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IJQRM 24,5

Assessing international tourists perceptions of service quality at Air Mauritius

Girish Prayag
Department of Management, Faculty of Law and Management, University of Mauritius, Reduit, Mauritius
Abstract
Purpose The aim of this paper is to assess the service quality of a small airline, Air Mauritius, using the SERVQUAL model and to determine the relative importance attributed to service quality dimensions by international tourists. Design/methodology/approach A sample of 140 international airline passengers travelling essentially for a leisure trip was administered the SERVQUAL instrument to determine their expectations and perceptions of service. A combination of in-ight and mail surveys was used for data collection leading to an overall response rate of 20.2 per cent. Findings The paper nds that service quality structural dimensions are context- and culture-specic. Four factors are perceived as inuencing perceptions of service, service efciency and affect being the most important, service personalisation, reliability and tangibles the least important. Empathy as a service dimension is valued more than assurance. Customer satisfaction and willingness to recommend the airline is primarily dependent on service efciency and affect. Research limitations/implications The sample size is relatively small and biased towards South African passengers, but the study is exploratory in nature. The starting-point for service improvements at Air Mauritius is better management of service reliability. The company is able to create high perceptions of service using tangible cues. Practical implications The generation of a vision of excellence supported by contact employees empowerment should improve perceptions of service. There is potentially a link between expectations of service levels at destination and tourists expectations from the ag carrier. Originality/value Often smaller airline companies have to resort to strategic alliances and service differentiation to survive in this globally integrated industry. The paper fulls the gap in the existing literature on service quality management in small airlines. Keywords Customer services quality, Perception, Airlines, SERVQUAL, Customer satisfaction, Mauritius Paper type Research paper

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International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management Vol. 24 No. 5, 2007 pp. 492-514 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0265-671X DOI 10.1108/02656710710748367

Introduction Mauritius has emerged as one of the best performing tourist destination in Africa over the last ten years. The country has registered a growth of 82 per cent in tourist arrivals over the period 1993 to 2002. Gross receipts from tourism amounted to approximately US$655 million and 681, 648 tourists arrivals were recorded during the year 2002 (Ministry of Tourism and Leisure, Mauritius, 2002). The prole of international visitors has also changed with the targeting of new markets such as India, China, Russia and Eastern European Countries. Traditionally, Mauritius has relied on France, Reunion Island and UK as principal tourist generating markets. The success of the tourism industry can be attributed to the strong and ongoing partnership of the local airline, Air Mauritius (MK), with its partners Air France, British Airways and more recently

Emirates (MK (Air Mauritius), 2004). Being a small island economy, the government has strongly supported the growth of Air Mauritius to enable the tourism industry to ourish. The ag carrier has reinforced the upmarket image of the destination over the years. MK has its early beginning in the 1930s and, like any other national carrier, the growth of the airline was dependent on government support and funding. Today, the airline ies 25 destinations around the world with a work force of around 2,600 staff worldwide serving the various on and off-line ofces. The number of passengers ying Air Mauritius worldwide was approximately 850, 000 for the nancial year 2002/2003 and an increase of 1.7 per cent was noted for the nancial year 2003/2004 (MK (Air Mauritius), 2004). The limited open sky policy and no charter ights of the government has enabled Air Mauritius to survive and grow successfully over the years. More recently, the pressure from the private sector to increase tourist arrivals in order to sustain growth of the tourism industry, has led the government to consider gradually implementing an open sky policy. In this respect, the local airline has to improve its service levels to remain competitive ` vis-a-vis the looming competition. The company is in the process of reviewing its service strategy to increase customer satisfaction. The airline has a strong commitment to service excellence as it acts as an ambassador for the country and reveals the image of its people for tourism purposes. However, intensifying competition between large and small airlines on the global scene implies not just the opportunity for airline companies to grow and succeed but also to fail and go out of business. The principal trends driving this sector are privatisation, globalisation, liberalisation and cooperation (Wirtz and Johnston, 2003; Chan, 2000a; Driver, 1999; Chidambaram, 1999) that have in essence redened the role of smaller airlines. Thus the potential threat for smaller airline companies to be taken over by mega-carriers is omnipresent. The pace and extent to which small airlines have to be innovative in their service approach are unquestionable. As such, the long-term survival of companies in this globally integrated industry is dependent on the quality of service they provide. While mega carriers are using strategic alliances as an effective way to compete internationally and provide higher levels of service to customers, smaller airlines cannot always resort to such measures for lack of funding. The consensus in the industry seems to be that both competition and collaboration will soon be inevitable in all parts of the world to enhance service (Chan, 2000a; Hanlon, 2003). Smaller airlines have to resort to strategic alliances with mega carriers to survive. Their role has been the provision of efcient feeder or secondary services for powerful consortia or alliances that in a way may dictate their future. Air Mauritius has been no different as it entered into a code share agreement with Air France in 1998 and Austrian Airlines in 2004. The company has also increased its number of ights to destinations such as Australia, South Africa, UK, India and Madagascar (MK (Air Mauritius), 2004) in order to sustain growth despite difcult economic conditions in this global industry. Success for such smaller airlines has been through service differentiation and airline positioning. Service quality has become a centrepiece of their corporate and marketing strategy. Already many mega carriers have pushed the boundaries of service quality to its limit through service personalisation, quality meals, greater variety of in-ight entertainment, modern aircraft, and frequent yer programmes amongst others (Zaid,

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1994; Sultan and Simpson, 2000; Wirtz and Johnston, 2003). Singapore Airlines, for example, has created a strong image and reputation for its in-ight service excellence through substantial investment in staff training and development (Wirtz and Johnston, 2003). Yet, other carriers such as Southwest Airlines and Easy Jet offer limited in-ight service but have been equally successful in the market place. In light of such different service management strategies employed in the airline industry, small and medium-sized carriers have two options for their survival and future growth, either to pursue a strategy of service excellence or lower cost better known as a no-frills strategy (Johnson and Scholes, 1999). Air Mauritius has decided to restructure around a service excellence strategy. The airline has consistently received numerous awards over the years for its service excellence, for example, it was awarded African Airline of the Year in 2002 at the African Aviation Award, Gold Award for Excellence and Business Prestige at the Quality Summit in New York in July 2003, National Excellence Award for tourism in ro, March 2004 and the Travel Oscar 2003 by Verkehrsbu the largest Austrian travel agency chain. The latter rates carriers according to customer satisfaction, in-ight-service, on-time performance, value for money, complaint management and agency support. Thus, such awards provide an indication that the airline offers comparatively good service on its European routes and its commitment to enhancing service quality is evident. However, perceptions of high service levels vary from customer to customer and from country to country (Sultan and Simpson, 2000). The inuence of culture on expectations and perceptions of service quality cannot be underestimated. A few authors (Calvert, 2000; Herbig and Genestre, 1996; Ling et al., 2005; Winsted, 1997; Sultan and Simpson, 2000) have found that national culture exercises a major inuence on service quality, satisfaction levels and repurchase intentions. The purpose of this exploratory study is to determine whether customers expectations are being met or exceeded. It provides an insight of international tourists perceptions of the service level provided by Air Mauritius. It serves as a diagnostic tool for the airline company. The SERVQUAL model developed by Parasuraman et al. (1985) is used to measure service quality and assess the level of importance that passengers attach to the various SERVQUAL dimensions. Therefore, the objectives of this study are threefold: (1) To measure customers expectations and perceptions of service quality based on the SERVQUAL model. (2) To determine customers assessment of the relative importance of the ve service quality dimensions of SERVQUAL. (3) To determine any specic dimensions of service quality which has the greatest inuence on tourists overall satisfaction levels and willingness to recommend the airline to others. In addressing these objectives, a concise synthesis of the extant literature on the subject is discussed below. Service quality As a concept, service quality has received much attention in the literature because of its sustainability as a source of competitive advantage. Service quality has been dened in

different ways by researchers. Kasper et al. (1999) dene service quality as the extent to which the service, the service process and the service organisation can satisfy the expectations of the user. Parasuraman et al. (1988) dene service quality as a function of the difference between service expected and customers perceptions of the actual service delivered. Gronroos (1978) suggests that service quality is made of two components technical quality and functional quality. Technical quality refers to what the service provider delivers during the service provision while functional quality is how the service employee provides the service. In the services marketing literature, the quality construct can be summarised as providing customer value (Feigenbaum, 1951), conformance to requirements (Crosby, 1979), tness for use (Juran et al., 1974) and meeting customers expectations (Parasuraman et al., 1985). Service quality is therefore an enduring construct that encompasses quality performance in all activities undertaken by management and employees. Customers are the sole judges of service quality. If they perceive it to be bad service, then it is. They assess service quality by comparing what they want or expect with what they perceive they are getting. Few airlines have been able over the years to establish a reputation of high service quality. This is because of rapid changes in the industry both in terms of changing needs of customers and denitions of what constitutes the industry itself (Rhoades et al., 1998). Singapore Airlines (SIA), British Airways (BA) and American Airlines (AA) are among the few airlines that have successfully positioned themselves globally as offering excellent service quality (Chan, 2000b). Delivering consistent service quality is difcult for both large and small airline companies. Mega carriers and small airlines are working together rather than competing with one another to maintain and enhance quality standards. Forms of cooperation include sub contracting, code sharing, franchising and the formation of global marketing networks. Such alliances allow rms to focus on their respective core competencies, while drawing the benets of scale economies (Dana and Vignali, 1999). Firms enter alliances for competitive reasons, for example Air Mauritius and Air Seychelles have a code share agreement on the UK route. Such an agreement between the two partnering airlines helps to increase ight availability and to increase yield from passengers. However, such an alliance is dependent on both airlines offering similar service levels and having similar market positioning for its success. Image of the two cooperating airlines has to be consistent to avoid negative perceptions of service levels. As rightly pointed by Wirtz and Johnston (2003), customers adjust their expectations according to brand image of the airline company. Service quality contributes signicantly towards service differentiation, positioning and branding. SIA and BA have long been widely acknowledged within the airline industry as the industrys strategic benchmark airlines, as well as the industry leaders and innovators of service branding as a source of strategic competitive advantage (Chan, 2000a). Companies that search for the most effective ways to incorporate the best service methods and processes tend to be winners in the long term in terms of favourable customer perceptions. Such companies excel in relation to their competitors and are able to build a solid foundation for customer loyalty based on segmented service. Service, both poor and outstanding, has a strong emotional impact on the customer, creating intense feelings about the organisation, its staff and its service, and inuencing the loyalty to it (Wirtz and Johnston, 2003). Several authors have shown empirically that there is a positive link between customer service improvements and

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customer satisfaction, customer loyalty and protability (Buzzell and Gale, 1987; Boulding et al., 1993; Rust and Oliver, 1994). At Air Mauritius, top management recognises that it has to review its service branding strategy and in-ight service to better meet customer needs. Services are more subject to social, cultural and national boundaries inuence, which predetermine customers evaluation of service quality (Philip and Hazlett, 1997). Few studies have focused on the relationship between a passengers cultural background and perceptions of service quality (Ling et al., 2005). Sultan and Simpson (2000) indicated that customer expectations and perceptions varied by nationality in an international environment. Service quality ratings of European passengers were signicantly lower than those of US passengers. Cunningham et al. (2002), Furrer et al. (2000), Herbig and Genestre (1996) found that there were some signicant relationships between culture and perception of service quality. Cross cultural comparison between US and Mexican consumers revealed that Mexicans had poorer perceptions of service quality compared to their US counterparts on the evaluation of products and services in general. Service quality has been shown to lead to different behavioural intentions with respect to customers from different cultures (Liu et al., 2001). Therefore, the cultural background of passengers cannot be ignored in assessing service quality as it contributes to building long-term brand recognition (Ling et al., 2005). Methods of measuring service quality While there may be general agreement that the evaluation of services is more subjective than that of tangible products, there has been less agreement about how to operationalise service quality as a construct (Gabbott and Hogg, 1997; Cronin and Taylor, 1992, 1994; Dabholkar et al., 2000). Firms throughout the world use a combination of methods to assess trends about changing customer needs and perceptions of service quality. Zaid (1995) suggests that regular service ratings by passengers through in-ight surveys can be used to monitor service quality in the airline industry. Otherwise survey audits, market studies, complaint and compliment monitoring are other available methods to measure service levels. Airlines tend to use a combination of methods simultaneously to get a rounded picture of their service management strategies. The Gaps model proposed by Parasuraman et al. (1985) has been the most comprehensive and widely used model to understand service quality. Its operationalisation through SERVQUAL using a battery of 22 statements have been proven to be reliable and valid across many service industries. The SERVQUAL scale has been applied to airlines (Nel et al., 1997; Sultan and Simpson, 2000), hotels (Ingram and Daskalakis, 1999; Juwaheer, 2004), travel agencies (Luk, 1997; Johns et al., 2004), nancial services (Kagis and Passa, 1997; Lassar et al., 2000; Newman, 2001), health care (Desombre and Eccles, 1998; Kilbourne et al., 2004) and the public sector (Donnelly et al., 1995; Wisniewski, 2001; Brysland and Curry, 2001). At the heart of the SERVQUAL model is an understanding of the nature and determinants of customer expectations and perceptions of service quality. Consumers expectations and perceptions are measured to identify any shortfall in service levels, better known as the disconrmation paradigm in the services marketing literature. A customer will perceive quality in a positive way only when the service provider meets or exceeds his/her expectations (Parasuraman et al., 1985, 1988; Bitner, 1990; Robledo, 2001). In the

airline industry, customers expectations are shaped at the moment-of-truth by reservations department of the airline, telephone sales, ticketing, cabin crew, cabin services, baggage handling, ight delays and others (Albrecht, 1992). SERVQUAL uses a concise 22-item scale to measure expectations and perceptions. The model suggests the existence of ve dimensions namely: tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy that can discriminate well across customers with differing quality perceptions. The last two dimensions contain items representing seven of the original dimensions namely: communication, credibility, security, competence, courtesy, understanding/knowing customers, and access (Parasuraman et al., 1985). Various researchers such as Carman (1990), Cronin and Taylor (1992), Babakus and Boller (1992), Boulding et al. (1993), Teas (1993, 1994), Buttle (1996), Asubonteng et al. (1996), Llosa et al. (1998), Sureshchandar et al. (2001) and Coulthard (2004) have criticised the model. Carman (1990, p. 44) suggests that it is better to collect data in terms of the perception/expectation difference directly rather than to asks about each separately. It is also important to take into account the level of experience of the customer with the service. Cronin and Taylor (1992) through the SERVPERF model argue that service quality should be measured as an attitude and support the use of perception statements only in the measurement of service quality. Numerous studies have been undertaken to assess the superiority of the two scales but consensus continues to elude as to which one is better (Jain and Gupta, 2004). One of the main criticisms of SERVPERF has been the way it measures customer satisfaction. Parasuraman et al. (1988) argues that quality is an enduring global attitude towards a service while SERVPERF measures satisfaction related to a specic transaction. The various criticisms of SERVQUAL centre on its theoretical paradigm and the operationalisation of the survey instrument. Buttle (1996), for example, argue that there is little evidence that customers assess service quality in terms of the gap between perceptions and expectations of a service and the model focuses on the service delivery process as opposed to the service outcome. On the operational side, criticisms are, for example, the administration of the instrument twice, which can lead to respondent boredom and confusion. Also, Babakus and Mangold (1992) suggest the use of a ve point likert scale as opposed to the seven-point Likert scale proposed by Parasuraman et al. (1985). In response to the growing literature on the weaknesses of SERVQUAL, Parasuraman et al. (1991, 1994a, b) amended the original SERVQUAL model to include, for example, levels of importance for each dimension by allocating a number of points to each dimension, and embodiment of not only the discordance between perceived service and desired service (labelled as measurer of service superiority) and the discrepancy between perceived service and adequate service (labelled as measure of service adequacy). Furthermore, criticisms were also levelled at the applicability of the SERVQUAL scale to service industries in developing countries (Jain and Gupta, 2004) and cross-cultural inuences on expectations and perceptions scores (Llosa et al., 1998; Zhao et al., 2002; Nel et al., 1997). It has been demonstrated empirically that based on cultural norms, UK and US customers have the same reaction to good service but they tend to respond differently to poor service encounters (Voss et al., 2004). The applicability of SERVQUAL as an instrument for measuring service quality across cultures can therefore be questioned. Mattila (1999) found that customers from Western cultural backgrounds are more likely to rely on tangible cues from the physical

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environment to evaluate service quality compared to customers from Asia. Furrer et al. (2000) conclude that customers from different cultures assigned different importance weights to the ve SERVQUAL dimensions, which in turn is reected in their perceptions of service quality. Yet surveys conducted in New Zealand and China revealed that customers in these apparently diverse countries display many similarities in their expectations of service quality (Calvert, 2000). Taking all these concerns into account, Philip and Hazlett (1997) proposed the P-C-P model that takes the form of a hierarchical structure based on three main classes of attributes namely: pivotal, core and peripheral. The pivotal attributes are considered collectively to be the single most determining inuence on why consumers approach a particular organisation in the rst instance and exert the greatest inuence on satisfaction levels. Core attributes are an amalgamation of people, processes and the organisational structure through which the consumers must interact and/or negotiate to achieve/receive the pivotal attributes. Finally, peripheral attributes are those attributes that can be classied as service extras to delight the customer. This model provides only a skeletal framework and still needs to be tested empirically for its reliability and validity as a superior measure of service quality across industries and cultures. Thus considering the various models proposed in the service quality literature, SERVQUAL remains the most widely accepted and used method of measuring service quality despite its weaknesses (Coulthard, 2004; Zhao et al., 2002; Wisniewski, 2001; Cook and Thompson, 2000; Lam and Woo, 1997; Jain and Gupta, 2004). Research methodology Survey instrument This study applies the disconrmation theory methodology of the SERVQUAL model. The survey instrument was designed and customised for Air Mauritius using the battery of expectations and perceptions statements proposed by Parasuraman et al. (1985, 1988). The survey instrument consisted of three sections. The rst section comprised of airline service quality expectations and perceptions statements measuring the ve dimensions of service quality. Only 22 items of the expectation and perception paradigm were included in the survey instrument as they have proven to be reasonably good predictors of service quality in its entirety (Sureshchandar et al., 2001). The SERVQUAL model measures ve dimensions: tangibility, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy. Research has shown that consumers evaluate providers of service along dimensions, which are groupings of criteria (Robledo, 2001). The second section of the questionnaire dealt with specic service attributes that customers associated with Air Mauritius. Included were also questions pertaining to overall level of customer satisfaction and willingness to recommend the airline to others. The nal section dealt with ying habits and preferences as well as demographic data. The SERVQUAL statements were all worded positively as suggested by Babakus and Boller (1992) since item wording signicantly inuences the result of factor analysis on the data set. A ve-point Likert scale was used to reduce the frustration level of respondents and increase response rate and quality as suggested by the following researchers (Babakus and Mangold, 1992; Krosnick and Fabrigar, 1997; Preston and Colman, 2000; Johns et al., 2004). The scales were hypothesised to have the ve dimensional structure used in the SERVQUAL model

(Robledo, 2001). A pilot study was carried out to validate the survey instrument, which involved mailing 50 customers that had travelled Air Mauritius over the last 12 months, only ten questionnaires were returned. Mail survey is problematic in South Africa as observed by Nel et al. (1997) in their assessment of service quality in the airline industry, which led to a response rate of only 33.75 per cent. Sample design and method of data collection Ideally to obtain an exact measure of the service quality offered by Air Mauritius, one would have to administer the survey instrument on every ight to every destination that the national airline ies to. Such a large-scale distribution of questionnaires was unrealistic given budget constraints for this study. Consequently, it was decided to administer questionnaires only to passengers travelling on the route South Africa to Mauritius, given the exploratory nature of this research. Air Mauritius ies to three cities in South Africa namely Cape Town, Durban and Johannesburg. The target population for this study was dened as all passengers having own Air Mauritius in the last 12 months. A combination of self-administered in-ight survey and mail survey was used to collect the data. Inability to have access to a database of customers from Air Mauritius led to a non-probability sampling procedure being adopted. A convenience sample was drawn for the in-ight survey. The survey instrument was administered on two ights from Cape Town to Mauritius. All seats on both ights were sold leading to 362 questionnaires (181 seats on each ight) being distributed by cabin crew. Only 95 questionnaires were returned, a response rate of 26.2 per cent. The mail survey was administered to customers that ew Air Mauritius from Durban and Johannesburg in the last 12 months. A list of 450 sampling elements was obtained from travel agents and tour operators that dealt with Air Mauritius customers in South Africa. All customers were sent a questionnaire but only 69 (response rate of 15.3 per cent) of them returned the questionnaire to their corresponding travel agent or tour operator. Therefore the study had an overall response rate of 20.2 per cent, which is similar to previous studies on service quality measurement in the airline industry, which achieved response rates of between 20 per cent and 40 per cent using similar data collection methods (Sultan and Simpson, 2000; Frost and Kumar, 2001; Robledo, 2001; Nel et al., 1997). All together data collection spanned over six weeks and of all questionnaires received, 24 were unusable due to errors and incomplete responses. A total of 140 questionnaires were used for data analysis. Both the self-completion survey and mail survey led to a low response rate. It is well documented that self-completion airline surveys do not generate high response rates (Sultan and Simpson, 2000; Nel et al., 1997). This is because the researcher has no control on the administration of the survey instrument in-ight. For this study, cabin crew was asked to distribute the questionnaire to all passengers, except to those of Mauritian nationality, and to collect them at the end of the ight. There is always a probability of self-selection bias, that is, only those passengers that felt the service was either excellent or poor to ll in and return the questionnaire to cabin crew. As noted by Goh and Uncles (2003), both self-completion surveys and mail surveys suffer from limitations such as prior conditioning, question order bias and problems in recalling previous behaviour. The mail survey as a method of data collection has well known limitations such as absence of mailing lists, poor mail services, and high levels of

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illiteracy (Aaker et al., 1998). The mailing list for this study was limited in terms of number of respondents, accuracy of recorded addresses, and time frame to return the questionnaire to travel agents and tour operators was short. South Africa is also notorious for its poor mail services (Nel et al., 1997). To increase response rate, a personalised cover letter was sent along with the survey instrument to respondents for the mail survey. Data analysis The discussion of the research ndings begins with a brief demographic prole of respondents in terms of age, monthly household income level and nationality. On average respondents were 37 years old, with a monthly household income in excess of US$1,267. Most of the respondents (73 per cent) were of South African nationality while British respondents accounted for 15 per cent of the sample and the remainder were respondents from Greece, Germany, Spain, India and Portugal. Regarding the purpose of visit to Mauritius, about 82 per cent were essentially on an all leisure trip. It was also noted that 46.4 per cent of tourists had own Air Mauritius for the rst time and 55 per cent had bought an all-inclusive package covering airfares and accommodation. Of all respondents, 62.8 per cent ew economy class, 22.2 per cent business class and 15 per cent rst class. Owing to the multidimensionality of the service quality construct, it was deemed necessary to assess the reliability of the SERVQUAL instrument administered to Air Mauritius customers. Reliability coefcients (Cronbach alpha), which is based on the internal consistency of the items pertaining to the different service dimensions, were computed separately for the ve dimensions on the raw SERVQUAL scores. As shown in Table I, all the dimensions were reasonably reliable, with greater than 0.7 alpha values. The reliability coefcients are more or less similar to previous studies in the airline industry (Nel et al., 1997; Frost and Kumar, 2001). In addressing the rst objective of the study, which is to assess customers expectations and perceptions of service, the former was on average highest for Assurance, with a mean value of 4.629 followed by Reliability with a mean value of 4.587 as shown in Table II. The average score for the service dimension Assurance imply that customers expect employees of airlines in general to be trustworthy and polite, they should get the necessary support to perform their job well and that customers should feel safe when transacting with the company. On average expectations of customers were lowest for tangible features (the appearance of physical facilities, equipment, personnel and communication materials). International tourists had the highest perceptions of service quality for the dimension Tangibles and lowest for Reliability as shown in Table II. The results
Dimensions Tangibles Reliability Responsiveness Assurance Empathy Total scale reliability Item coefcient (alphas) 4 5 4 4 5 22 Reliability item alpha 0.7323 0.8841 0.8436 0.7169 0.7131 0.9258 Standardised 0.7471 0.8833 0.8453 0.7286 0.7723 0.9327

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Table I. Service quality scores: Cronbachs alpha

suggest the existence of service gaps at Air Mauritius. While expectations of Air Mauritius customers are lowest for Tangibles in comparison to other service dimensions, customers tend to agree (mean 4:125) that the company has up to date equipment, visually appealing physical facilities, well-dressed employees and visually appealing communication materials. It is also worth noting that customers expect the company to be reliable (mean 4:587) but the same dimension has obtained the lowest perception scores. This is a real cause of concern and provides a clear starting point for service improvements at Air Mauritius. The results of the SERVQUAL gap scores conrm the existence of Gap 5 as suggested by Parasuraman et al. (1985, 1988). The overall perceived service quality of Air Mauritius will be higher, the more positive is the perception minus expectation score. The more negative the SERVQUAL score, the more serious is the service quality shortfall in the eyes of the customer. The mean SERVQUAL score on each service quality dimension was computed. The results are shown in Table II. Air Mauritius does not exceed customer expectations on any of the ve service dimensions. The most problematic service dimension is reliability with an overall mean score of 2 0.729 and the least is tangibles (mean 20:315). A negative score for reliability shows that customers on average perceive that Air Mauritius does not: keep its promises, show sincere interest in solving customer problems, perform the service right the rst time, provide the service at the time it promises to do so and insist on error free records. Earlier SERVQUAL research (Nel et al., 1997; Asubonteng et al., 1996; Frost and Kumar, 2001; Zhao et al., 2002; Ingram and Daskalakis, 1999) indicates that businesses nd it easier to meet customer expectations in the dimension found least important by customers generally (tangibles), while nding it most difcult to meet expectations in the dimension most valued by customers (reliability). These assessments would suggest that airlines intent on improving customer service quality should spend more management attention and resources on improving the reliability dimension and less on tangibles (Sultan and Simpson, 2000). The overall SERVQUAL mean score for Air Mauritius is 2 0.531 and it shows the extent of the discrepancy between customer expectations and perceived service (Gap 5). The P-E framework suggests that the highest service quality score for an attribute occurs when the expectation score is 1 (strongly disagree) and the perception score is 5 (strongly agree), giving a service quality score of 4. Also when service quality perceptions are less than expectations, customers are dissatised, this suggests that on average customers are dissatised by the service quality of the airline. The company
Unweighted gap scores (P-E) 2 0.315 2 0.729 2 0.471 2 0.531 2 0.611 2 0.531

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Dimension Tangibles Reliability Responsiveness Assurance Empathy Overall average SERVQUAL score

Expectations 4.440 4.587 4.543 4.629 4.470

Perceptions 4.125 3.858 4.072 4.098 3.859

Weightings 14.7 28.1 18.9 17.5 20.8

Weighted average 20.046 20.205 20.089 20.093 20.127 20.560

Table II. SERVQUAL scores for Air Mauritius

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must strive harder to align customers expectations with perceptions on all service dimensions. However, assessing the importance of the service dimensions to customers is crucial, as any investment improving service quality will payoff in the long term only if customers perceive such investment to be of value to them. Consequently, the relative importance of each dimension were computed using Parasuraman et al. (1991) suggestion of allocating 100 points among the ve service dimensions. Customers allocated the highest weighting to Reliability and the lowest to Assurance as shown in Table II. The overall service gap using the weighted SERVQUAL model is 2 0.56 and reveals a larger discrepancy between tourists expectations and perceptions. These ndings conrm previous studies (Llosa et al., 1998; Sureshchandar et al., 2001; Coulthard, 2004) that show weighted dimensions contribute marginally in enhancing understanding of service quality. The negative SERVQUAL scores both weighted and unweighted indicates that there is room for improvement in the service quality at Air Mauritius. The second objective of the study was further investigated using the suggestions of Sultan and Simpson (2000) where passengers were asked to rank the importance of the service dimensions (rank 1 indicating the most important attribute and rank 5 the least important one). The results showed that 42.7 per cent of passengers indicated reliability to be the most important service quality feature, 30.7 per cent ranked empathy as the second most important, 29.9 per cent indicated responsiveness as the third most important, 30 per cent Assurance as the fourth most important and 30.7 per cent indicated tangibles as the least important. it is evident that the order of importance (reliability, empathy, responsiveness, assurance and tangibility) is not the same as noted by Parasuraman et al. (1988). Sultan and Simpson (2000) found reliability to be the most important dimension for US and European passengers, followed by responsiveness, assurance, empathy and tangibles. International tourists ying Air Mauritius value reliability and empathy more than any other service dimensions. This can be attributed to different expectations on behalf of passengers when travelling specically for holiday purposes. The higher importance attached to empathy is perhaps the result of tourists also taking into consideration expected service levels at their holiday destination in their evaluation of a ag carrier. This link is emphasised by Juwaheer (2004), in her study of international tourists perceptions of service quality provided by hotels in Mauritius. Personalisation of service (empathy) emerged as a signicant inuencing factor on tourists perceptions of service quality. It is interesting to note that tourists perceive assurance to be of lesser importance than empathy. This is most probably due to repeat customers (53.6 per cent) feeling that employee trust and condence is a given in a transactional relationship between a company and its customers, otherwise the relationship does not exist in the rst place. Hence, empathy as a construct can only be displayed after an employee has inspired trust in the customer at the moment of truth. In the short term, Air Mauritius can still be protable but if service reliability is not improved, it will become increasingly more difcult for the company to retain existing customers and attract new ones. Investments in service quality improvement may not show immediate nancial returns, but in the long term it is the only true source of competitive advantage that will ensure continuous cash ows (Buzzell and Gale, 1987). To further verify the dimensionality of the 22 items, the raw SERVQUAL scores were factor analysed. A principal component procedure with Varimax normalised

rotation was used to ensure reliability of results. The aim of a principal component procedure is to explain the greatest amount of variance in the data set, thus providing data reduction (Aaker et al., 1998). There are various rotational strategies such as Varimax, Biquartimax, Quartimax, and Equamax (Jennrich and Sampson, 1966) that enable a researcher to obtain a clear pattern of loadings, that is, factors that are somehow clearly marked by high loadings for some variables and low loadings for others. The option Varimax rotation of the normalised factor loadings was chosen in order to maximise the variances of the dquared normalised factor loadings across variables for each factor. It is the method that is most commonly used (Clarkson and Jennrich, 1988). Kaisers criterion ensured that only factors with eigenvalues greater or equal to one were reported and chosen for interpretation. In essence such a criterion proposed by Kaiser (1960) suggests that unless a factor extracts at least as much as the equivalent of one original variable, it should be dropped from factor analysis. The analysis was constrained a priori to ve factors as the SERVQUAL model was hypothesised to have a ve dimensional structure (Frost and Kumar, 2001). Various researchers have used different criteria to interpret factor loadings, Nunnally (1967) suggests loadings of 0.7 or greater to be reliable while Frost and Kumar (2001) as well as Juwaheer (2004) used 0.4 as cut off points. Consequently, variables with factor loadings greater or equal to 0.45 were deemed to load heavily on a particular factor. The resulting procedure led to a four-factor structure that explained 63.1 per cent of the variation in the SERVQUAL model. The corresponding factor loading matrix, including commonalities is shown in Table III. Commonalities show how much of the variance in the variable has been accounted for by the four factors (Kinnear and Gray, 1994). Factor one is made up of seven statements that explain most of the variation (43.6 per cent). It contains statements pertaining to service dimensions such as responsiveness, assurance and empathy. The result suggests that tourists perceive enhancing factors of service delivery such as, helpfulness of employees, feelings of trust and safety dealing with employees, promptness of service, and having the best interest of passengers at heart, to be all related and part of the same construct. This factor can be named service efciency and affect. This nding is in line with the research carried out by Khan and Su (2003), which showed that indeed a hierarchy of service dimensions exist and that tourists tend to expect more of those services that are courteous and informative, and convey a feeling of trust and condence. Five statements loaded heavily on factor two, explaining 8.4 per cent of total variance. This factor can be named service personalisation, which is already a signicant service dimension in the hospitality industry (Kandampully et al., 2001; Stevens et al., 1995; Mittal and Lassar, 1996). Research has shown that international tourists visiting Mauritius attach a lot of importance to warmth and reliability of service in hotels (Juwaheer, 2004). Also, the destination has over the years built a strong reputation for service excellence, which creates high expectations among passengers as Air Mauritius is part of the destination experience. Wirtz and Johnston (2003) conrm that competitive advantage for airlines lies in service delivery, where softer skills such as warmth, care and anticipation of needs rather than the technicalities of ight schedules, seat comfort, and punctuality are more important to passengers. The latter most airlines can master. Factor three pertains to the service dimension of reliability and explains 6.1 per cent of variance and factor four measured tangibility with 5 per

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Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5 Q6 Q7 Q8 Q9 Q10 Q11 Q12 Q13 Q14 Q15 Q16 Q17 Q18 Q19 Q20 Q21 Q22 Explained variance Proportion of total variance

Factor 1

Factor 2

Factor 3

Factor 4 0.5739 0.6751 0.5152 0.7421 0.4889

504

0.5958 0.7440 0.7723 0.7541 0.7040 0.6939 0.4954 0.6744 0.6397 0.7181 0.7808 0.5123 0.7407 0.6676 0.6144 0.5723 0.4552 2.6220 0.1192 4.0554 0.1843

Table III. Factor loadings with Varimax rotation of SERVQUAL scores

0.4800 0.4822 0.6303 4.2323 0.1924

2.9577 0.1344

Note: Factor loadings below 0.45 are not shown in the table

cent of variance explained. Thus, exploratory factor analysis revealed that service efciency and affect was the most important dimension for international tourists followed by service personalisation, reliability and tangibility. Hence, as noted by authors of several studies (Nel et al., 1997; Babakus and Boller, 1992; Carman, 1990), the SERVQUAL instrument in this study does not consistently measure the same factors as suggested by Parasuraman et al. (1988) and that indeed dimension structure may be context specic. The third objective of the study was to determine the extent to which the identied service dimensions inuenced overall satisfaction and willingness to recommend the airline to others. The four service quality factors were entered into regression analysis for that purpose. Table IV reports the results of the stepwise regression model, using tourists overall judgement of service quality as the dependent variable and the four factors presented above as independent variables. It should be noted that the dependent variable was measured on a ve-point Likert scale from not at all satised to very satised. As it can be seen, there are two factors (service efciency and affect and tangibility), which explain 21.1 per cent of variance in passengers rating of satisfaction levels. Correlation analysis between the dependent variable of the model and service dimensions revealed that correlation exists between the independent variables. This phenomenon can be explained by the multidimensionality of service quality constructs in the data set. Using linear combinations such as these reduces, but cannot eliminate, a potential multi-collinearity problem.

As can be seen from Table IV, Service efciency and affect appear to be a core dimension (b 0:415) in tourists evaluation of satisfaction with the airline service. The F statistic for the regression model was 9.041 with a p value less than 0.000. The result differs from the study of Cunningham et al. (2002), who found that reliability and empathy were signicant predictors of customer satisfaction among US customers. The cultural and social background of respondents for this study might account for the difference. The model also indicates that 78.9 per cent of the variance cannot be explained and therefore further research is needed to identify other factors that inuence service quality at Air Mauritius. Earlier studies have shown that service quality perceptions can also be inuenced by factors such as value (Rust and Oliver, 1994; Zeithaml, 1988), attributions and equity (Bolton and Drew, 1991), information availability, perceived risk of ying (Cunningham et al., 2002) and atmosphere (Peyrot et al., 1993). These factors could perhaps explain at least part of the unexplained variance. Similarly, a regression model was developed to determine which service quality factors inuence tourists likeliness to recommend the airline to others. As shown in Table V, three factors namely Service efciency and affect, Tangibility and Reliability explained 21.7 per cent of variance. The F statistic for the regression

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b
Dependent variables Overall customer satisfaction Independent variables Factor 1 (service efciency and affect) Factor 4 (tangibility) Multiple R R2 Adjusted R 2 Standard error F statistic p-level

p-level

0.415 0.155 0.459 0.211 0.188 0.755 9.041 0.000

5.424 2.023

0.000 0.044 Table IV. Stepwise regression analysis results for customer satisfaction levels

b
Dependent variables Overall willingness to recommend airline to others Independent variables Factor 1 (service efciency and affect) Factor 4 (tangibility) Factor 3 (reliability) Multiple R R2 Adjusted R 2 Standard error F statistic p-level

p-level

0.334 0.279 0.168 0.467 0.217 0.205 0.702 12.618 0.000

4.404 3.679 2.219

0.000021 0.000033 0.028112 Table V. Stepwise regression analysis results for willingness to recommend airline to others

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model was 12.618 with a p value less than 0.000. The model also indicates that 78.3 per cent of variance can be explained by other factors and further research is needed to identify additional factors inuencing tourists willingness to recommend the airline. The regression results for the dependent variables satisfaction levels and willingness to recommend the airline reect Bitners (1992) proposition that the service-scape (tangibility) is used by consumers as surrogate indicators of service quality and hence inuence satisfaction levels. It is surprising to note that reliability of service does not contribute to evaluation of satisfaction levels and marginally contributes to willingness to recommend, while other studies (Cunningham et al., 2002; Johns et al., 2004; Juwaheer, 2004) have found this service dimension to be a signicant predictor. Cross-cultural differences have been found to be a plausible explanation for the above (Nel et al., 1997; Winsted, 1997; Ling et al., 2005). Discussion and conclusions The overall results suggest that the underlying factors dening service quality seem to be inconsistent across service providers or contexts. The results of the empirical study show that tangibility and reliability are clearly perceived by international tourists while original service dimensions, responsiveness, assurance and empathy are uni-dimensional to some extent. Further research is required to explicitly conclude if empathy plays a bigger role than responsiveness and assurance in tourists perceptions of service quality. In fact, Carman (1990) highlighted the multi-faceted nature of some services that resulted in a number of inter-relationships between dimensions. It would appear that the number of service dimensions is very much inuenced by the context under evaluation and methods of evaluation (Coulthard, 2004). The SERVQUAL model showed good internal reliability with high Cronbach alpha scores on all dimensions in line with other studies. Like some researchers who have suggested that overall reliability can be improved by changing negatively worded items into positive ones (Babakus and Boller, 1992; Babakus and Mangold, 1992; Carman, 1990), this study conrms the latter. The discriminant validity of SERVQUAL was poor for this study as well, in line with other studies that found great overlap among service dimensions (Peter et al., 1993). The number of distinct dimensions based solely on factor analysis results is not the same as with other studies in the airline industry (Frost and Kumar, 2001; Sultan and Simpson, 2000). The variation may be due to differences in data collection, analysis procedures and nationality of respondents. The majority of interviewees being of South African nationality could account for the difference in the hierarchy of dimensions found in this study. In fact, Nel et al. (1997) made various recommendations on the applicability of SERVQUAL among South Africans, one of which was that respondents for surveys tend to be Caucasians with a very good command of the English language. The respondents for this study are no different as Mauritius as a tourist destination attracts largely a Caucasian crowd. In the same line of thought, Sultan and Simpson (2000) demonstrated empirically that there are signicant differences in service quality expectations and perceptions based on nationality as well as overall perceptions of service quality. The SERVQUAL model differs in its features, that is, the various dimensions and importance of the dimensions in an international context. Thus, cultural and social background of respondents may have led to different service quality expectations and perceptions. Clearly what matters to South Africans when evaluating a service

encounter differs from other countries. Personalisation of service is much more important to them. As pointed out by Khan and Su (2003), culture prescribes how the service is delivered, perceived and consumed. For Air Mauritius, a strategy of service differentiation should start on improving reliability of service and not only focus on reducing costs. This type of strategy is common in the airline industry, but few can master the complexities. The company is able to create high perceptions using tangible cues but under performs on process dimensions, which seem to be of more importance to customers. Customers expect personalised service, employees sincerity and personal warmth in service delivery, to make the service experience memorable. The regression analyses have shown the extent to which service efciency and affect contributes to overall satisfaction and willingness to recommend the airline to others. Excellent customer service is the result of all the components being in place, from the right strategic focus and service culture, to a clear understanding of the service, to good training and people, to good systems and processes. A service culture should be developed in the organisation that promotes values and beliefs such as excellence and zero tolerance for mediocrity. Berry et al. (1994) have outlined the following ten critical lessons for improving service quality that should become embedded in the organisational culture: listening, reliability, basic service, service design, recovery, surprising customers, fair play, teamwork, employee research and servant leadership. Marketing activity of Air Mauritius should centre on the development of branding strategies to integrate their service, establish identities and images both for their employees and customers. The Gaps model, in particular Gaps 1 to 4, should be investigated to identify potential factors contributing to shortfalls in service delivery at the moment of truth. Management actions could include empowerment and training of employees which might increase feelings of ownership of the service encounter, resulting in more personalised and accountable service for customers (Bowen and Lawler, 1992). Employees are the most important element in the service delivery process thus ensuring customer satisfaction (Frost and Kumar, 2001). Successful management of service encounters can only happen if management has an excellent understanding of customer expectations and adequate internal communication of these expectations within the organisation. Benchmarking has become vital as a source of identifying gaps that exist between customer expectations and company performance as perceived by customers. The extent to which internal marketing is successful within the organisation should be investigated. Employee role conict and ambiguity can act as a barrier to effective service delivery (Hartline and Ferrell, 1996). Self-efcacy, job satisfaction and adaptability inuence employees ability to serve customers in a manner that enhances the service experience. Service quality issues should not be seen as a means of solving actual and potential service delivery problems. It must be viewed as a strategic orientation of a company with the belief that service quality provides real business advantages over the long term. A strategy of superior customer service can be generated through a vision of excellence throughout the organisation. A service organisation that does not have a shared vision and culture of service excellence will have a tough task acquiring it, as it cannot be bought. It must be built (Chan, 2000a). Service quality helps in supporting an organisations competitive position in much the same way as cost synergies, organisational expertise and brand equity do. The consequences of such a strategy is

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the ability to command premium prices, with high margins, in a global industry where small airlines are dependent on repeat business for survival, and with word-of-mouth praise by customers as an important channel of marketing. Customers want to be respected and rewarded for their business and not just with frequent-yer miles, which have become a commodity, a price of entry into the market (Albrecht, 1992). The thrust for Air Mauritius should be on providing an experience as opposed to a function. Such a strategy is that anyone can y airplanes but few organisations can excel in serving people. And because it is a competence that is hard to build, it is also hard for competitors to copy or match (Chan, 2000a). Successful service companies have shown to be consistently excellent listeners to their customers and service quality strategies are often characterised by customer segmentation, customised service, guarantees, continuous customer feedback, and comprehensive measurement of company performance (Sultan and Simpson, 2000). In addition, perceptions of high service are the result of very carefully planned service processes. Management and employees should be encouraged to own up their mistakes and much effort should be spent in sharing experiences of service failures to use them as learning opportunities. At Southwest Airlines for example, improvement plans are generated based on past problems to enable the organisation to learn from mistakes and move on (Laszlo, 1999). Such a climate encourages innovation in service delivery. Operational systems, procedures, processes should be all oriented towards serving the needs of customers. Once the right culture is in place, internal communication processes should be geared towards motivating employees to deliver high service while external communications should be managed to set the right level of expectations among consumers. Air Mauritius should also consider the trend of outsourcing of non-core services (catering, administration, ground handling, maintenance etc.) and the rationalisation of distribution channels (Driver, 1999) to focus resources on service delivery. Survey limitations and directions for future research This research was exploratory in nature and its limitations should be noted. The sample size should be considered adequate only for exploratory analysis and a larger sample is needed to validate the study. Also, the in-ight self completion survey and mail survey led to a very low response rate due to a number of factors that were discussed earlier on. The non-response problem for both the in-ight survey and the mail survey could potentially have led to a bias in the sample. Passengers other than international tourists should be surveyed to provide a more holistic picture of service quality at Air Mauritius. A more in-depth study is required to assess customer expectations and perceptions of service quality from passengers of different nationalities. Sultan and Simpson (2000) showed that signicant differences in service quality perceptions exist among European and US airline passengers. Cross-cultural comparisons of a similar nature based on the SERVQUAL model will provide for rewarding research in Southern Africa. This study focused on literate passengers with at least a command of the English language, it may be important to develop ways of measuring service quality in different languages in an international context. The link between international tourists perceptions of service quality for airlines and both expectations and perceptions of service at the tourist destination should be

researched. Repetitive studies within the same industry should be conducted to examine the stability of ndings among international tourists visiting Mauritius. Other factors inuencing customer satisfaction and willingness to recommend the airline should be identied to improve the predictive validity of the regression models used. Moreover, comparative research on service quality perceptions is needed within other airlines from the Indian Ocean such as Air Seychelles, Air Austral and Air Madagascar. Air Mauritius should also undertake benchmarking studies with airlines such as South African Airways, Air France, Emirates and British Airways in order to improve its service levels. Quality does not improve unless it is measured (Sureshchandar et al., 2001) and hence longitudinal studies would enhance the usefulness of the data collected during this research.
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Further reading Carr, C. (1990), Front-line Customer Service: 15 Keys to Customer Satisfaction, John Wiley, New York, NY. Genestre, A. and Herbig, P. (1996), Service expectations and perceptions revisited: adding product quality to SERVQUAL, Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice, Vol. 4 No. 4, pp. 72-82. Ghobadian, A., Speller, S. and Jones, M. (1994), Service quality concepts and models, International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, Vol. 11 No. 9, pp. 43-66. About the author Girish Prayag is a Lecturer in Marketing and Tourism in the Department of Management at the University of Mauritius. His areas of interest include, consumer behaviour in tourism, airline service quality, destination marketing and branding, and SMEs. Girish Prayag can be contacted at: girish@webmail.co.za

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