The proximity between Latin countries regarding customer's expectations about the hotel service

Abstract

PurposeThe main purpose of this research is to understand if customers from countries with alleged similar culture expect services dimensions equally and to understand the level of proximity among those countries.Design/methodology/approachQuantitative methodology was used to test the level of proximity in customers' expectations about a service among different countries with alleged similar cultural patterns and if these customers share similar expectations about a set of service dimensions. This transnational research regarded the hotel service and data were collected from ten Latin countries: Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Romania, Brazil, Mexico, Uruguay, Bolivia and Chile. About 1262 customers answered a questionnaire about their expectations about service dimensions of the hotel service.FindingsFindings show that Latin customers' expectations about services are not equal and that there is a low level of proximity or similarity of customers' expectations about service among Latin countries.Research limitations/implicationsResearch was applied in one group of Latin countries that revealed a low level of proximity of customer's expectations about the hotel service. Further attempts should be made to expand research to additional Latin countries in order to allow understanding if the proximity level rises, decreases or maintains.Originality/valueThe major contribution was to use a cross-cultural approach to understand the level of proximity between the Latin countries in terms of customer's expectations about service dimensions, as these countries are frequently clustered into one group and customer's expectations are presumed to also be similar.