1.4 Link between service quality and customer loyalty

1.4 Link between service quality and customer loyalty

The link between service quality and customer loyalty has been investigated and many studies have  acknowledged a  relationship among these two elements (Yi, 1991). 

Furthermore ,when judging  an organization’s success or failure many recognized that customer loyalty the  core fundamentals factor  (Reichheld & Sasser, 1990, Zeithaml et al.,(1985). Generally, it identifies  that good  service quality will impact in a long term  loyal customer (Zeithaml et al, 1996).

Most service providers tend to use “quality service” in their advertising As an attempt to build excellent bond with their customers. The question is “what do they mean by quality service” .Haneborg ,(1998) pointed out that the quality in service may understood differently by different people in the service process as each individual has different perception towards certain situations .Therefore ,it is important that the top level managers to  create quality standards and communicate it within the organisation however , the problem arises when the customer expectations of quality is different to organizations definition of quality. Therefore the quality Standards at any service organization, should be revised constantly to stress constant  Improvement. (www.cfigroup .com).

 The service is what a customer remembers. It earns an establishment a reputation, good or even bad. (Kelley, 1999). It is also understood, that providing good quality service is a vital factor for gaining profit.(Ghobadian et al., 1994Reichheld & Sasser, 1990;) It is also service that makes customers return again and again.

It is also been understood that the poor service quality is a significant reason,why customer hunt for competitor brands (Philips & Hazlett, 1997). Oliver,1981 identifies that the best way to create a loyal customer is to provide them with the best quality service.Finally, it all comes down to the way that they are treated and respected. Depending on the treatment the customers, will decide whether to return or not. This can be called as Loyalty in simple form. Therefore, everlasting success of a service organisation is basically identify  by its capability of attaining and retaining  a large number of loyal customers. (Wong & Sohal, 2003) This will be more advantageous for a hotel chain because  Once they become loyal to the organisation, they  will even learn to seek out different branches of hotel in the same chain.

Many researchers pointed out attracting a new customer is  costly. Generally ,it is known as three to five times more than maintain  an existing customer. (Reichheld,2001) The more a business organisation understands its consumers have a better chance for a successful future. The size of the organisation does not matter in this. Identifying the customer needs and fulfilling the those expected needs can take in to consideration when analyzing customer retention and loyalty towards an organisation.

As mentioned above the service providers capacity to deliver excellent quality regular basis and gaining satisfied customers are considered the core fundamental necessity for growth of customer loyalty(Tepeci, 1999; Backs and Parks, 2003).However, as the competition has grown the number of business offer the similar type of services have also increased. The consumer has the choice to choose from variety of options to fulfill their desired needs. When switching cost is less ,the consumer makes a quick change from one  provider to another without giving it a second thought. It is very important to an organisation to provide what the consumer want and to retain customers by whatever means possible. An organisation should understand that giving more weight to service quality. may have a potential to attract more consumers and retain the customers loyal to their particular service. Heung et al. (1996) indicates that the high quality service at a hotel will leads to satisfied customers, hence the increase in retain, return and refer.

Kandampully and Suhartanto(2000, 2003) give the conclusion of  a relationship  which involved  performance at a hotel in different aspects such as reception, housekeeping etc .They find  a direct relationship of above aspects to customer satisfaction,  They further mentioned that the customer satisfaction is considered to be the most important factor when considering the after service reactions such as intent to ,return repurchase, recommend etc which shows the loyalty towards the service provider.

When a consumer make a reservation at a particular hotel, the guest has some outline of the service they are indented to receive. This is called expectation of the service. Now, the hotel must deliver their service up to customers expected level.There are quite a few attributes which may expected to be fulfilled in general to any customer, Researcher may divide these attributes  in to two main categories, such as internal an external expectation.