A SERVQUAL, QFD, AND IPA INTEGRATION APPROACH TO HOTEL SERVICE MANAGEMENT: A CASE STUDY OF A HOTEL IN OMAN

Abstract

Recently, the tourism industry has expanded a lot, and since the most important issue for a tourist is a place to stay, the hotel industry also becomes very important. Competition in the hotel industry is fierce and the best way to increase the market share is to listen to the voice of the customer. The purpose of this study is to evaluate customer satisfaction with the service quality in one of the hotels in Oman using the integration of SERVQUAL, Quality Function Deployment (QFD), and Importance-Performance Analysis (IPA) method. We evaluate the difference between the customer's perceptions and expectations of the quality of service at hotel in Oman through a questionnaire designed based on the five distinct dimensions of the SERVQUAL method. Respondents who have stayed at least one night at the hotel. Then, the Wilcoxon signed-rank test is used to investigate if there is significant difference between the customer's perceptions and expectations. Also, a regression study is conducted to know the relationship and importance between SERVQUAL distinct dimensions and customer satisfaction. Moreover, a modified QFD and IPA method is employed to understand the customers’ requirements and to know where and how the service quality improvement should be done. The SPSS software is utilized as a testing platform.