Impact of Service Quality of Low-Cost Carriers on Airline Image and Consumers' Satisfaction and Loyalty during the COVID-19 Outbreak.

Thowayeb H Hassan,Amany E Salem

doi:10.3390/ijerph19010083

Abstract

Low-cost carriers (LCCs) in Saudi Arabia operate in a competitive, highly demanding environment. Customer-related attributes may be influenced by the levels of service quality in a no-frills airline, which might impact satisfaction and loyalty. Given the unique traveler and market characteristics of the aviation sector in the kingdom, we sought to investigate the impact of service quality of LCCs on customer satisfaction and loyalty and the perceived airline image. A total of 299 passengers at two international airports were approached using a modified SERVQUAL scale. Results revealed that service quality was a significant predictor of customer satisfaction (β = 0.46, p < 0.0001), airline image (β = 0.55, p < 0.0001), and customer loyalty (β = 0.16, p = 0.006). The responsiveness dimension was the most important dimension of service quality, since it predicted all other constructs (satisfaction, loyalty, and brand image). Airline tangibles and reliability were independently associated with brand image and loyalty, respectively. Based on these results, LCCs should tailor future strategic plans that rely heavily on improving different service quality measures, particularly the responsiveness domain.

Highlights

Academic Editor: SunghyupService quality improvement has been integrated as a major component of any business’s strategic plans, and it has become an unavoidable part of the total quality management in almost all firms worldwide
Results revealed that service quality of Low-cost carriers (LCCs) was a significant factor of customers’ satisfaction regarding the provided services (β = 0.46, t = 8.99, p < 0.0001), airline image (β = 0.55, t = 10.39, p < 0.0001), and customers’ loyalty (β = 0.16, t = 2.74, p = 0.006, Table 4)
Focusing on LCCs in Saudi Arabia, an improvement in overall service quality leads to a parallel increase in satisfaction and loyalty as well as an enhanced brand image

Summary

Introduction

Academic Editor: SunghyupService quality improvement has been integrated as a major component of any business’s strategic plans, and it has become an unavoidable part of the total quality management in almost all firms worldwide. Many large companies have established quality programs that quantify customers’ evaluations of quality and their correlates with distinct service attributes. This is because service quality has increasingly been considered a key factor in the discrimination between service products and an important aspect of building the competitive advantage [2]. In 1985, Parasuraman et al [3] had initially developed a set of ten components to quantify service quality by computing the variation between customer expectations and their real experiences. These items were collapsed into five constructs, including Tangibility, Response, Reliability, Assurance, and Empathy. Improving the quality of provided services has become the mainstay approach to assure customer satisfaction, which may be linked to customer loyalty, word-of-mouth recommendations, market share of companies, and company’s image [6,7]

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