Servqual Model Of Service Quality

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Service Quality is an assessment of how well a delivered service conforms to the client 's expectations. Service business operators often assess the service quality provided to their customers in order to improve their service, to quickly identify problems, and to better assess client satisfaction. In order to understand how users perceived and assessed the quality of services, a study was developed in 1985 involving twelve focus groups, three in each of the four different services investigated - retail banking, credit cards, securities brokerage, and repairs and maintenance. Based on common perceptions among the groups, the authors formally defined service quality as the degree and type of discrepancy between the perceptions and expectations …show more content…

Parasuraman, Valarie. A. Zeithaml and Leonard L. Berry for measuring and managing service quality across abroad range of service categories. It was based on their definition of quality as ‘difference between the expected and perceived performance’. Parasuraman et al. (1984) derived SERVQUAL from the fifth gap of the Gap Model of Service Quality based on information from 12 focus groups of consumers in service and retailing organization to assess service quality. The definitions of each of the gaps are as …show more content…

The scale consisted of 22 pairs of statements – measuring expectations of customers by 35 asking each respondent to rate, on a 7 point scale, how essential each item is for an excellent service. The second set of 22 identical statements ascertains the respondent’s perception to the level of service given by the service provider. The difference between the ranked perception and the ranked expectations is calculated: the average score is the SERVQUAL overall service quality score. This model has been vigorously tested and improved upon (Parasuraman et al.,1985, 1988, 1990, 1991, 1993, 1994, 2004; Zeithaml, et al., 1996; Zeithaml, Parasuraman & Malhotra, 2002; Parasuraman, et al., 2005). In 1988, the ten factors were collapsed to five dimensions: Reliability, Assurance (competence, courtesy, credibility, security), Tangibles, Empathy (access, communication, knowing the customer) and Responsiveness, better known as the R.A.T.E.R. dimensions. Then in 1991, the authors refined much of the wording of the original items to focus more on customer expectations. The measure of expectations was further refined by using the three side-by-side measures of adequate, desired and perceived quality measures. In 1994, the

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