218 1629907997 PDF
218 1629907997 PDF
218 1629907997 PDF
3562-3573
http://ilkogretim-online.org
doi: 10.17051/ilkonline.2020.03.735520
ABSTRACT- Objective: The research study aimed to investigate the prevailing competitive
environment in the airline industry.By comparing the compare service quality of threedifferent
airlines (PIA, Oman Airline, and Air Arabia) using the SERVPERF model.Background: Observing
the competitive landmark of the airline industry, the airlines concentrate on the need to analyze
the customers’ demands and provide services according to their demands. Method: A total of
150 customers were selected randomly to collect the data through self-administered
questionnaire. The statistical reliability and validity of each questionnaire were tested through
Cronbach’s Alpha and factor analysis with positive responses. The research applied ANOVA,
correlation, and regression to predict the results.Results: The results declared that PIA shows
significant means for empathy while insignificant for tangibility, reliability, responsiveness, and
assurance. Oman Airline showed a significant mean for assurance dimension of service quality
while insignificant for tangibility, responsiveness, reliability, and empathy. While for Air Arabia
the results declared a significant mean for tangibility, assurance, and insignificant mean for
responsiveness, reliability, and empathy. Conclusion: The detailed analysis has proved that
service quality in the form of tangibility, assurance, responsiveness, reliability, and empathy is
the most important contributor to the satisfaction of customers of the Airline Industry.
I. INTRODUCTION
1.1. Background
The commercial aviation sector, in the last three decades, has become an important catalyst, in
the economic growth and development of nations. The aviation industry assists 2.7 trillion US
Dollars and 3.6% in the total gross domestic product (GDP). Aviation transportation facilitates
close to 4 billion passengers annually and 62 million tons of freight to domestic and
international destinations and has assumed a significant role in the faster and convenient
movement of passengers and goods in n3ational economies. Besides, it is providing immense
employment opportunities and enabling about 29 million people to earn their bread and butter
from commercial aviation. The growing importance of aviation, in the economies of various
countries, has resulted in creating a highly competitive environment. This, in turn, requires that
3562 | Syed Waleed Ul Hassan Impact of Service Quality on Customer’s Satisfaction in the Airline
Industry (A case study of PIA, Oman Airline and Air-Arabia)
the airlines provide high-class amenities to their passengers’ resultant increase in their profits.
The quality of facilities has always been important for the existence and competitiveness of
airlines (Chen, 2008). The service quality results in the long-term increase in passenger
satisfaction and in turn client’s trustworthiness, which is the antecedent of cost savings,
increased market share, and improved profitability. The travelers are not satisfied with
provided service quality and are not expected to have a long-run relationship with the
respective airline (Lin & Wu, 2011). Standards of service quality influence a company’s
comparativeness and help to retain customer support and market shares (Park, Roberston&Wul,
2004; Morash&Ozment, 1994). Therefore, customer loyalty is always regarded as important for
any organization (Reichheld & Schefter, 2000: Rauyruen& Miller, 2007). Client loyalty has been
the rational interactive answer of travelers pleased with the provision of superior value. (Oliver,
1999; Parasuraman & Grewal, 2000; Lee, Lee, &Feick, 2001)
Holding customers and evolving relationships with new customers are one of the key business
strategies. Business growth depends on frequent visits of a customer for any business and the
most effective way to increase customer’s visits is to provide the service quality that meets and
customer’s expectations. Similarly, in the airline industry, it is needed to keep its service quality
up to the mark to attract and retain customers in the existing competitive surroundings. There is
a lot of recognition in the researched writings that service quality has proven significant in the
attainment and maintenance of market share and return on investment goals for an
organization. (Anderson &Zeithaml 1984; Philips, Change &Buzzel, 1983). The substantial part
of the overall responsibility for the improvement of service quality rests upon the employees
detailed to contact and deliver to the passengers. Church and Stum (1990) call such customer
service employees “corporate ambassadors" Which is most important to make travelers’ loyalty
and organizational image. So, therefore, the association between customer and service provider
is considered an important aspect of satisfaction and quality because services are normally
treated with large social components (Crosby & Stephens 1987; Brown & Swartz 1989; & Crosby
1991).
Keeping in view, the relationship between an airline and its passengers, the prevailing standards
of service delivery needs to be overhauled for the satisfaction of the customer. The analysis
would help in identifying grey areas contributing negatively towards customers’ satisfaction and
charting appropriate responses to ensure customer satisfaction. To attain this goal, the focus on
service quality in PIA, Air Arabia, and Oman airline should, not be on its delivery only, rather the
service should be delivered in a manner that generates and manages customer’s traveling
records with the airlines as a brand. The service quality of PIA, Air Arabia, and Oman Airline
must not be confined to more providing traveling facilities. Passengers should be made to feel
like a special guest rather than an ordinary traveler. The people should experience something
special the moment they get to the Airline while going through the checking countries boarding
the Aircraft, the way food is served, its quality and taste during flights, entertainments, the
texture of massage seats. All the facilities must maximize the delight of the passengers.
In case PIA manages to revamp its service provision to the complete satisfaction of customers,
there is a fair possibility for the national airline to achieve a strategic competitive position in the
industry. Similarly, if Air Arabia successfully provided its service quality to satisfy the customers
it would help them to attract and retain a larger number of passengers than any other airline,
moreover if customers’ are satisfied with the services of Oman Airline they would be able to get
the competitive advantage over other high-cost airlines in the same territory.
3563 | Syed Waleed Ul Hassan Impact of Service Quality on Customer’s Satisfaction in the Airline
Industry (A case study of PIA, Oman Airline and Air-Arabia)
Theoretical framework
Hypotheses
H0. Tangibility has no significant effect on the customers’ satisfaction
H1. Tangibility has a significant effect on the customers’ satisfaction.
3565 | Syed Waleed Ul Hassan Impact of Service Quality on Customer’s Satisfaction in the Airline
Industry (A case study of PIA, Oman Airline and Air-Arabia)
Source: Lai, Griffin, and Babin (2009)
The definitions mentioned above clearly indicate the association between service standards and
customersatisfaction.
2.4. Connecting the SERVPERF model of Service quality with the Airline industry
The study of previous studies recognized that the service quality of an airline has many qualities
grouped in various stages of the service delivery process, such as pre-flight, in-flight, and post-
flight stage, etc. Each service quality is one of the dimensions of airline quality. Each service
quality attributes belong to one of the service quality dimensions which are the mainstay of the
3566 | Syed Waleed Ul Hassan Impact of Service Quality on Customer’s Satisfaction in the Airline
Industry (A case study of PIA, Oman Airline and Air-Arabia)
model. However, few alterations in the dimensions can be made to suit the environment of
research as was done and tested by Gilbert and Wong (2003). A theoretical framework of airline
service quality that emerged from this review is conceptualized as below:
Tangibility: Up to date equipment, visually appealing facilities, well-dressed employees, latest
facilities.
Reliability: Respond within the time frame, reassuring when a problem arises, punctuality, and
dependable, correct record.
Assurance: Safety (in-flight), politeness (reservation, pre, during, and post-flight), employees
have support to do their job, employees are trustworthy.
Responsiveness: Efficient service, well in time, and quick information to the customer,
employees willing to help in response to the request.
Empathy: Individual attention to customers, the anticipation of customer needs, convenient
timings of flights, the best interest of the customer in employees’ minds.
3567 | Syed Waleed Ul Hassan Impact of Service Quality on Customer’s Satisfaction in the Airline
Industry (A case study of PIA, Oman Airline and Air-Arabia)
measurements that comprise administration quality (Sureshchandar, Rajendran, and
Anantharaman, 2002).
Despite solid connections between administration quality and consumer loyalty, the two
developments are in truth not the same as the client's perspective (Baker, 2013). Brady and
Cronin (2001) attempt to explain the determination and nature of the administration quality
and fulfillment development and discovered exact help for the conceptualization that
administration quality was a precursor of the superordinate fulfillment build. In the avionics
business, Huang (2009) states that administration quality influences consumer loyalty and that
consumer loyalty influences client conduct, including repurchase aim and verbal.
Correspondingly, Yunus, Jamil, and Rashid (2013) contend that the nature of administration
conveyance via carriers significantly affects consumer loyalty, which thusly, altogether
influences client dedication. These discoveries confirm Retnaningsih (2013) accommodation.
Moreover, Chou, Liu, Hung, Yih, and Han (2011) assess carrier administration quality in a
Taiwanese aircraft and found that dependability and affirmation are the principal significant
measurements, responsiveness is the second, sympathy the third pursued by physical assets and
flight design. Different elements of aircraft administrations incorporate security, client objection
taking care of, the kindness of group, on-time takeoff and appearance, solace and tidiness of
seats, adaptability, cordiality, and genuineness (Hynes and Dredge, 1998). Furthermore, Wang,
Shu, Lin, and Tseng (2011) inspect nine assessment criteria of service quality in the carrier
organizations and found that travelers are more worriedabout solace, inside adornment, and the
administrations of aircraft organizations.
III. METHODOLOGY
For the current study of examining the service feature of the airline business and their
customers’ satisfaction positivism (quantitative approach) is used because positivism helps
relies on reliability uses of research instruments (Blaxter, Hughes, & Tight, 2006). For the
current research, positivism is applied.
The population N for the research in hand is all the customers traveling through PIA, Oman
Airline, and Air Arabia to study the service quality and customers’ satisfaction.Customers from
different airlines are selected randomly through a random sampling technique. The number
decided was 150 customers 50 from each airline (Nunnally,1967; Schreiber et. al., 2006) ten
elements for every parameter to be estimated is anacceptable value.Then the conceptual
framework was operationalized using 5 point scale starting from strongly agree to strongly
disagree. Data was collected through close-ended questionnaires and statistical analysis was
performed by ANOVA and regression.
3568 | Syed Waleed Ul Hassan Impact of Service Quality on Customer’s Satisfaction in the Airline
Industry (A case study of PIA, Oman Airline and Air-Arabia)
Female 26 52.0 52.0 52.0
Air Arabia Male 24 48.0 48.0 100.0
Total 50 100.0 100.0
The overhead table demonstrates the number and percentage of male and female respondents
in the three airlines. The result shows that the percentage of males was more than female for
PIA, similarly, for Oman Airline the result shows high percentages of males than females, while
for Air Arabia the response percentage of females is more than males.
Table 4.2:
Table 4.3:
3569 | Syed Waleed Ul Hassan Impact of Service Quality on Customer’s Satisfaction in the Airline
Industry (A case study of PIA, Oman Airline and Air-Arabia)
Assurance
Q10 2.58 2.94 3.48
Q11 3.70 3.24 3.98
Q12 4.14 3.86 4.48
Empathy
Q13 4.18 4.28 4.62
Q14 4.16 3.52 4.34
Q15 4.08 3.46 4.12
The above table indicates the average score of each item of the Service Quality dimension for
Pakistan Airline, Air Arabia and Oman Airline.For tangibility average score of Oman Airline was
upper than other Airlines for question 1 for the second and third question average score of Air
Arabia was upper than the rest. For reliability mean score of Oman Airline was higher than the
rest of the Airlines and the second and third question mean score of PIA was greater than the
other companies for responsiveness. The mean score of the first and second questions was
higher in PIA and the third question meansthe score was higher in Oman airline. For assurance,
all three mean scores of Oman Airlines were higher than others. For empathy, all three mean
scores for Oman airlines were higher than the rest of the
4.3. ANOVA
4.4.
ANOVAa
Airline Model Sum of Squares Df Mean Square F Sig.
Regression 31.061 5 6.212 13.772 .000b
PIA 1 Residual 19.847 44 .451
Total 50.908 49
Regression 34.469 5 6.894 18.122 .000c
Oman Airline 1 Residual 16.738 44 .380
Total 51.207 49
Regression 18.072 5 3.614 7.838 .000b
Air Arabia 1 Residual 20.290 44 .461
Total 38.362 49
a. Dependent Variable: satisfaction
The above table shows comparisons of the impact of service quality on customer satisfaction in the
three airlines under consideration derived models are
PIA
Oman Airline
Air Arabia
For PIA the results indicate that empathy has a statistically significant positive effect on
customer satisfaction with a p-value of 0.000. While for Oman Airline the results indicate that
assurance has a significant positive effect on customer satisfaction with a p-value of 0.005 and
for Air Arabia the results portray that tangibility has a statistically significant negative impact on
customer satisfaction and assurance has a significant positive impact on customer satisfaction
with p-value 0.002 and 0.048 respectively. Variance inflation factor (VIF) which is used to detect
strong multicollinearity shows that there is no strong multicollinearity among explanatory
variables.
V. DISCUSSION
A comprehensive review of existing research work highlighted that there is a dire need to
identify the role of service quality of Airline Industry that is almost unaddressed by previous
researchers and to compare different airlines in terms of service quality to know what gaps are
left indifferent airlines for the achievement of customers’ satisfaction and indirectly to maximize
profit. Most of the studies conducted previously were limited to one airline or have used
different models(Khan &Fasih, 2014, Kaura, et al., 2012). The research in hand focused on
national i.e. PIA as well as international airlines i.e. Oman Airline and Air Arabia in terms of
3571 | Syed Waleed Ul Hassan Impact of Service Quality on Customer’s Satisfaction in the Airline
Industry (A case study of PIA, Oman Airline and Air-Arabia)
service quality using the SERVPERF model. With concern to the inspiration that service quality
possesses on the satisfaction of the airline customers, the results declared that SERVPERF
dimensions possess a positive relationship with the satisfaction of customers in the airline
industry. Satisfaction is the main invented by the employees, due to the reason that they are the
major part of the productions or service provisions. Prices, airline responses, airplane
environment and equipment, the image of the airline in terms of satisfaction, the policy of
luggage and baggage, are the other matter that causes customers satisfaction at first. When
customers pay more money they want the services according to the price which they paid, and if
they don’t get the right services they get unsatisfied(Naik et al., 2010; Wisniewski, 2001; Curry &
Herbert, 1988; and Zeithaml, 1988). Service quality is also evaluated by the appearance of the
aircraft and their condition if the airplanes are in good conditions customer feels more satisfied
and vice versa because they have to stay in that environment during the whole flight. The
customer gets attracted to the airlines by the image of the airline in general, which sometimes
increases the expectations of the customers. Receiving the customers by the cabin crew is also
one of the drivers for satisfying customers. The on-time flight service, the on-time landing and
the response to problems are also the value-added to service quality. The findings of this
research confirm the results of the researches conducted previously(Hossain, 2012; Juwaheer,
2004).
VI. CONCLUSION
Observing the competitive landmark of the airline industry, the airlines concentrate on the need
to analyze the customers’ demands and provide services according to their demands so that
they would be able to attract, retain and maintain their passengers in long run. To address the
concern mentioned above, the current study is conducted to identify the impact of service
quality provided by International Airlines (PIA, Oman Airline, and Air Arabia. The detailed
analysis has proved that service quality in the form of tangibility, assurance, responsiveness,
reliability, and empathy is the most important contributor to the satisfaction of customers of the
Airline Industry. The comparison of 3 international Airlines highlighted that all 5 factors of
service quality, empathy for PIA, assurance for Oman Airline and Tanginility+assurance for Air
Arabia has a positive significant effect on their customer’s satisfaction. Altogether, the study
offers a significant contribution to the body of knowledge regarding service quality and
customers’ satisfaction with PIA, Oman Airline, and Air Arabia. As well, this study is quite
significant for Policymakers to improve services accordingly.
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