Customer services quality

This paper contributes to the service quality literature by applying the service performance (SERVPERF) model in an under-researched Zambian universities context. Therefore, it examines the influence of each service quality dimension on overall service satisfaction and behavioural intentions in terms of loyalty and positive word of mouth. Based on a quantitative correlational design , primary data were collected from 656 senior final year undergraduate students at one public university. The findings indicate that service quality performance dimensions (tangibility, reliability, responsiveness, empathy and assurance) are each significantly positively related to overall customer satisfaction which in turn affects behavioural intentions. For scholars, administrations and policy makers, the study shows that the service performance model is a valid and useful framework for assessing and monitoring how students form their service quality perceptions and behavioural intentions. This paper is the first to extend the service performance model of service quality into the under researched developing country context of higher education in Zambia.

The present research explored the effects of nonverbal mimicry behavior and mimicker attractiveness in a natural retail context.  A 3 (nonverbal mimicry, non-mimicking, anti-mimicry) by 2 (attractive salesperson, attractiveness control) design was used to study the effects of different combinations of these variables on female customers’ (N = 150) purchases, customer service ratings, and plans to return to the store.  Results showed that customers spent the most and had the highest customer service ratings when they interacted with a salesperson who was both attractive and mimicking them.  When the salesperson, however, was less attractive and engaged in the opposite gestures as the customer, it corresponded with substantially lower customer service ratings and a tendency to not wish to return to the store.  The theoretical and practical implications of these findings for mimicry and attractiveness in a retail environment are discussed.

The purpose of the paper is to comprehensively review the extant literature on the level of satisfaction of passengers in India from in-flight quality of services provided-for passengers travelling with different purpose-Business or Leisure in the low cost carriers and the passengers' re-flying intention with the same airlines. A total of 180 research papers related to the study were accessed and only 84 papers were found to be relevant. Most of the studies conducted on airlines services quality are focused on the North American, European and Southeast Asian countries, but there are limited studies on the emerging markets of the Asian region like India. SERVQUAL, SERVPERF and AIRQUAL have been used extensively as relevant tools for service quality measurement. The review of existing literature also suggests that statistical techniques mostly used for analysis included Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) and Regression Analysis.

Purpose – This paper demonstrates how psychological safety influences individual contributions in customer groups where multiple customers co-create a service experience. It also shows the influence of other customers’ contributions on an individual customer’s own contribution to the service experience as well as the individual customer’s perception of his/her own and of other customers’ contributions toward service satisfaction.
Design/methodology/approach – This empirical research paper is based on structural equation modelling to examine customer group experiences of two different service providers, a white water rafting company and an indoor soccer company. Data from a survey of a combined total of 273 consumers were utilised to test the research model.
Findings – The results demonstrate that, on an aggregate level, psychological safety affects an individual customer’s perception of his/her own and others’ contributions to a service experience. The findings show that the contributions of others have a significant influence on one’s own contribution. No influence or relationship could be found regarding one’s own contribution and service satisfaction; however, other customers’ contributions have a negative effect on an individual’s service satisfaction. The results vary on a subsample level.
Research implications/limitations – The generalisability of the findings is limited to two customer group services, one group sport experience and one group leisure experience.
Practical implications – This research provides insights for service firms with respect to managing the provider-to-multi-customer co-creation interface.
Originality/value – This article contributes to the analysis of co-creation efforts of individuals in groups with respect to a specific environment (psychological safety). It adds value to the discussion of factors that influence the partial creation of a service by individuals while interacting with one another and the impact on the perceived outcome. The paper provides a platform for further research on aspects of co-creation in customer groups.
Keywords – customer groups, service experience, psychological safety, contribution, satisfaction
Classification – Research paper

Evaluation of airlines based on service quality criteria can help to improve the processes of airlines, and also can give guidance to travel agencies to provide better choices for passengers and tourists. In this study, a hybrid simulation-based assignment approach is proposed to deal with multi-criteria decision-making problems with a group of decision-makers. A probability distribution is used to model decision-makers’ opinions and constructing a stochastic decision matrix. Then some efficient multi-criteria decision-making methods are utilized for evaluating alternatives in a simulation process. The proposed approach is applied to a problem of evaluation of five airlines with respect to opinions of 58 experts on 28 criteria. The results show the efficiency of the proposed to handle decision-making problems with a large number of experts. Moreover, the evaluation results are more reliable than the other decision-making approaches because of simulating decision-makers’ opinions, using multiple methods and evaluating based on aggregative results.

Öz: Bu çalışmada sağlık ve zindelik merkezleri üyelerinin hizmet kalitesi algıları ve müşteri bağlılık düzeyleri arasındaki ilişkinin test edilmesi amaçlanmıştır. İlişkisel tarama modelindeki çalışmanın araştırma grubunu sağlık ve zindelik kulüplerine üye olan toplam 205 (Ortyaş = 27.53± 7.09) üye oluşturmaktadır. Kolayda örnekleme yöntemi ile seçilen katılımcılar "Hizmet Kalitesi Değerlendirme Ölçeği" (HKDÖ) ve "Spor İşletmelerinde Müşteri Bağlılığı Ölçeği"ni (SİMBÖ) cevaplamışlardır. Parametrik testlerin temel varsayımlarının test edilmesinden sonra, verilerin analizi için tekrarlı ölçümler için t-testi, MANOVA, ANOVA ve Pearson correlation istatistiki yöntemleri kullanılmıştır. Yapılan tekrarlı testler t-test analizi sonuçları "HKDÖ"nin tüm alt boyut puanlarında anlamlı farklılık olduğunu göstermektedir. MANOVA analiz sonuçları cinsiyet değişkeni ana etkisi açısından katılımcıların "SİMBÖ"nin "önem-zevk almak" ve "HKDÖ"nin "program" alt boyut puanlarının anlamlı olarak farklılaştığını göstermiştir. Analizler, fiziksel aktiviteye katılım sıklığı değişkeninin "HKDÖ" ve "SİMBÖ" alt boyutları üzerindeki temel etkisinin anlamlı olduğunu göstermektedir. Fiziksel aktiviteye katılım sıklığı ana etkisi açısından katılımcıların "SİMBÖ"nin "davranışsal niyet", "değişime direnç", "genel tatmin", "algılanan değer", "durumsal ilgilenim", "önem-zevk almak", "ifade etme" ve "HKDÖ"nin "personel" alt boyut puanlarının anlamlı olarak farklılaştığı sonucuna ulaşılmıştır. Son olarak yapılan Pearson korelasyon analizine göre hizmet kalitesi ve müşteri bağlılığı arasında istatistiksel olarak pozitif yönde anlamlı bir ilişki olduğu sonucuna ulaşılmıştır. Sonuç olarak, üyelerin hizmet kalitesi ve müşteri bağlılık düzeyleri arasında pozitif bir ilişkinin olduğu ve üyelerinin hizmet kalitesine ilişkin beklenti ve algıları arasında farklılıklar oluştuğu söylenilebilir. Anahtar Kelimeler: Hizmet kalitesi, müşteri bağlılığı, sağlık ve zindelik kulübü Abstract: The aim of this study was to test the relationship between service quality perceptions and customer loyalty of health and fitness club's members. The research group of the study in the descriptive research model is 205 (Mage = 27.53 ± 7.09) members in health and fitness clubs. Participants who were selected with the convenience sampling method answered the Turkish version of "Service Quality Assessment Scale" (T-SQAS) and the Turkish version of "Loyalty Scale in Sport Services" (T-LSSS). After testing the basic assumptions of parametric tests, paired samples t-test, MANOVA, ANOVA and Pearson correlation statistical methods were used to analyze the data. The results of t-test analysis were significant differences in all subscale scores of "T-SQAS". MANOVA results indicated that, in terms of gender main effect, the result of "T-LSSS" was significantly different in "importance-hedonism" and "program" subscale's of "T-SQAS". Analyzes revealed that the main effect of the frequency of participation in physical activity variable on the subscales of "T-SQAS" and "T-LSSS" were significant. In terms of the frequency of participation in physical activity main effect, the result of "T-LSSS" was significantly different in "behavioral intentions", "resistance to change", "overall satisfaction", "perceived value", "position involvement", "importance-hedonism", "sign" and "staff" subscale's of "T-SQAS". Pearson Correlation analysis indicated statistically positive correlation between service quality and customer loyalty. As a result, it can be said that there was a positive relationship between the quality of service and the level of customer loyalty of the members and the differences between expectations and perceptions of the members' quality of service.

Substantial research recognizes the importance of understanding employee-customer interactions in order to optimize the customer experience. While most retailing and services research focuses on frontline employees' handling of customer complaints, the present studies take an inverse approach by examining a relatively unexplored phenomenon: customers' perceptions of frontline employee complaining. First, a pilot study confirms two commonly overheard types of employee complaints-complaints about the company and customers. Next, Study 1 provides empirical support for the effects of overhearing employee complaining on relevant customer outcomes and identifies perceived impropriety as the mediating mechanism underlying these effects. The results of Study 2 indicate that soliciting customers' feedback about their experience attenuates the indirect effects of one type of employee complaint-complaints about the company. We conclude with a discussion of our findings and provide practical suggestions to retailers and service providers for reducing the harmful effects of overheard employee complaints.

Understanding how the quality of customer service is impacted by employees is essential to managing and improving customer service quality. This article develops a model that looks at the relationship between a series of two important customer service gaps. The first series of gaps (service provider gaps) is a result of the difference between consumers' and employees' expectations based on various dimensions of the customer service encounter. The second series of gaps (service quality gaps) occur when a difference exists between consumer expectations and the service they actually receive based on specific aspects of the customer service encounter. This study found a positive significant relationship between these two series of gaps. This significant relationship provides empirical evidence as to the importance of keeping employees informed about the expectations of consumers.

As successful tourism firms invest heavily in marketing to defend or improve their competitive position, they increasingly need to measure their marketing performance. Previous studies related to tourism have largely focused on financial and operational performance, but the marketing perspective has been largely overlooked. Drawing on an in-depth investigation involving 12 hotel chains, 8 travel agencies and 8 tour operators, this study provides an overview of the state-of-the-art marketing performance measurements among some of the leading tourism firms in Italy. Several issues and unanswered questions are also identified.

Customer service improvement is directly related with organizational standards and productivity. Employees activities have certain objectives to be followed but sometimes outcomes are different than expected. Human error while performing regular job activities cause sufficient losses and difficult to address. Management faces real challenges while dealing with employee related issues and sometimes becomes unproductive. We propose Brahms Model with multi layered alert filtration and feedback cycle which would address the human error in the system and generate the filtered alerts in the form of sms or by emails. This is especially useful for Human-Computer Interfacing (HCI) Scenarios. Controlling human error and addressing real issues may protect any institution from severe damage and losses. Efficiency of a customer service department can be improved and maximized by multi-layered alert filtration system using Brahms Model.

This study was based on the identification of critical success factos (CSFs) that maximise customer satisfaction, as well as an analysis of customers’ degree of satisfaction and the importance that they attach to CSFs. For this purpose, 225 customers of the company Futurlab were surveyed, with a sampling error of 5.8% at a significance level of 5%. To identify the CSFs, we used exploratory factor analysis and, to analyse satisfaction and importance for the CSFs, we used an importance-satisfaction matrix. This study also
sought to identify homogeneous groups of customers using cluster analysis.
Based on the results, seven CSFs were identified, and, in general, customers showed satisfaction with the performance of Futurlab. The cluster analysis identified four clusters according to the importance and satisfaction attributed to the CSFs