Promote Service Quality Research Articles

Effects of Halal Awareness, Service Quality and Promotion on Visitor Decisions Through Destination Imagery as a Mediator

Indonesia has a diversity of destinations and natural and cultural wealth; major assets that other countries might not have. Tourists’ desire to travel is undoubtedly diverse. Hence, the Ministry of Tourism and Creative Economy of the Republic of Indonesia carried out promotions to increase the number of tourist visits by providing halal tourism locations that promoted the Muslim-friendly concept. This study determines the impact of halal awareness, service quality, and promotion on visitor decisions through destination imagery. The research method was descriptive quantitative, incorporating a purposive sampling technique to select participants who are visitors or people who have visited Kota Tua. The present study data were obtained by distributing questionnaires to 150 respondents who had visited Kota Tua tourist attractions in the past six months. The data analysis technique used was path analysis using SPSS software. The Cronbach’s Alpha value for every variable was greater than 0.60, which implies the questions were trustworthy and it was possible to use each one. Based on the path analysis, halal awareness, service quality, and promotion impact on destination imagery has an R Square (R2) of 0.364 or 36.4%. The impact of halal awareness, service quality, and promotion on visitor decisions has an R2 of 0.548 or 54.8%. The findings indicated that halal awareness has a significant impact on destination imagery. Service quality promotion did not have a significant impact on destination imagery. Halal awareness and service quality did not significantly impact visitor decisions. Promotion and destination imagery had a significant impact on visitor decisions.

Rescheduling trains by crossover tracks to promote service quality of urban rail transit under partial blockages.

This study focuses on the rescheduling problem with disruptions that cause partial blockages in the urban rail transit (URT), contributing to extending the relative train rescheduling studies. The alternative driving measure (ADM), which could be regarded as one train rerouting measure, is used to skip the blocked section, and a mixed-integer nonlinear programming (MINLP) model is built based on it. Time-varying passenger flow as well as the turnaround process of rolling stocks is taken into consideration. To solve the model, a customized genetic algorithm is used to quickly generate high-quality solutions. Real-world data is studied and sensitivity analyses are taken to verify the feasibility and advantage of ADM. The results validate the proposed model and algorithm, as well as confirm that ADM shows significantly better performance than the practical operation measure in promoting passenger service quality of URT under partial blockage.

A Theoretical Framework on Customer Satisfaction in an Automotive Lubricant Market

Malaysia was reported to have the highest car ownership ratio in the ASEAN region, with 3.3 people per vehicle. As a result of this rapidly growing automotive sector, Malaysia experienced a rise in the demand for premium lubricants. Recognizing the fact that most automobile users would rather pay a mechanic or workshop to perform an oil change rather than do it themselves, hence, this study seeks to understand the antecedents that influence automotive lubricant consumer satisfaction. A content analysis approach is used in this study to discover potential antecedents of consumers' quality-of-service experiences. The SERVQUAL model is then employed as the theoretical foundation for investigating and synthesizing the antecedents. Five antecedents are addressed during the examination and discussion: tangibility, dependability, responsiveness, assurance, and empathy. In addition, five quality-of-service experience propositions are offered, and the framework developed in this conceptual study highlights the quality-of-service experience instigators. This study's conceptual nature provides preliminary insights into the quality-of-service experience in the automotive lubricant market. This study contributes to the body of knowledge by illuminating the antecedents that promote service quality, resulting in satisfied customers who will in turn stimulate the Malaysian automotive lubricant market, which can lead to a significant increase in the industry's contribution to Malaysia's gross domestic product (GDP) rate. The developed theoretical framework serves as a foundation for future empirical studies of quality-of-service experience.

Stroke Survivor's Satisfaction and Experience with Rehabilitation Services: A Qualitative Systematic Review.

Research in healthcare is increasingly focused on quality assurance and continuous quality improvement aiming to promote service quality. Satisfaction is a key endpoint in outcomes research and service benchmarking, along with "traditional" clinical outcomes. What controls stroke survivors' satisfaction differs among qualitative studies' conclusions, but there is general consensus on the importance of communication, improvement in activity, and engagement in goal setting. This review aims to collect and synthesise studies of the satisfaction of stroke survivors with rehabilitation services. A systematic search was conducted in seven electronic databases, including CINAHL, OVID, Pedro, Scopus Midline, Web of Science, and PubMed. The database search yielded 1339 studies, while one additional work was identified through hand searching. After removing duplicates, 74 studies were read in full, and after resultant exclusions, 12 qualitative studies were systematically reviewed, extracted, and appraised by two reviewers independently (HAS and RT) and the third reviewer (CS) was available for any disagreement. Five analytical themes were identified: Healthcare Professional-Patient Relationship (HCP), Delivery Service, Perceived Patient Autonomy (PPA), Expectations Shape Satisfaction, and Culture Influences Satisfaction. The studies of survivors' satisfaction, experiences, and their rehabilitative needs with the services they receive have provided different factors that influence their satisfaction during rehabilitation in different countries worldwide. However, the context in which the studies were conducted is quite limited, and more detailed studies are required for many underexplored contexts.

Promoting service quality with incentive contracts in rural bus integrated passenger-freight service

A rural bus integrating passenger and freight transport is a new effective public transit mode to realise village interconnection and solve the first–last mile rural logistics service. Mixed services reduce logistics costs and generate additional income for transit operators. However, the mutual interpenetration of logistics and passenger services in a single bus trip may lead to a decline in the service quality of both passengers and goods. With this in mind, we designed a government subsidy incentive contract and a logistics alliance payment incentive contract respectively from the perspective of participants based on the principal-agent theory. In addition, a bi-level programming model consisting of two principals (government and logistics alliance) and one agent (transit operator) was proposed to incentivise bus operators and improve passenger and freight service quality. It scientifically realises the coordination of interests between the principals and agents. A Chinese case study was conducted to examine the proposed models and methods, and a passenger-based incentive subsidy programme from the government was proposed to replace the mileage-based one. With both incentive policies (government and logistics alliance), passenger travel time can be reduced by 4.2 min, and logistics transportation time can be shortened by 30 min. In addition, the total annual government budget can be reduced by 17.2% (¥450,000, $64,000) and annual fleet mileage savings by approximately 9.4% (62,000 km) compared with the mileage-based incentive programme in the case study. A sensitivity analysis is conducted to explore the impact on the collaborative system. This innovative concept, combined with incentive schemes, is a good reference for public administration to avoid the dilemma of having passenger and freight transport in low-demand areas.

Person-organization fit, person-job fit and organizational commitment among hotel employees: the roles of positive affect and calling

PurposeDrawing on affective events theory, the purpose of this study is to examine the mediation effect of positive affect on the association between fit (e.g. person-organization fit and person-job fit) and organizational commitment in the hospitality industry. The secondary aim is to investigate the moderated mediation effect of hospitality employees’ calling on these associations.Design/methodology/approachThe authors collected data from 248 hotel employees in China at three different time points. A moderated mediation model was examined by using the bias-corrected bootstrapping method.FindingsResults revealed that person-organization fit and person-job fit indirectly influenced organizational commitment via positive affect. Calling was found to moderate the indirect influences of person-organization and person-job fit on organizational commitment via positive affect.Practical implicationsManaging employees’ affective experiences in the hospitality industry and promoting their organizational commitment are key strategies for hospitality organizations to promote service quality and retain their employees. This study suggests that hospitality organizations should actively attempt to improve employees’ fit perceptions and promote their sense of calling.Originality/valueBy theorizing and investigating the mediating role of positive affect and the moderating role of calling in the association between fit and employee commitment, this research extends existing knowledge on the association between fit–job attitudes and makes notable contributions to the hospitality literature on fit, affect, calling and job attitudes.

An Integrated Mediating and Moderating Model to Improve Service Quality through Job Involvement, Job Satisfaction, and Organizational Commitment

Employees’ perception of their job and organization is believed to influence service quality (SQ). Hence, this study aims to integrate a mediating and moderating model to improve SQ through job involvement (JI), job satisfaction (JS), and organizational commitment (OC), and investigate how that model incorporating JI, JS, and OC can improve SQ in higher education contexts in developing countries. This study applied a conceptual integration between employees who provide the service and customer-perceived service quality. Data collection from the respondents was performed using a two-sample research design and two sets of questionnaires. The academic staff (296 responses) and their students (1480 responses) formed the study’s sample size. Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) was used to analyze the collected data. The data analysis showed a significant impact of JS on OC and SQ (i.e., the quality of lectures they received in the classroom that shaped their learning experiences). OC significantly affected SQ and partially mediated the effect of JS and SQ. JI plays a moderator role in the JS-OC and SQ relationship. This study contributes to the literature by linking employees’ JI, JS, and OC to SQ. Employee JI, JS, and OC are crucial in promoting service quality. Practical implications for students, employees, institutions, and society were provided.

INFLUENCE OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT (HRM) PRACTICES ON SERVICE QUALITY: AN EMPIRICAL STUDY AT FOOD BASED DOWNSTREAM INDUSTRY

Lack of emphasis on the service quality performed by the organizational employees that involves in food based downstream activity leads to negative implications in product and customer perspectives. Therefore, the organization will not be able to maintain its competitiveness in running the business. Determination of the strategic factors that would promote service quality among the employees in the organization is very crucial. This research aims to examine the impact of Human Resource Management (HRM) practices on service quality among employees in food based downstream industry. Investigating HRM practices in this study are based on the dimensions namely recruitment and selection, training and development and performance appraisal. Questionnaires were adapted from previous empirical research instruments and data were analyzed using the "Statistical Package for Social Science" (SPSS) version 26.0. This study involved a total of 162 employees from the industry as respondents. The results of the correlation and regression analyses revealed that recruitment and selection, training and development and performance appraisal had a positive relationship and significant effect on service quality respectively. In addition, the result of this study showed that the most dominant determinant factor of human resource management practices on service quality was training and development. The results of this study were seen to be able to contribute within the scope of knowledge in managing HRM practices and the importance of the impact of HRM practices on the quality of services in an organization.

INFLUENCE OF HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT (HRM) PRACTICES ON SERVICE QUALITY: AN EMPIRICAL STUDY AT FOOD BASED DOWNSTREAM INDUSTRY

Lack of emphasis on the service quality performed by the organizational employees that involves in food based downstream activity leads to negative implications in product and customer perspectives. Therefore, the organization will not be able to maintain its competitiveness in running the business. Determination of the strategic factors that would promote service quality among the employees in the organization is very crucial. This research aims to examine the impact of Human Resource Management (HRM) practices on service quality among employees in food based downstream industry. Investigating HRM practices in this study are based on the dimensions namely recruitment and selection, training and development and performance appraisal. Questionnaires were adapted from previous empirical research instruments and data were analyzed using the "Statistical Package for Social Science" (SPSS) version 26.0. This study involved a total of 162 employees from the industry as respondents. The results of the correlation and regression analyses revealed that recruitment and selection, training and development and performance appraisal had a positive relationship and significant effect on service quality respectively. In addition, the result of this study showed that the most dominant determinant factor of human resource management practices on service quality was training and development. The results of this study were seen to be able to contribute within the scope of knowledge in managing HRM practices and the importance of the impact of HRM practices on the quality of services in an organization.

Hospital service quality based on HEALTHQUAL model and trusting nurses at Iranian university and non-university hospitals: a comparative study

BackgroundEstablishment and improvement of patients’ trust in healthcare organizations like hospitals necessitate delivery of high-quality services by nurses, as the largest group of healthcare providers. The present study aimed to compare hospital service quality based on the HEALTHQUAL model and trusting nurses at university and non-university hospitals in Iran.MethodsThis comparative cross-sectional study was conducted on 990 patients admitted to university and non-university hospitals located in Bushehr Province, southern Iran, who were selected using the stratified random sampling method. The data were collected through the HEALTHQUAL questionnaire and the Trust in Nurses Scale, and then analyzed via the SPSS Statistics software (version 22) as well as the General Linear Model (GLM) univariate procedure and the Chi-square test with a significance level of 0.05.ResultsThe study findings revealed that the mean values of real quality (perceptions) and ideal quality (expectations) were 3.89 ± 0.69 and 4.55 ± 0.47, respectively. The gap between the real and ideal quality (− 0.64) was also larger at non-university hospitals from the patients’ viewpoints. Comparing various dimensions of service quality, the largest gap at university and non-university hospitals was associated with “environment” (− 0.13) and “empathy” (− 0.18), respectively. Additionally, the mean scores of the patient trust in nurses at university and non-university hospitals were 10.34 ± 5.81 and 8.71 ± 4.05, respectively, being a statistically significant difference (p < 0.001).ConclusionThe study results demonstrated that hospital service quality and trusting in nurses were at higher levels at the university hospital than the non-university one; however, hospital service quality was at a lower level than what the patients had expected. Accordingly, hospital managers and policy-makers were suggested to focus on patients to reduce gaps in service quality, to promote service quality, and to provide better healthcare services to patients.

Customer trust and perceived service quality in the healthcare sector: Customer aggressive behaviour as a mediator

ABSTRACT Most healthcare providers experience some form of aggressive behaviour by patients and their relatives (i.e. customers). Customer aggressive behaviour (CAB) is detrimental to customers and healthcare providers, as well as to the overall service quality provided by the healthcare organisation. Drawing on the Social Exchange Theory, the purpose of the study was to examine whether customers’ trust in healthcare providers decreases incidents of CAB and in turn improves the perceived service quality of the clinic. Data were collected from 45 primary care clinics of the same organisation, including three sources: Customers (N=579); healthcare providers (N=398); and data provided by the organisation. The data were aggregated and analysed at the clinic level. The results confirmed a mediation model in which customer trust in healthcare providers reduced CAB as experienced by providers, which in turn led to higher levels of clinics’ perceived service quality. As CAB in this study was examined as a mediating factor, it was possible to investigate its role within the context of the organisational dynamic. Practically, these findings suggest that healthcare organisations should proactively create and nurture a culture of trust between customers and healthcare providers in order to promote service quality through reducing CAB.

A simplified approach to understanding customer support and help during self-service encounters

PurposeIn the absence of direct employee involvement, customers sharing knowledge and know-how with other customers during self-service encounters is key for promoting service quality. This study assessed the extent to which customer support and help during self-service encounters could simply be explained by multiple motivations of the social exchange theory.Design/methodology/approachA survey approach was followed. The model was tested among 258 electronic banking customers in South Africa and later cross-validated among 253 electronic banking customers in Australia. Multi-group confirmatory factor analysis with country as the grouping variable, latent variable modelling and indirect tests were performed to assess interrelationships among diverse factors that may contribute to customer support and help during self-service encounters, as accounted for by motivations of the social exchange theory.FindingsAdequate model fit was obtained for the combined structural model, which was based on the invariant model. Value contribution and competence affirmation, pleasure derived from helping, reciprocity and reputation enhancement are relevant motivations of the social exchange theory that may impact customer support and help through knowledge sharing.Research implicationsThe study provides a simplified and more cohesive explanation of customers' motivations for engaging in customer support and helping behaviours during self-service encounters.Practical implicationsService providers seeking guidance on knowledge sharing among customers, which may lead to greater service quality, should benefit from this research.Originality/valueThe findings contribute to greater understanding of social exchanges by customers who provide support and help to other customers during self-service encounters, and that ultimately may affect service quality.

Peer Review Mandates and CPA Entrepreneurship

I study whether mandatory peer review affects CPA entrepreneurship—that is, CPAs’ decisions to start, continue, or cease operating their own CPA firms. In an effort to promote service quality, CPA firms have to be reviewed by other CPA firms to meet licensing requirements. While this peer review system is the main oversight mechanism for CPA firms without public clients, little is known about its consequences. I exploit the staggered introduction of peer review mandates and, using a novel dataset based on CPA licenses, find that CPA entrepreneurship declines with the introduction of mandatory peer review—CPA entrepreneur entries decline, and CPA entrepreneur exits increase. Exits are pronounced for young female CPA entrepreneurs but not for CPA entrepreneurs subject to disciplinary actions. These findings suggest that differences in the costs of meeting licensing requirements, rather than active screening on service quality, explain the observed heterogeneity in exit effects.

Do social networking platforms promote service quality and purchase intention of customers of service-providing organizations?

Purpose Customers are interested in finding service recommendations, reviews and word of mouth using social networking platforms. These service reviews are useful for enhancing service quality, level of information and engagement, and purchase intention of customers. The purpose of this paper is to uncover which social networking platform is more useful for the exchange of service reviews and how organizations are improving purchase intention as well as service quality in the light of customer’s reviews/experiences. Design/methodology/approach The study is exploratory in nature because it aims to understand the use of social networking platforms for enhancing service quality and the purchase intention of customers using a purposive sampling technique. To meet the objective of this study, non-directive and semi-structured interviews have been conducted with customers and marketing teams in the banking sector and internet service providers. Findings The results show that social networking websites are helpful in fostering responsiveness, awareness, assurance, reliability and empathy. However, respondents revealed serious concerns regarding the privacy of personal and financial information especially in the context of the banking sector. It has been found that official Facebook pages of service-providing organizations, open and closed local community Facebook groups, sponsored ads and promotional advertisements on Facebook, WhatsApp groups and YouTube video comments are more frequently used to exchange service reviews (i.e. influence the process of purchase decision) among friends, friends of friends, family members and the general public. The selected customers and market team respondents revealed that local community Facebook groups (i.e. open groups and closed groups) have gained prime importance for enhancing service quality and purchase decisions. Practical implications The effective and well-organized use of social networking platforms can foster service reviews, word of mouth, level of service awareness, interactive communication, intention to purchase, social influence, social trust and services quality. Furthermore, online social networking platforms require a lower level of advertisement costs and offer huge amounts of information, discussions, enquires, service stories, word of mouth, transactions and interactions of consumers. Originality/value The present study is exploratory in nature because it selects an under-researched issue regarding the use of social networking applications to enhance levels of purchase intention and service quality. There is limited literature which has combined the multiple constructs in a single study (i.e. social media platforms, cross-platform platforms, service quality and purchase intention of consumers). Most of the previous studies are dependent on various dimensions of service quality (i.e. “reliability, responsiveness, assurance, empath and tangibles”). However, the present study extracted that respondents have given more preferences of services awareness and privacy compared to traditional elements of service quality.

Effectiveness of medical service quality promotion project for child and adolescent patients with mental disabilities and psychiatric disorders in Taiwan

Objective: The Ministry of Health and Welfare of Taiwan launched a project in June 2015 and provided community mental health outreach services and outpatient psychiatric treatment for child and adolescent patients with mental disabilities and psychiatric disorders from schools and institutions and in the community. The main purpose of this study project was intended to promote medical service quality for child and adolescent patients with mental disabilities and psychiatric disorders. Methods: Service team members from seven hospitals in Taiwan, including psychiatrists, clinical psychologists, and case managers, provided both outreach community services and outpatient psychiatric treatment. We collected the basic data and assessment scale scores of all outpatients from June 2015 to December 2018 (n = 163). Results: The findings revealed significant improvement in the scores of the Clinical Global Impression (CGI) – CGI-Severity Scale, Global Assessment of Functioning Scale, and Children's Global Assessment Scale (p

Study on the construction of Intelligent Courier Station Model

Campus Express is an important window to observe the city consumption logistics service "last kilometer".The research on Campus Express service is not only conducive to campus environment improvement and service quality promotion, but also provides all types of community, agglomeration areas such as urban terminal "last kilometer" logistics with reference.This article first proposed the main problems of campus express service,analyzed the mode of smart express station and finally built a smart express station.

The Objective of Organizing Congresses by Medical Universities of Military Forces: An Institutional Task or a Service Quality Promotion Platform

The Objective of Organizing Congresses by Medical Universities of Military Forces: An Institutional Task or a Service Quality Promotion Platform

A Decision Method to Maximize Service Quality under Budget Constraints: The Kano Study of a Chinese Machinery Manufacturer

Manufacturers are increasingly facing keen competition and improving customers’ position in the value chain. Many of them have made efforts to promote service quality and enhance customer satisfaction. Research is lacking in considering the trade-off between service costs and customer satisfaction when tackling service quality issues in the machinery industry. A decision method is proposed for maximizing service quality in machinery industry under budget constraints, from the perspective of enterprise capacity and customer satisfaction. Due to the strength of the Kano model in acknowledging the nonlinear impacts of quality elements on customer satisfaction, we formalize the relationship between customer satisfaction and sufficiency of service quality elements quantitatively. And then we develop a novel nonlinear programming model to maximize service quality under budget constraints. In particular, we implement our model at Xuzhou Construction Machinery Group Co., Ltd., one of the largest Chinese construction machinery companies, to validate the efficacy of the method.

EDITOR'S NOTES

EDITOR'S NOTES

Exploring the Correlations among Service Encounter, Customer Perceived Value, Purchase Intention in Hospitality Industry

Service in hospitality is a business with higher experience qualities, pursuing the final objective of consumer satisfaction with service quality. In this case, various hospitality businesses have actively provided excellent core services and favorable and complete service model to enhance the customer service quality, promote the word-of-mouth with customer satisfaction, and absorb more customers. Human factors in promoting service quality or enhancing customer satisfaction are hard to control, and most services are delivered by people that the close contact between service providers and customers is involved in the service delivery process. Such contact opportunities would affect the evaluation process and emphasis of served customers. Customers of The Grand Hotel Kaohsiung are the major research participants in this study. Total 300 copies of questionnaires are distributed, and 213 valid copies are retrieved, with the retrieval rate 71%. The research results show the significant correlations between 1.Service Encounter and Customer Perceived Value, 2.Customer Perceived Value and Purchase Intention, and 3.Service Encounter and Purchase Intention.