The Relationship Between Service Quality and Customer Satisfaction in India’s Rural Banking Sector: An Item Analysis and Factor-Specific Approach

Abstract

Earlier research has shown that, in today’s highly competitive business world, service quality and satisfaction are central to management concerns for marketing effectiveness and success. This study attempts to determine customer-perceived service quality at rural Indian banks and identify the most significant predictors of overall customer satisfaction based on a five-dimensional ‘performance-only’ scale measuring service quality. Data was collected from 289 patrons of rural banks, based on a seven-point Likert scale ranging from 1 (”strongly disagree”) to 7 (“strongly agree”). The absence of a reliable sampling frame necessitated following a controlled sampling technique. In order to extract factors relevant to service quality, we employ exploratory factor analysis, means, standard deviations, t-tests, and regression analysis. Our preliminary analysis indicates that rural customers report high levels of perceived service quality across all five dimensions while the results of the regression analysis (β) show that reliability and assurance explain overall customer satisfaction at rural banks in India. The study’s findings can be employed by the banking industry to restructure and prioritize its service quality and develop appropriate promotional strategies by highlighting relevant aspects of service quality and customer satisfaction.