concentrating on customer acceptance, service failure, or specific technologies rather than integrated business-system governance. Future research should examine how firms can design self-service systems that balance customer agency, operational productivity, ethical responsibility, and service quality assurance.
Journal of Digital Business and Management Studies
Review | Open access | 18 March 2026 | Article: 94