Customer Satisfaction in Qatars Banking Sector - Essay Example

SERVQUAL Contents Contents Introduction 3 Introduction to the Organization 4 Research Questions 4 Research Design 5 Sampling 5 Data Collection 5 Findings and Analysis 6 Marketing Implications 8 Works Cited 10 Executive Summary In recent times, customer’s satisfaction was not considered as an important factor to have an impact on organization’s performance. Strategists and business managers failed to identify the factor that greater customer satisfaction would lead to greater profitability. Moreover, due to the absence of quality competition within industries also deprived businesses to achieve customer satisfaction, mainly because customers had few alternatives to fulfill their demand for a product or service. Today, the scenario has quite changed as there is a defined importance of customer satisfaction due to the globalize competition which has increased the strategic necessity of customer satisfaction along with quality and loyalty eventually. This helps greatly in achieving better customers and people who would further promote the business. By adopting quantitative method to research study, the researcher aims to identify the gap between customers’ expectations and customers’ perceptions towards Al-Khalij Bank’s services. The selected sample consists of 15 respondents. The results reflects that the customers are somewhat satisfied with the services they receive at Al-Khalij Bank. Customer Satisfaction in Qatar’s Banking Sector Introduction The basic aim of management of any business is to ensure that their customers are satisfied from the products and services they purchase. Businesses formulate strategies that can achieve customers’ loyalty to the brand and its products upon attaining customers’ satisfaction. Businesses focus on influencing consumer behavior through effective marketing and quality products and services, which help them to meet customers’ expectations. It was not long time ago that customers’ satisfaction was not considered as an important factor to have an impact on the organization’s performance. Strategists and business managers failed to understand the fact that greater customer satisfaction would eventually lead to greater profitability (Olorunniwo, Hsu and Udo). Moreover, the absence of quality competition within industries also deprived businesses to achieve customer satisfaction. This was mainly because customers had few alternatives to fulfill their demand for a product or service. However, in present times, the scenario has quite changed as there is a defined importance of customer satisfaction due to the globalize competition, which has increased the strategic necessity of customer satisfaction along with quality and loyalty eventually. This helps greatly in achieving better customers and people who would promote the business further (Grzinic). Although, there was a huge decrease in the research work related to consumer satisfaction in the public sector till 1985, but privately as soon as the mangers came to realise the importance of customer satisfaction and its affects on the profitability of the business, numerous researches were made on the topic. The reason of attaining much credibility for customer satisfaction is that customer satisfaction has incredibly changed customer behaviour in the past years. Customers were not well aware of what services and goods should they purchase and never used to express their dissatisfaction (Jeong and Oh). Presently, customers have become critical and they have a clear idea about their needs and requirements. The reason of not showing their dissatisfaction was that there were really few organizations and the competition was not so hard which left no choice for the customers. Nowadays, business boundaries have extended and the consumers know about their wants all around the world. Due to this, customers have power, choice and the assets, which are the most important part required in a business (Parasuraman, Zeithmal and Berry). Introduction to the Organization To evaluate the customer satisfaction level, Al-Khalij Bank of Qatar is selected as the organization to carry out the research work. Al-Khalij is Qatar’s largest conventional banking organization holding around QR 20 billion in customer deposits. The main customer base of Al-Khalij Bank belongs to Qatar, UAE, and France. Al-Khalij Bank is considered to be serving a customer base of around 15% of total banking service consumers in the country, whereas, another 5% customers of the bank belongs to France and UAE (Al-Khalij Bank). Research Questions The current research work revolves around understanding customers’ expectations from Al-Khalij Bank and the perception of customers about the services they availed at the bank. This research work will be interesting for the readers in a sense, that it will help readers to understand what is SERVQUAL and how it helps organizations to understand and eliminate the gap between customer expectation and perception. Following are the research questions that will be answered by the end of this research work: 1. What is the relationship between customer expectation and customer perception? 2. How Al-Khalij Banks build customers’ expectations from its services? 3. How Al-Khalij Bank build customers’ perceptions from its services? 4. What does a negative or positive gap between customers’ expectations and perceptions refers to? Research Design Sampling To accomplish the objectives of this study and considering its nature, the researcher has used simple random sampling technique to collect required data. For this purpose, the researcher has acquired permission from the branch manager of Al-Khalij’s Doha Road branch. At this branch, the researcher was able to conduct the survey of 15 customers of Al-Khalij Bank. Data Collection The survey questionnaire developed to gather the primary information contains 20 closed–ended statements and 4 demographic questions. The twenty statements are divided into two parts of 10 statements each. The first part of the survey questionnaire aims at gathering demographic information of the respondents. In addition to this, there are 10 statements, which aim at identifying customers’ expectations from Al-Khalij Bank’s services. The second part of the survey questionnaire contains another 10 statements aiming at identifying customers’ perceptions of services availed at Al-Khalij Bank. All statements included in the survey questionnaire are close-ended and based on the Likert Scale. This measurements scale is used to measure respondents’ agreement or disagreement with the given statements. Likert Scale 1 2 3 4 5 Strongly Disagree Somewhat Disagree Neither Agree nor Disagree Somewhat Agree Strongly Agree Each part of the survey questionnaire is divided into 5 sub-dimensions of service quality. For example, in Customer Expectation section, 10 statements are equally divided into 5 sub-dimensions of SERVQUAL instrument, i.e. tangibility, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy. Similar division has been done in the second part of the survey questionnaire. The questionnaire was developed to provide an accurate measurement of customers’ expectations and perceptions towards Al-Khalij Bank’s services. Each respondent completed the survey questionnaire in approximate 6 to 8 minutes. Findings and Analysis The graph presented below projects the findings of the research work. In addition to this, a table of calculation is also given which highlights the gap between customers’ expectations and their perception of Al-Khalij Bank’s services. Figure 1: Expectations and Perceptions of Al-Khalij Bank’s Customers SERVQUAL Dimension Expectations Perceptions Gap Calculation Tangibility 3.4 3.6 0.2 Reliability 4.1 4.8 0.7 Responsiveness 3.3 3.2 - 0.1 Assurance 3.9 4 0.1 Empathy 4.2 3.9 -0.3 Table 1: Figure 1: Expectations Gap of Al-Khalij Bank’s Customers It has been found from the statistical analysis of the data that 60% of customers are male and majority of respondents belong to the age group of 35-45 years. In addition to this, there are 30% respondents who are married or widowed. The demographic information enables readers of a research study to understand the dynamics of consumer behaviour and factors, which evolve consumers’ behaviour. The findings of customers’ expectations from the services of Al-Khalij Bank provide that customers are most satisfied with the bank staff’s ability to respond to the customers’ requests and complaints. Moreover, empathy found to be the least scoring dimension mainly because the banking staff is not trained properly for delivering superior results in the service delivery. From the preliminary analysis, it has been found that the customers of Al-Khalij Bank are somewhat satisfied from the services availed at the bank. It has been found in the secondary research that a customer’s loyalty to the employee is much stronger than the loyalty to the business. Due to superior person-to-person relationship maintained by the management of Al-Khalij Bank, it is ascertain that the senior management monitors the customer service at the bank. As a result, the bank focuses on developing relationships with the customers on a personal level. Moreover, if the ‘gap’ score of each SERVQUAL dimension is considered. It is observed that the dimension in which service structure failed to satisfy the customers is small. This is indicative of the fact that the customers of Al-Khalij Bank are somehow satisfied with the service quality. Marketing Implications The technique of using bank employees or managers as mystery shoppers can also be used by Al-Khalij Bank to find out exactly what the customer feels about the services being provided by the bank or simply to find out what they expect from the bank. In addition to this, marketing strategies should be designed to deliver value added benefits to customers to influence their purchasing behaviour. This will help the bank gain first hand insight into customers’ minds, which will help them a great deal in improving its level of service quality. Another benefit of adopting a marketing perspective while dealing with customers would be clear and concise communication. In this manner, the clients will not have problems in understanding the bank’s systems and procedures, which would also reduce the amount of complaints and claims submitted by the unhappy customers. Works Cited Al-Khalij Bank. About Us. 2014. Web. 19 March 2014 . Grzinic, J. "Concepts of Service Quality Measurement in Hotel Industry." 2007. Web. 20 March 2014 . Jeong, M and H. Oh. "Quality function deployement: An extended framework for service quality and customer satisfaction in the hospitality industry." International Journal of Hospitality Management 17.4 (1998): 375-390. Print. Olorunniwo, F, M Hsu and G. Udo. "Service Quality, customer satisfaction and behavioral intentions in the service factory." Journal of Services Marketing 20.1 (2006): 59-72. Print. Parasuraman, A, V Zeithmal and L. Berry. "A Multiple Item Scale for Measuring Consumer Perceptions of Service Quality." Journal of Retailing 64.1 (1988): 22-37. Print. Appendix-1: Survey Questionnaire SECTION 1 - DEMOGRAPHICS 1) Age [ ] 18-25years [ ] 25-35 years [ ] 35-45 years [ ] Older than 45 2) Gender [ ] Male [ ] Female 4) How long have you been using the services of this bank? [ ] Less than 12 months [ ] 12-24 months [ ] 24-36 months [ ] 36 months-48 months [ ] More than 48 months SECTION 2 – Perceptions TANGIBLES 5) You are satisfied with the tangible aspects of the service quality [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree 6) The tangible aspects of service quality can be improved. [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree RELIABILITY 7) You are satisfied with the reliability aspects of the service quality. [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree 8) The reliability aspects of service quality can be improved. [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree RESPONSIVENESS 9) You are satisfied with the responsiveness aspects of the service quality. [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree 10) The responsiveness aspects of service quality can be improved. [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree ASSURANCE 11) You are satisfied with the assurance aspects of the service quality. [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree 12) The assurance aspects of service quality can be improved. [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree EMPATHY 13) You are satisfied with the empathy aspects of the service quality. [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree 14) The empathy aspects of service quality can be improved. [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree SECTION 3 – Expectations TANGIBLES 15) You expect the tangible dimension of this bank to be excellent [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree 16) You have heard good words about the tangible aspects of this bank’s service delivery [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree RELIABILITY 17) You expect the reliability dimension of this bank to be excellent [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree 18) You have heard good words about the reliability aspects of this bank’s service delivery [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree RESPONSIVENESS 19) You expect the responsiveness dimension of this bank to be excellent [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree 20) You have heard good words about the responsiveness aspects of this bank’s service delivery [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree ASSURANCE 21) You expect the assurance dimension of this bank to be excellent [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree 22) You have heard good words about the assurance aspects of this bank’s service delivery [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree EMPATHY 23) You expect the empathy dimension of this bank to be excellent [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree 24) You have heard good words about the empathy aspects of this bank’s service delivery [ ] Strongly Disagree [ ] Disagree [ ] Neutral [ ] Agree [ ] Strongly Agree THANKYOU THANK YOU FOR YOUR TIME AND SUPPORT. 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