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Developing zones of tolerance for managing passenger rail service quality

Robert Y. Cavana and Lawrence M. Corbett
Victoria Management School, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand, and

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Received April 2003 Revised June 2005

Y.L. (Glenda) Lo
Transpower New Zealand Ltd, Wellington, New Zealand
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this article is to develop and empirically test an extension to the three-column format SERVQUAL instrument to evaluate passenger rail service quality. Design/methodology/approach This article combines the literatures of service quality and rail transport quality to develop the conceptual framework. Three new transport dimensions (comfort, connection, and convenience) are added to the original ve SERVQUAL dimensions (assurance, empathy, reliability, responsiveness, and tangibles). The instrument was tested on a passenger line in Wellington, New Zealand. Valid responses to 340 questionnaires were statistically analyzed. Findings High Cronbach alpha values supported the reliability of the instrument. Content and construct validity are demonstrated also. Regression analysis identied assurance, responsiveness and empathy as the quality factors that had signicant effects on overall service quality. In addition, customers indicated that reliability and convenience were also very important factors. Service quality zones of tolerance were identied for each dimension and attribute. Research limitations/implications There are not many published studies to conrm or compare the results of the three-column SERVQUAL instrument, either in the general service literature or in the rail passenger literature. Although the ve original SERVQUAL dimensions have been tested quite extensively, the three new rail transport dimensions require further development and testing, particularly since the sample was drawn from a single passenger line in New Zealand. More development and empirical testing are required to rene this measure. Practical implications Based on the eight dimensions, the practical use of the zones of tolerance for identifying areas of quality shortfall and managing quality are illustrated in this paper. Originality/value This paper provides one of the few empirical applications of the three-column SERVQUAL instrument and extends it to make it more suitable for evaluating rail passenger service quality. Keywords Customer services quality, SERVQUAL, Rail transport, Transportation, Surveys, New Zealand Paper type Research paper

Introduction The rapid growth of service sectors all over the world and the deregulation of many service industries have led researchers with an interest in quality issues to the importance of acquiring more understanding about service quality. It is recognized that high quality service is essential for rms that want to be successful in their business (Parasuraman et al., 1988; Rust and Oliver, 1994). It leads to customer loyalty (Lewis, 1994), higher protability (Gundersen et al., 1996) and lower cost (Grant, 1998).

International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management Vol. 24 No. 1, 2007 pp. 7-31 q Emerald Group Publishing Limited 0265-671X DOI 10.1108/02656710710720303

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However, the existing knowledge about product quality is insufcient to deal with service quality (Parasuraman et al., 1985). This is because of the intangibility, heterogeneity and inseparability characteristics of service industry outputs (Parasuraman et al., 1985, 1988; Lewis, 1994). Service quality is recognized by a number of authors as both abstract and elusive (Parasuraman et al., 1985, 1988; Carman, 1990; Cronin and Taylor, 1992; Lewis, 1994). Parasuraman et al. (1985, 1988, 1991a, b, 1994a, b) have developed an instrument, called SERVQUAL, to measure service quality in organizations:
SERVQUAL has emerged as perhaps the most popular standardized questionnaire to measure service quality (Frost and Kumar, 2001, p. 372).

The three-column format SERVQUAL instrument is the latest development by Parasuraman et al. (1994a), and it is claimed that this can be used for managers for diagnostic purposes and it offers the opportunity for using the perception items separately for predictive purposes. Despite the potential diagnostic value, there have been very few reported empirical studies using this instrument. Recently Caruana et al. (2000) have undertaken a study to assess the usefulness of the revised SERVQUAL instrument. However, their study focuses on experiments with different combinations of the one, two and three column SERVQUAL instruments, rather than on the diagnostic usefulness of the instrument for managers. This suggests more empirical work is required using the three-column SERVQUAL instrument. This is the research gap we wish to address in this paper. In addition, we selected the rail passenger industry for study since there are very few applications of the SERVQUAL instrument reported based on the rail transport industry. Also one of the co-authors previously worked in the company selected for the study, and had access to data and company support for the project. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to provide an empirical application of the three-column format SERVQUAL instrument developed by Parasuraman et al. (1994a). In addition, the paper extends the standard ve dimensional SERVQUAL instrument to include an additional three dimensions specically related to measuring quality in the rail passenger industry. We then describe the testing of this enhanced SERVQUAL instrument and the results of applying it on a rail passenger line (called Rail Co. in this research) in Wellington, New Zealand. Finally we discuss the insights into the factors that affect passengers overall perception of quality based on the results of this study. Background to the SERVQUAL model In the early 1980s, Gronroos (1982) indicated that service quality included technical quality and functional quality. Technical quality referred to the results that the customer could get after a service. Functional quality referred to those processes during which the service was delivered to the customer. Lehtinen and Lehtinen (1982) stated that there were three components for service quality: physical quality, corporate quality and interactive quality. Physical quality involved the physical issues of the service. Corporate quality involved the image of the organization. Interactive quality referred to the interaction among people including contact staff and customers. Accordingly, service delivery contains two components: the outcomes of a service and the processes during service delivery (Parasuraman et al., 1985). From this stream of research work, Parasuraman et al. (1985) developed the well-known ve-gap model of service quality (SERVQUAL) based on their exploratory research. Parasuraman et al.

(1985) originally identied ten dimensions for perceived service quality. These were subsequently reduced to the following ve dimensions (Parasuraman et al., 1988, p. 23): tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy. This model was further rened by expanding the expectation to two levels: desired and adequate (Parasuraman et al., 1991a, 1994a, b). Desired service is dened as the level of service representing a blend of what customers believe can be and should be provided. Adequate service is the minimum level service customers are willing to accept (Parasuraman et al., 1994a, p. 202). There is a region called zone of tolerance that separates the desired service level and the adequate service level. Any performance rated within the zone would be considered satisfactory (Parasuraman et al., 1994a). This expanded model is the latest along this stream of research work. This model is also described as the three-column model owing to the way the authors lay out the questions in the instrument. The general SERVQUAL instruments (one or two-column formats) have been tested and used by many researchers in the eld of service quality in various research settings. Examples include: care hospital (Bowers et al., 1994; Carman, 1990; Lam, 1997), bank (Cronin and Taylor, 1992; Llosa et al., 1998; Parasuraman et al., 1988, 1991b), airline (Fick and Ritchie, 1991; Young et al., 1994; Frost and Kumar, 2001), hotel (Fick and Ritchie, 1991), restaurant (Fick and Ritchie, 1991) and public services (Orwig et al., 1997). However, there have been very few applications of the three-column SERVQUAL instrument. Walker and Baker (2000) used this framework to investigate the zone of tolerance as it related to consumer experience with health clubs. They claimed that their results suggested service marketers can make better use of resources by investing directly in improving performance to meet/exceed adequate expectation levels on essential service dimensions rather than pursuing an ideal standard on less-essential dimensions (p. 433). De Carvalho and Leite (1999) reported on a study using the framework with postal agencies in Brazil. Also, while there are a number of studies of rail passenger service quality (e.g. Disney, 1998, 1999; Hanna and Drea, 1998; Drea and Hanna, 2000; Tripp and Drea, 2002), there is very little published literature that reports on the use of SERVQUAL in the assessment of railway passenger service quality. Service quality in public transport industry Allen and DiCesare (1976) considered that quality of service for public transport industry contained two categories: user and non-user categories. Under the user category, it consists of speed, reliability, comfort, convenience, safety, special services and innovations. For the non-user-category, it is composed of system efciency, pollution and demand. Silcock (1981) conceptualized service quality for public transport industry as the measures of accessibility, reliability, comfort, convenience and safety. Pullen (1993, p. 261) dened quality of service for local public transport industry as a concept that involves those attributes of the service which affect its tness for purpose and the attributes, and indeed tness for purpose, require detailed denition in relation to local objectives and circumstances. Traditionally, the performance indicators for public transport industry are divided into two categories: efciency and effectiveness. Under the efciency category, the measures are concerned with the processes that produce the services while the

Rail service quality

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measures in the effectiveness category are used to determine how well the services provided are with respect to the objectives that are set for them (Pullen, 1993). Quality of service is one of the performance indicators under the effectiveness category. It is composed of accessibility, reliability, comfort, convenience and safety. These quality measures are shown in Appendix 1 (Silcock, 1981). Allen and DiCesare (1976) classied the performance measures into three categories: quantity of service, quality of service and cost/revenue of which are further divided into user and non-user measures. Passengers waiting time, lost mileage and characteristics of each journey mode (time of arrival, time spend, time of arrival at the destination) are commonly used measures in the industry to measure quality of service (Pullen, 1993). More recently, output quality measures that have been used for the rail system in Britain include train performance (delays per passenger train), train overcrowding, asset condition (broken rails per train mile), and safety or accident risk (signals passed at danger per train mile) (Pollitt and Smith, 2002). Following the deregulation of public transportation in New Zealand and other countries, operators became more aware of the need to understand what their customers wanted. Psychometric measures caught the attention of many transport undertakings. The level of transport service (LOTS) was developed to measure the quality of service based on travel speed and comfort. The measures are shown in Pullen (1993) (see Appendix 2). The rating scale is from A (excellent) to F (not suitable). Each attribute was assigned a weight that reects the importance of each attribute. The weighted score reects the performance of that attribute. The overall performance (i.e. overall LOTS value) can be obtained to reect the quality of service. Other measurement systems are discussed in Du Plessis (1984), McKnight et al. (1986), Forsyth and Smyth (1986), Miller (1995). Hanna and Drea (1998), and Drea and Hanna (2000) have studied quality of service in part of the Amtrak passenger rail system in the US. Their research focus was on the attributes of service quality that inuenced the transport choice of the survey respondents, e.g. rail vs automobile. The attributes used in the rst paper were: comfort, cost, timing (ability to travel when I want), location (ability to travel where I want) and in-transit productivity (ability to work while traveling). In the later paper cost, convenience getting to the station, parking availability, Amtrak comfort, seat comfort, ride, seating area cleanliness, and courtesy of on-board staff were the service quality attributes tested. Tripp and Drea (2002) also used a survey of Amtrak passengers to assess the direct and indirect relationship between pre-core/peripheral and core service performance components and their impact on the likelihood of repeat purchase (p. 433). They found that the core experiences on-board that determined the customers attitude to the service provider an subsequently their intention to use the train again. These attributes included announcements, seat comfort, ride, cleanliness of seating area, courtesy of on-board staff, rest rooms and cafe car conditions. The conceptual model Perceived quality is subjective, enduring and less situation-specic. It is an attitude to reect customers judgment of the excellence of service. Parasuraman et al. (1994a, b) demonstrate that the conceptualization of service quality can be based on a disconrmation paradigm (i.e. the gap between performance and expectations). The

gap model of service quality and the concept of transport service quality showed consistency that service quality should be measured on a multidimensional basis. Some transport service quality literature pointed out that different methods could be used for measuring service quality. It depends on the type of users, purposes for using the measures and the environment in which the services were provided. From this point-of-view, SERVQUAL is an instrument that could be used to fulll the purpose of measuring perceived service quality from the customers perspective in this industry. On the other hand, inconsistency is also found when comparing these two. They have different dimensions in conceptualization of the service quality. SERVQUAL is much more service oriented. Those commonly used in the public transport industry are more industry-based. SERVQUAL is much more humanistic, or customer-related, while most of the measures used in public transport industry are much more mechanistic, or have a technical focus, or use more objective measures, as discussed in the previous section. This led to the criticism that SERVQUAL could not tell the whole story. In Genestre and Herbigs (1996) study, it was shown that by adding product quality to SERVQUAL, several strong products related factors are identied. In the airline industry, Young et al. (1994) added the industry-based measures to SERVQUAL measures, and the predictive power to satisfaction was signicantly increased. In summary, in order to measure the quality of service thoroughly, the attributes used in SERVQUAL, the public transport industry, and the railway service sector should be grouped together to form a pool of items for measurement. The basis of the conceptual framework to be used in this research is an extended SERVQUAL model that incorporates the relevant attributes mentioned above. The value of adopting this model is: . The diagnostic value is very high. The broad areas that are not doing well and their importance to the evaluation can be unfolded. . As seen from Table I, while SERVQUAL has the ability to capture some dimensions, elements that are not captured can be incorporated in the additional measures. . The gap model has already been gone through a complete building process since 1985 and was fully tested afterwards. From the literature review, it is clear that we need a set of attributes that could be classied into different dimensions to measure service quality. Also these attributes and dimensions will need to be more context-specic than the basic SERVQUAL dimensions. The traditional measures in public transportation industry lack information about the underlying perception of customers, while the SERVQUAL model is too service-oriented and lacks information about the service offering. Therefore the combination of the dimensions from these two different aspects of measuring service quality could increase the understanding of the quality construct for the railway service sector. Table I summarizes our ndings about the dimensions or aspects used by the SERVQUAL instrument, and the public transportation operators and researchers. It is these dimensions that we will incorporate in our extended model. We propose that three more dimensions that are important to the railway passenger service are added. They are: convenience, comfort and connection.

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Reliabilitya Responsiveness Assurancea Safety Safety and security Empathya Tangiblesa Convenienceb Speedb,c Duration Quick Comfortb
a

Sources of information SERVQUAL; Allen and DiCesare (1976); Corry (1997); Miller (1995); Nieuwenhuis (1997); Silcock (1981) SERVQUAL SERVQUAL Silcock (1981) Allen and DiCesare (1976) SERVQUAL SERVQUAL Allen and DiCesare (1976); Catling (1996); Corry (1997); Moodie (1997); Silcock (1981) Allen and DiCesare (1976); Arentz (1969); Pullen (1993) Moodie (1997) Miller (1995) Allen and DiCesare (1976); Catling (1996); Francois (1997); Moodie (1997); Pullen (1993); Silcock (1981)

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Table I. Summary of dimensions for rail passenger service quality

Notes: aSERVQUAL dimensions; bProposed new dimensions; cSpeed dimension renamed connection after exploratory factor analysis (Lo, 1999)

The conceptual framework for rail passenger service quality, based Parasuraman et al. (1994a) expanded three-column model, is provided in Figure 1. In the expanded model, the expected service is further divided into two levels: desired level and adequate (minimum acceptable) level.

Figure 1. Conceptual framework for measuring railway passenger service quality

Methodology Operational denitions The indirect measure (difference score) of the perceived quality service construct is operationalized as the difference between the perceived performance and the expectation (Parasuraman et al., 1994a): . Measure of service adequacy (MSA) is dened as MSA P 2 Ea: . Measure of service superiority (MSS) is dened as MSS P 2 Es. where: . P the ratings of the perceptions of service performance. . Ea the ratings of the minimum acceptable level of expected service. . Es the ratings of the desired level of expected service. Advantages of using indirect measurements, as used in our research are: . Understanding customer expectation about service quality can help managers to nd out the shortfalls, which are required to be improved (Parasuraman et al., 1988, 1994a), and to examine the dynamics of service quality over time (Parasuraman et al., 1993). Managers can understand the expectation for each important area and develop strategies to increase customer satisfaction by lowering their expectation (Carman, 1990). . The potential for inated ratings in indirect measurement, which may lead to erroneous inferences, is much lower than that in direct measurement (Parasuraman et al., 1994a). . The response error is low (Parasuraman et al., 1994a). Item selection After identifying the dimensions, the next step was to consolidate the different items that are used to measure the corresponding dimensions from a variety of literature. It is a very difcult task at this stage. Since a large part of the conceptual framework (Figure 1) for this research comes from SERVQUAL, questions in the SERVQUAL instrument were used as the starting point in designing the questions for the ve original dimensions. If SERVQUAL is used as a basic skeleton for measuring service quality in a specic rm, items for each dimension can be reworded or added to make the instrument more suitable to be used (Carman, 1990; Cronin and Taylor, 1992; Parasuraman et al., 1988, 1991b). According to the guidelines in using the SERVQUAL (Parasuraman et al., 1991b), minor wording can be changed and content-specic items can be added provided that the question is general and not transaction-specic. In addition it is better to retain all the items in the SERVQUAL instrument unless it is proved to be unnecessary (Carman, 1990) because deletion of items will inuence the integrity of the scales (Parasuraman et al., 1991b). Three new dimensions were added to complement the measure of quality of railway passenger service. They are convenience, comfort and connection as shown in Figure 1. Based on the ndings in the two small pre-tests and the suggestions from the management of the Rail Co. and a statistics consultant, the battery of questions used in this research is shown in Table II.

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Dimension Assurance

Items 1. Courtesy staff on train 4. Being informed if there are delays 10. Personal safety at station 16. Personal safety on train 29. Courtesy staff at ticket ofce 30. Having the knowledge to answer your questions 37. Providing you with information about Tran Metro 31. Dealing with you in a caring fashion when you make inquiries 32. Understanding your needs when you make inquiries 38. Having your best interests at heart 23. 24. 34. 35. Maintaining the frequency of trains as scheduled in timetables Providing on time train services Dependability in handling your service problems Performing services right the rst time

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Empathy

Reliability

Responsiveness

3. Willingness to help you 28. Prompt service 36. Availability of staff in handling your requests 2. A neat, professional appearance staff on train 6. Clarity of information given in timetables 7. Clarity of timetables given at stations 12. Cleanliness of station 13. Modern appearance station 18. Cleanliness of train 19. Overall appearance train 33. A neat, professional appearance staff in ticket ofce 17. 20. 21. 22. 27. Availability of seating train Comfortable seats on train Comfortable temperature on train Smoothness of ride on train Traveling time on train

Tangibles

Comfort

Connection

Table II. Battery for the rail passenger three-column SERVQUAL instrument

11. Adequacy of parking facilities 14. Ease of access to your home station 15. Ease of access to the nearest station at your working place/school 25. Frequency of trains that meet your needs 26. Trains running at suitable times so you can catch connecting transport services 5. Ease of access to travel information 8. Ease of buying tickets 9. Convenient ofce hours at ticket ofce

Convenience

Measure of importance of dimensions The SERVQUAL instrument rated the importance of features by the allocation of points relative to other features. The total points should be added up to 100 across the features. Since the questionnaire was to be lled in on trains by passengers, the requirement for passenger to sum up eight numbers on train is not an easy task. In addition, we wanted to use a scale that could help respondents to answer the questions more quickly, Therefore we used an alternative nine point bi-polar numerical scale

with 1 being not at all important and 9 being extremely important (Cavana et al., 2001). In determining relative importance, the regression analysis or the direct rating approach could be used (Brandt, 1997). The scale described in this section adopts the latter approach. For this research, the former was basically used to determine the relative importance of the quality dimensions. The direct rating approach aims at providing additional information for understanding how passengers evaluate the relative importance. Summary of questionnaire design For the initial stage in questionnaire design, the questions in the SERVQUAL instrument were used. They were subjected to minor wording modication and addition of some items that were relevant to the urban railway passenger sector under the eight dimensions outlined in Table II. This resulted in 46 questions. Following two small tests on the question design, we reduced the number of questions to 38. The reasons were: . The original questions in SERVQUAL are so generic that they might not be appropriate when used in the railway industry. The respondents either did not give answers to the questions or wrote a question mark besides the questions. . In order to reduce the time needed to ll in the questionnaire so that a better response rate and better quality of response could be obtained, some questions that are believed to have some duplications with other items in the questionnaire were deleted. In addition, some wordings were changed in the questions to make the questions clearer to raise respondents interest in completing the questionnaire. The draft questionnaire was piloted with a sample of 20 passengers who got onto the selected Wellington train service that departed at 6:30 a.m. on a week day. The questionnaire was designed to ask information about passengers expectation in terms of minimum and desired service levels, their perception of services provided by the Rail Co., their value for money rating, overall quality rating, overall satisfaction rating, their trip information and some demographic data. Finally, an open-ended question was asked such that comments and suggestions from passengers could be obtained. Further details of the questionnaire are provided in Appendix 2. Sampling and data collection One passenger rail service in Wellington was surveyed for the purposes of this research. The rail company has six lines into and out of Wellington. Based on the resources available, we surveyed only one line of these train services. Random sampling from the passengers on one line is sufcient to determine the underlying factors that will affect their perception of passenger services. The population studied in this research was all passengers who traveled by the Rail Co. trains during the surveyed period and had their home station on Upper Hutt line. The sample was stratied by peak and off peak users. A total of 800 questionnaires were distributed. The number of returned questionnaires was 429. Among the returned questionnaires, 208 (48.5 percent) were collected on trains and 221 (51.5 percent) were mailed back by the respondents. Thus the response rate was 53.6 percent. Among the

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429 returns, 340 (79.3 percent) of them were usable. The non-usable questionnaires were mainly due to the presence of many missing items, many response errors and passengers whose home stations were not on the selected line. The number of non-usable questionnaires was 89 (20.7 percent). Reliability and validity of the survey instrument We then subjected our data collection instrument to reliability and validity analysis. Dimensionality As previously described, the items used for measuring the three new dimensions were based on the literature review. MSS is a measure for excellent quality and is consistent with the original denition of the gap model. Therefore exploratory factor analysis on MSS was performed to investigate the factor structure of the three newly added items (Lo, 1999). In order to estimate the number of factors, principal component analysis was performed. With the selection criteria that the eigenvalue should be greater than 1, three factors resulted. This shows consistency in the number of factors that we postulated for the new items. In addition, due to the ndings from previous research, that intercorrelations are found among the dimensions in measuring perceived quality of services, the three-factor solution was subjected to oblique rotation in order to facilitate the interpretation of the result (Parasuraman et al., 1988). All 38 questions under the eight dimensions were retained for reliability assessment. In order to investigate the distinctiveness of these dimensions, the intercorrelations among them were computed and are shown in Table III. The average intercorrelations for the three newly added dimensions were 0.62, 0.53, and 0.56, respectively. This shows that the newly added dimensions are quite distinctive by themselves. However, the ve SERVQUAL dimensions, which have a higher average intercorrelation, could suffer from some multicollinearity in this passenger services model (Tabachnick and Fidell, 1989). This suggests that the multiple regression analyses, using the eight dimensions as independent variables, performed hereafter should be interpreted carefully. Reliability Reliability is dened as the extent to which an experiment, test, or any measuring procedure yields the same results on repeated trials (Carmines and Zeller, 1979, p. 11).
Dimension (1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8) Assurance Empathy Reliability Responsiveness Tangibles Comfort Connection Convenience (1) 1.00 0.78 0.78 0.79 0.76 0.65 0.56 0.63 (2) 1.00 0.74 0.79 0.64 0.56 0.48 0.53 (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)

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Table III. Correlations among the eight dimensions in the conceptual model

1.00 0.75 0.63 0.65 0.57 0.53

1.00 0.66 0.58 0.50 0.56

1.00 0.66 0.55 0.57

1.00 0.55 0.48

1.00 0.53

1.00

Note: Numbers reported are Pearson correlations; all values are signicant at p , 0.01, correlations only shown below the diagonal

In this research, the internal consistency method was adopted for estimating reliabilities. It has the advantage of being a single test administration. Besides, this method has also been used for instrument assessment in various research studies on perceived quality of service (Carman, 1990; Babakus and Boller, 1992; Cronin and Taylor, 1992; Bowers et al., 1994; Lam, 1997; Llosa et al., 1998; Parasuraman et al., 1991b). Cronbachs alpha was used to assess internal consistency. Table IV shows the Cronbachs alpha values for the eight dimensions. For measuring MSA, the range is from 0.71 to 0.86. For measuring MSS, the range is from 0.74 to 0.85. The acceptable range for Cronbachs alpha in measuring constructs with narrow to moderately broad conceptual scope is from 0.55 to 0.90 (Van de Ven and Ferry, 1984). The result shows that the items are reliable in measuring the corresponding concepts. In addition, the results are consistent with those reported by Parasuraman et al. (1988). Validity The other important criterion that is used to determine the goodness of an instrument is validity. Validity is to measure the extent to which a scale fully and unambiguously captures the underlying unobservable, construct it is intended to measure (Parasuraman et al., 1988, p. 28). However, Asubonteng et al. (1996) note that:
The validity of a measure of service quality is difcult to test as a proven criterion is not available.

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They indicate (based on Peter and Churchill, 1986) that there are several different forms of validity that can serve as a criteri for assessing the psychometric soundness of a scale: discriminate validity, face validity and convergence and concurrent validity. We will discuss the face, convergent and discriminant validity of this research. These tests are similar to those carried out by Parasuraman et al. (1994a, pp. 212-214) when comparing the validity of the three-column format with the one and two column format data collection instruments. Face validity. In assessing the face validity of the instrument for this research, it was necessary to see how the pools of items were selected. The items were derived from the literature review about quality of services in service industries, quality of service and customer satisfaction on public transportation, existing documents of the passenger surveys carried out by the Rail Co. and suggestions from management personnel in the Rail Co. Moreover, two small pre-tests were carried out during the development of the

Dimension Assurance Empathy Reliability Responsiveness Tangibles Comfort Connection Convenience

Measure of service adequacy (MSA) Cronbachs alpha 0.83 0.85 0.85 0.71 0.85 0.86 0.78 0.82

Measure of service superiority (MSS) Cronbachs Alpha 0.84 0.85 0.83 0.75 0.81 0.82 0.74 0.77

Table IV. Reliability coefcients by quality dimensions for the rail passenger quality instrument

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instrument. The respondents were train users and they generally could understand the content of questions. Therefore the instrument can be considered to have face validity. Convergent validity. Convergent validity is established when the scores obtained by two different instruments measuring the same concept are highly correlated (Cavana et al., 2001, p. 213). For this research, convergent validity was assessed by regressing the overall service quality ratings and overall value for money ratings on the scores for the eight dimensions. The R 2 values for the overall service quality regression are 0.39 and 0.16 for MSS and MSA respectively. The R 2 values for the overall value for money regression are 0.22 and 0.06 for MSS and MSA respectively. Both of the R 2 values for MSS are generally high and the results are consistent with the ndings reported in Parasuraman et al. (1994a). However, these values for MSA are not high. Although Parasuraman et al. (1994a) also reported a R 2 value of 0.10 for MSA scores in the auto insurer company, the validity of this instrument in measuring service adequacy should be treated with caution. The perceptions-only scale is found to be higher than the other two scales (R 2 of 0.51 for the overall service quality regression and an R 2 of 0.30 for the overall value for money regression). It is consistent with the ndings from some previous studies (e.g. Babakus and Boller, 1992) that the predictive power is higher for perception-only scale. Discriminant validity. Discriminant validity is found when based on theory, two variables are predicted to be uncorrelated, and the scores obtained by measuring them are indeed empirically found to be so (Cavana et al., 2001, p. 213). In this research, discriminant validity was assessed by comparing the R 2 obtained from the overall value for money regression with that obtained from the overall quality regression. Theoretically, the extended rail passenger SERVQUAL instrument is used to measure quality, therefore it should relate better to the overall quality construct than the overall value construct, and the variance explained in the quality regression should be higher than that in the value regression. The R 2 values provided above, indicate that the instrument possesses discriminant validity. Summary of validity tests. These tests indicate that extended rail passenger SERVQUAL instrument outlined in this paper, does provide face, convergent and discriminate validity. Hence it is sufciently valid to continue with the exploratory analysis of diagnosing the zones of tolerance for managing rail passenger service quality. Analysis and results One of the main purposes of this research was to understand the quality of railway passenger service. In order to achieve the goal, the following research questions were addressed: . Is there any linear relationship between each of the eight dimensions and the perception of overall quality? . What is the relative importance of the eight dimensions? . What are the shortfalls of the service in the broad areas (i.e. dimensions)? . What are the shortfalls of the attributes in the poorly performed broad areas? Parasuraman et al. (1988, p. 47) dened service quality as global judgment or attitude relating to the superiority or excellence of service when they developed the

SERVQUAL instrument. We used the MSS scores of the eight dimensions as the independent variables in the following analysis to answer the research questions. Correlations Since perceived service quality in the conceptual model is measured at two levels: desired level and adequate (minimum acceptable) level, we correlated both the MSS and MSA scores with overall service quality. As shown in Table V, there are statistically signicant relationships between the perceived service quality of each of the eight dimensions and the perception of overall service quality at the 99 percent condence level. They are therefore positively correlated with the perception of overall quality. The correlations ranged from 0.36 to 0.61 for MSS scores and 0.19 to 0.37 for MSA scores. Relative importance of quality factors In order to identify the relative importance of the eight dimensions in the overall quality, standard multiple regression analysis was performed since the eight dimensions are postulated to be correlated. The MSS scores were regressed on the overall quality measure for reasons mentioned above. However, a limitation of the regression approach to assessing importance is that it tells us nothing about the causal relationships it simply provides the best statistical relationship (correlations) between the variables. Although statistically useful, the results must be interpreted with caution. Nevertheless, the R, R 2 and adjusted R 2 are provided in Table VI. The multiple correlation coefcient is statistically signicant at the 99 percent condence level. However, due to the high correlation among the dimensions, the amount of variance attributable to unique sources is only 0.052. The shared variability shows that the amount of variance that the eight dimensions jointly contribute to R 2 is 0.351. The relative importance of the quality factor is also summarized in Table VI. Parasuraman et al. (1988) used standardized slope coefcients to determine the relative importance. The higher the standardized slope coefcient value, the more important the dimension is, provided this coefcient is statistically signicant. Three dimensions were found to be statistically signicant at the 10 percent level or better. Assurance is the most important followed by responsiveness and empathy. The other ve dimensions are not statistically signicant in this multiple regression
Measure of service adequacy (MSA) Pearsons correlation coefcient 0.37 0.33 0.26 0.37 0.26 0.25 0.19 0.26 Measure of service superiority (MSS) Pearsons correlation coefcient 0.61 0.55 0.50 0.57 0.47 0.45 0.36 0.42

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Dimension Assurance Empathy Reliability Responsiveness Tangibles Comfort Connection Convenience

Note: All values are signicant at p , 0.01

Table V. Correlations between the dimensions of perceived service quality (MSS and MSA) and the perception of overall quality

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Dimension

Standardized slope coefcient

Measure of service superiority (MSS) Signicance level Square of semipartial of slope correlation (sr2) 0.000 0.191 0.902 0.635 0.087 0.394 0.048 0.398 0.035 0.003 0.000 0.000 0.005 0.001 0.007 0.001

20

Table VI. Relative importance of the eight dimensions in predicting overall quality

Assurance 0.410 * * * Comfort 0.084 Connection 20.007 Convenience 0.028 Empathy 0.135 * Reliability 20.068 Responsiveness 0.163 * * Tangibles 20.061 R 0:634 * * * R 2 0:403 Adjusted R 2 0:388 Unique variability sum of sr2 0:052 Shared variability 0:351 Notes: *p , 0.1; * *p , 0.05; * * *p , 0.01

analysis. The relatively small and/or negative magnitudes of the regression coefcients for the comfort, reliability, tangibles, convenience and connection dimensions should be interpreted carefully because all of them have statistically signicant simple correlations with overall service quality. Owing to the fact that the eight dimensions are highly correlated (Table III), multi-collinearity will be present and the signs (negative values) and values of the coefcients will not be meaningful. However the overall regression model can still be used for prediction purposes. In part II of the questionnaire (see appendix B), respondents were asked to rate the eight dimensions (with 1 being not at all important and 9 being extremely important). Since the three new dimensions were slightly recongured, the meaning of these three dimensions in the instrument will no longer exactly match the meaning of the recongured ones. However, since the differences in meanings are not substantial, the ndings could still be used for comparison and are shown in Table VII. In reality the ranking of importance by the direct method is likely to be more robust than the ranking using regression analysis (since the presence of multi-collinearity will distort the regression coefcients and weights).
Dimension Reliability Convenience Responsiveness Assurance Comfort Empathy Speed/connectiona Tangibles Mean score 8.43 8.13 8.06 7.81 7.66 7.63 7.51 7.02 Standard error 0.048 0.056 0.054 0.066 0.064 0.073 0.082 0.081

Table VII. Passengers ratings of importance of the quality dimensions

Notes: a Speed is used in the initial conceptual model and connection in the nal conceptual model

Based on the direct rating method, customers indicated that reliability, convenience, responsiveness and assurance were the most important factors that affect passengers perception of service quality. However, all features were regarded as relatively important. The zones of tolerance Since two levels of expectation (adequate and desired) have been measured in this research, managers and analysts can learn whether their customers service perceptions fall within the zone of tolerance (the space between adequate service and desired service) or outside the zone. Managers can see where customers perceptions fall relative to the zone of tolerance for individual service quality items and dimensions, and compare their own customer data to competitor customer data. These insights are possible only if customers expectations are measured separately (Parasuraman et al., 1993). We investigated the presence of the zone of tolerance in service quality for each dimension. There was a signicant difference (p , 0:01) between minimum (or adequate) and desired levels of service for each dimension. We then tested the signicance of the gaps between the minimum and perceived service levels (MSA), and the desired and perceived service levels (MSS). There was no signicant gap at the 95 percent level for empathy and tangibles between the minimum level and perceived quality. On the other hand there were signicant gaps at the 99 percent level for all dimensions between desired and perceived quality. Figure 2 shows these results. Perceived service for each dimension except Assurance is statistically within the zone of tolerance but near the adequate (minimum) level. The Rail Co. is not doing well for the most important dimension, Assurance. It falls outside the zone of tolerance and statistically below the minimum (adequate) level of expected service. Similar plots for four types of companies: computer manufacturer, retain chain, auto insurer and life insurer are in Parasuraman et al.s (1994a) study. The individual zones of tolerance for each dimension in Figure 2 can be examined more closely by considering the zone of tolerance for each of the attributes (items) that make up the dimension. Since Assurance falls below the minimum acceptable expected level of service, we have provided the detailed analysis for each attribute for this dimension in Figure 3. Figure 3 shows that passengers were worried about their personal safety at railway stations and were not satised about the information given by Rail Co. when there were delays. A complete analysis of the remaining dimensions is contained in Lo (1999). These results were discussed fully with managers of the Rail Co. in Wellington, and they were found to be most interesting and useful. They provided valuable insights for quality improvements, hence conrming their value as a diagnostic tool, only made feasible by the collection of data through the rail passenger extended three-column format SERVQUAL instrument initially developed by Parasuraman et al. (1994a). The general implications of these zones of tolerance are discussed in the conclusions under managerial implications Conclusions and recommendations This paper has developed an extension to the three-column SERVQUAL model (Parasuraman et al., 1994a) to evaluate the quality of passenger rail services. We have combined the literatures of service quality and rail transport quality to develop our

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Figure 2. Service quality perceptions relative to zones of tolerance by dimension

conceptual framework. We reported on the results of testing the model on a passenger line in Wellington, New Zealand. Three new dimensions (comfort, convenience and connection) were added to the original ve SERVQUAL dimensions (assurance, empathy, reliability, responsiveness and tangibles) and were modied after exploratory factor analysis. The high Cronbachs alpha values for each dimension support that the items are reliable in measuring the underlying concepts. The high reliability in measuring the quality of rail passenger services is also evidenced by the high value in the total-scale reliability. In addition, Pearsons correlations between the ratings of each of the eight dimensions and the overall quality rating show that all of them are signicantly related to it. The model for measuring perceived quality contains eight factors. Therefore in predicting the overall service quality, all of the eight factors were entered in the regression equation. This regression method identied three signicant factors in predicting overall service quality that were Assurance, Responsiveness and Empathy. Based on the direct method of rating the importance of these factors by the passengers surveyed, Reliability and Convenience were also identied as very important factors or dimensions of quality. However, the passengers regarded all the factors as relatively important.

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Figure 3. Quality perceptions relative to zones of tolerance for the assurance dimension

Limitations Key limitations of this research include: . Although the SERVQUAL model has been tested for a long period of time in various industries, the expanded three-column SERVQUAL instrument is relatively new. There are not many published empirical studies to support this model. . The applications of the SERVQUAL model in rail passenger services are not found in published academic literature. It makes the validation process very difcult. . The nal adapted model is developed based on the adoption of SERVQUAL model and the incorporation of three new dimensions into the original model to form a larger and more comprehensive framework. The ve SERVQUAL constructs have already undergone a series of empirical verication and validation. However, the three new dimensions are only theoretical constructs. Readers should take caution to this point. . This is the rst time that this instrument has been tested empirically. Therefore replications of the testing are necessary before it can be used commercially. . The ndings are based on a random sample from one line of train services in Wellington, New Zealand.

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This model helps to identify only the broad area of service shortfalls. The detailed causes of dissatisfaction, and the actions that should be done to correct them, should only be revealed by carrying out other research or surveys to get insights to the specic problem.

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Comparison of the model used in this research with other models and the ndings from airline services and other service industries indicate that this model generally performs as well as other models. The service attributes used in this study were derived from the literature and our factor analysis. They are similar to most of the attributes used in other rail passenger studies, e.g. Hanna and Drea (1998), Drea and Hanna (2000), and Tripp and Drea (2002) that used literature searches and focus groups. Their Cronbach alpha values are similar to those in this study. As stated earlier, there are few studies that have used the three-column SERVQUAL instrument, The Walker and Baker (2000) study is one such study but it involved customers of health clubs, and only used the standard ve SERVQUAL dimensions. This nding is sufcient enough to support the application of our model in rail passenger services since one of the principal objectives of the research was to apply the adapted SERVQUAL model to identify limitations in existing measurements of SERVQUAL as it relates to this service industry. Managerial implications The traditional quality measures on transportation industry alone are not sufcient to help managerial decision-making. The quality standard set by referencing these measures are mostly from managements point-of-view. The psychometric measures that are based on the customer perspective do not seem to have caused much attention. Although many transport operators have carried out some passenger surveys in order to capture passengers perceived service quality and/or passenger satisfaction, these measures seem to be treated as unidimensional and lack conceptual clarity. For example, service quality and satisfaction are used interchangeably in much of the transport literature. In view of this weakness, the SERVQUAL framework from the marketing literature is brought into the transport industry for studying the measurement of service quality. It provides managers the opportunity of looking at the indicators of service quality from other perspectives. An important feature of the extended three-column SERVQUAL model is its diagnostic value in terms of zone of tolerance and expectation management. It helps managers to analyze the effectiveness of the service quality and identify those problem areas that need to be improved. The perceived quality rating relative to the minimum and desired level of expected services help managers to develop their long-term and short-term strategy planning. The short-term improvement plan may include those aspects that are below the zone of tolerance. The long-term improvement plan may be formulated by referencing the relative position of the perceived quality pointer within the zone of tolerance and by considering the width of the zone of tolerance (Kettinger and Lee, 1997). The narrower the zone, the more attention is needed. In reality, it is unlikely to fulll all the ideal service quality requirements desired by their customers. Therefore it is necessary for the managers to manage customer expectation by the adequacy level of expectation so as to widen the zone of tolerance

(Kettinger and Lee, 1997). In addition, the managers could optimize the utilization of the available resources by positioning their company towards the lower end of the zone of tolerance for the appropriate dimensions. Practical implications The administration problem pointed out by Parasuraman et al. (1994a) was present. The response rate for this research was 54 percent. Among the returned questionnaires, 21 percent were non-usable. This was mainly due to missing and invalid data within each questionnaire. The rather high percentage of non-usable returns reects the complexity of the questionnaire. Therefore the suggestions recommended by Parasuraman et al. (1988) in handling this problem should be re-considered in future research from practical point-of-view. Data should be collected longitudinally since monitoring and continuous improvements are the major goals of quality management. The results on the direct ratings of the importance about the dimensions are not conrmed by the results generated by statistical analysis. This discrepancy was also found in Parasuraman et al.s (1991b) study. Brandt (1997) noted that this may be due to methodology differences in measuring the concept of relative importance. However, before the above explanation is accepted, this discrepancy should be investigated. As for this research, the possible reasons may be: . The bipolar nine-point numerical scale is not good enough to capture the concepts of relative importance relating to service quality. . The questions for the features in part II are not clear enough to capture all the meanings of the attributes that constitute that feature. It implies that the questions should be re-examined more carefully in order to get a fully representation meaning of the underlying meaning of that dimension. This part of the information is important and useful especially when this instrument is going to be used commercially. It helps to reduce the necessity to use complex statistical techniques during data analysis. Moreover, it is easier for managers to understand and interpret the surveys results (Brandt, 1997). Recommendations for future research The original SERVQUAL instrument focused mainly on a dimensional view of service quality evaluation. It did not include any concepts on object-based evaluation. Since this research aims at adding value to the application of the SERVQUAL model in a rail passenger sector, a compromise step was taken in view of the complex nature of rail passenger service which involves several services encounters during service delivery. Only those questions that were important to assess the performance of both staff on trains and staff at the ticket ofce were asked separately. Otherwise they were asked pertaining to one type of staff who were believed to have greater performance inuence on that attribute. This step was taken to avoid long questionnaires, which could cause administration problems. However for rail passenger services, inclusion of objects in quality evaluations seems to be appealing since this structure can reduce variability due to objects. It can also provide a richer and more accurate picture of the nature and structure of the service quality. Future research can investigate the possibility of bringing this

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multidimensional-multiobject model as suggested by Singh (1991) in measuring rail passenger service quality in practice. In addition, this exploratory research study also reveals the following recommendation on the renement of this initial instrument: . More studies should be carried out to clarify the discrepancy of results from regression analysis and direct rating in obtaining the relative importance of service quality dimension before the instrument is used commercially. . The wording of the questions and the adequacy of the questions in the questionnaire should be reexamined based on the results from the open-ended questions which ask respondents to give their comments and suggestions related to quality of service. . The order of the questions should be rearranged and sub-headings should be removed to avoid the possible methodology artifact if factor analysis is going to be used in development of the instrument. . More empirical tests should be carried out to rene the measures. More validation of the model through replication should be performed in future. Finally, the zones of tolerance provide information about what areas and attributes that are need to be improved but not how to improve them. Future research on nding, examining and measuring the determinants of expectation would add value in monitoring service quality.
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Cavana, R.Y., Delahaye, B.L. and Sekaran, U. (2001), Applied Business Research: Qualitative and Quantitative Methods, John Wiley & Sons, Brisbane. Corry, A. (1997), Operators must focus on service delivery, Passenger Rail Management, November, p. 18. Cronin, J.J. Jr and Taylor, S.A. (1992), Measuring service quality: a reexamination and extension, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 56, July, pp. 55-68. De Carvalho, F.A. and Leite, V.F. (1999), Attributor importance in service quality: an empirical test of the PBZ conjecture in Brazil, International Journal of Service Industry Management, Vol. 10 No. 5, pp. 487-504. Drea, J.T. and Hanna, J.B. (2000), Niche marketing in intrastate passenger rail transportation, Transportation Journal, Vol. 39 No. 3, pp. 33-43. Du Plessis, M.K. (1984), Monitoring quality of service from the passengers perspective, Transportation Research Record, Vol. 992, pp. 28-31. Fick, G.R. and Ritchie, J.R.B. (1991), Measuring service quality in the travel and tourism industry, Journal of Travel Research, Fall, pp. 2-9. Forsyth, E. and Smyth, A. (1986), The application of attitudinal research to the management of urban public transport, in Behavioural Research for Transport Policy, 1985 International Conference on Travel Behaviour, Noordwijk, The Netherlands, VNU Science Press, Utrecht. Frost, F.A. and Kumar, M. (2001), Service quality between internal customers and internal suppliers in an international airline, International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, Vol. 18 Nos 4/5, pp. 371-86. Genestre, A. and Herbig, P. (1996), Service expectations and perceptions revisited: adding product quality to SERVQUAL, Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice, Fall, pp. 72-82. Gronroos, C. (1982), Strategic Management and Marketing in the Service Sector, Swedish School of Economics and Business Administration, Helsingfors. Hanna, J.B. and Drea, J.T. (1998), Understanding and predicting passenger rail travel: an empirical study, Transportation Journal, Vol. 38 No. 1, pp. 38-46. Kettinger, W.J. and Lee, C.C. (1997), Pragmatic perspectives on the measurement of information systems service quality, MIS Quarterly, June, pp. 223-40. Lam, S.S.K. (1997), SERVQUAL: a tool for measuring patients opinions of hospital service quality in Hong Kong, Total Quality Management, Vol. 8 No. 4, pp. 145-52. Lehtinen, U. and Lehtinen, J.R. (1982), Service quality: a study of quality dimensions, unpublished working paper, Service Management Institute, OY, Helsinki. Lewis, B.R. (1994), Managing service quality, in Dale, B.D. (Ed.), Managing Quality, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, pp. 233-50. Llosa, S., Chandon, J. and Orsingher, C. (1998), An empirical study of SERVQUALs dimensionality, The Service Industries Journal, Vol. 18 No. 2, pp. 16-44. Lo, Y.K. (1999), Understanding the quality of railway passenger services in Wellington and its impact on passenger satisfaction, unpublished Master of Management Studies (Decision Sciences) thesis, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington. McKnight, C.E., Pagano, A.N. and Paaswell, R.E. (1986), Using quality to predict demand for special transportation, in Behavioural Research for Transport Policy, 1985 International Conference on Travel Behaviour, Noordwijk, The Netherlands, VNU Science Press, Utrecht.

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Miller, M. (1995), Improving customer service and satisfaction at London underground, Managing Service Quality, Vol. 5 No. 1, pp. 26-9. Moodie, P. (1997), A fresh approach to customer care, Passenger Rail Management, November, p. 19. Nieuwenhuis, D. (1997), New marketing techniques in a deregulated environment: a UK update, Public Transport International, Vol. 6, pp. 42-6. Orwig, R.A., Pearson, J. and Cochran, D. (1997), An empirical investigation into the validity of SERVQUAL in the public sector, PAQ, Spring, pp. 54-68. Parasuraman, A., Berry, L.L. and Zeithaml, V.A. (1991a), Understanding customer expectation of service, Sloan Management Review, Spring, pp. 39-48. Parasuraman, A., Berry, L.L. and Zeithaml, V.A. (1991b), Renement and reassessment of the SERVQUAL scale, Journal of Retailing, Vol. 67 No. 4, pp. 420-50. Parasuraman, A., Berry, L.L. and Zeithaml, V.A. (1993), Research note: more on improving service quality measurement, Journal of Retailing, Vol. 69 No. 1, pp. 140-7. Parasuraman, A., Zeithaml, V.A. and Berry, L.L. (1985), A conceptual model of service quality and its implications for future research, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 49, Fall, pp. 41-50. Parasuraman, A., Zeithaml, V.A. and Berry, L.L. (1988), SERVQUAL: a multiple-item scale for measuring consumer perceptions of service quality, Journal of Retailing, Vol. 64 No. 1, pp. 12-40. Parasuraman, A., Zeithaml, V.A. and Berry, L.L. (1994a), Alternative scales for measuring service quality: a comparative assessment based on psychometric and diagnostic criteria, Journal of Retailing, Vol. 70 No. 3, pp. 201-30. Parasuraman, A., Zeithaml, V.A. and Berry, L.L. (1994b), Reassessment of expectations as a comparison standard in measuring service quality: implication for further research, Journal of Marketing, Vol. 58, January, pp. 111-24. Peter, P.J. and Churchill, G.A. (1986), Relationships among research design choices and psychometric properties of rating scales: a meta-analysis, Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 23, February, pp. 1-10. Pollitt, M.G. and Smith, A.S.J. (2002), The restructuring and privatisation of British Rail: was it really that bad?, Fiscal Studies, Vol. 23 No. 4, pp. 463-502. Pullen, W.T. (1993), Denition and measurement of quality of service for local public transport management, Transport Reviews, Vol. 13 No. 3, pp. 247-64. Rust, R.T. and Oliver, R.L. (1994), Service quality insights and managerial implications from the frontier, in Rust, R.T. and Oliver, R.L. (Eds), Service Quality: New Directions in Theory and Practice, Sage, London, pp. 1-19. Silcock, D.T. (1981), Measures of operational performance for urban bus services, Trafc Engineering and Control, Vol. 22 No. 12, pp. 645-8. Singh, J. (1991), Understanding the structure of consumers satisfaction evaluations of service delivery, Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Vol. 19 No. 3, pp. 223-44. Tabachnick, B.G. and Fidell, L.S. (1989), Using Multivariate Statistics, 2nd ed., Harper & Row, New York, NY. Tripp, C. and Drea, J.T. (2002), Selecting and promoting service encounter elements in passenger rail transport, The Journal of Services Marketing, Vol. 15 No. 5, pp. 432-42. Van de Ven, A.H. and Ferry, D.L. (1984), Measuring and Assessing Organizations, John Wiley & Sons, New York, NY.

Young, C., Cunningham, L. and Lee, M. (1994), Assessing service quality as an effective management tool: the case of the airline industry, Journal of Marketing Theory and Practice, Spring, pp. 76-96. Appendix 1

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Aspects Accessibility Performance measures Percentage of population within 1 mile of a route 4 Percentage of public transport dependent within 1 mile of a route 4 Percentage of employment served by bus services Number of buses taking x minutes longer than schedule Percentage of buses one minute early to four minutes late Average waiting time of passengers Excess waiting time of passengers Maximum number passengers/total available seats averaged over each route at maximum load point (i.e. load factors) Peak-hour oor area/passenger averaged over each route at the minimum load point (i.e. oor area) Ventilation Vehicle jerk Number of transfers/number of passengers (i.e. route directness) Hours of service Stop spacing Bus stop provision Vehicle step height Information services Ratio of bus journey time: time by car Number of accidents/veh-km Number of crimes/veh-km Table AI. Silcocks classication of quality measures

Reliability

Comfort

Convenience

Safety

Source: Silcock (1981)

Characteristics Travel speed Comfort

Measures Speed Delay Space Horizontal acceleration Vertical acceleration Jerk Temperature Ventilation Noise

Source: Pullen (1993)

Table AII. LOTS classication of quality measures

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Appendix 2. Overview of the rail passenger three-column SERVQUAL questionnaire (Adapted from Parasuraman et al., 1994a) Part I A total of 38 items that are used to measure quality of passenger service are asked. For each item, passengers were asked to give three different attitude ratings. They are the minimum level of expected service, the desired level of expected service and their perception of the Rail Co.s performance. A 9-point scale is used with 1 being the lowest level and 9 being the highest level. For rating the perception of the companys performance, an option for no opinion is provided (Figure A1). Part II The major information obtained in this part are: perception of passengers importance of eight major features about quality of service, overall quality rating, overall perception of value for money about the service and overall satisfaction with the services provided. For measuring the importance of the eight features, respondents were asked to give a rating from 1 to 9 with 1 being not at all important and 9 being extremely important. For measuring the overall quality of service provided, respondents were asked to give a rating from 1 to 9 with 1 being extremely poor, 5 being neutral and 9 being extremely good. For measuring the overall value for money, respondents were asked to give a rating from 1 to 9 with 1 being poor value, 5 being neutral and 9 being excellent value. For measuring overall satisfaction, respondents were asked to give a rating from 1 to 9 with 1 being terrible, 5 being neutral and 9 being delighted. Part III Information about the trip on which the questionnaire was distributed is asked in this part. It includes the boarding station, getting off station and boarding time. Questions about how regularly the respondent uses the train and her home station are also included. Part IV Demographic information, including gender, age group and occupational group.

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Figure A1. Sample of part I of the questionnaire used in this research

Part V An open ended question about respondents comments and suggestions related to the quality of passenger service. About the authors Robert Y. Cavana is a reader in decision sciences at the Victoria Management School, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. Previously he was Corporate Economist at NZ Railways Corporation. He holds an MCom (Hons) in economics from the University of Auckland and a PhD in management science from University of Bradford, England. His research interests include systems thinking, system dynamics, transport and logistics, resource management and sustainable development. He has co-authored two books: Systems Thinking and Modelling: Understanding Change and Complexity (Pearson Education, Auckland, 2000) and Applied Business Research: Qualitative and Quantitative Methods (Wiley, 2001). He is a chartered member of the Institute of Logistics and Transport in New Zealand and a managing editor of System Dynamics Review. Robert Y. Cavana is the corresponding author and can be contacted at: bob.cavana@vuw.ac.nz Lawrence M. Corbett is an associate professor at the Victoria Management School, Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand. He holds a BE in chemical and materials engineering from the University of Auckland, New Zealand, and an MBA from Craneld University, England. He has industrial experience as an engineer and operations manager in the metallurgical industry in New Zealand, Australia and England. He has published in Journal of Operations Management, International Journal of Production Research, International Journal of Operations & Production Management, International Journal of Quality & Reliability Management, and Production and Inventory Management. His research interests are quality management, manufacturing strategy, and the evolution of competitive advantage. Y.L. (Glenda) Lo is a graduate of Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand with a Masters degree in Management Studies (Decision Sciences) and Victoria University of Technology, Australia with a 1st class Honours degree in Computer Science, Australia. She has worked in the eld of industrial and educational research and software quality control in Hong Kong. From 2001 until 2004, she was teaching computing and commercial subjects at Institute of Vocational Education (Chai Wan) in Hong Kong. Currently she is working as a Business Analyst at Transpower NZ Ltd, Wellington, New Zealand.

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