Management perception of service quality in the hospitality industry

2.4
 
Measuring Service Quality 
SERVQUAL is a multiple-item scale that can be used to better understand the service 
expectations and perceptions from the customer point of view customers and 
therefore be able to improve service based on the findings for further development of 
either quality service or value proposition for the customer. The scale was based on the 

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ten dimensions of service quality and at first contained 97 items, approximately 10 
items per dimensions with a few exceptions, and was based on two statements. One 
was to measure expectations within a service category and the second was to measure 
perception about a specific firm whose service quality was being measured at the time. 
(Parasuraman et al. 1988, 17) 
After having examined the results of the analysis, the scale was reduced to 22 items 
which spread amongst the five most important dimensions of service quality 
mentioned earlier. (Parasuraman et al. 1988, 23) 
According to Zeithaml et al. (1988, 45) the purpose of SERVQUAL is to be used as a 
diagnostics tool for uncovering the weaknesses and strengths of an organizations 
service quality. As mentioned earlier, the five dimensions of service quality are the 
common variables used by customers to measure service quality and SERVQUAL uses 
these dimensions through its expectation and perception format to determine the 
relative importance if these five dimensions in influencing the customers overall quality 
perceptions. (Parasuraman et al. 1988, 31) 
Having done so, management would be able to understand which of the five 
dimensions has the most relative impact on service quality (GAP 5) and with the help 
of the theoretical constructs and variables of the extended gap model, management 
could focus on this dimensions the most throughout each of the four remaining gaps. 
It must be mentioned that SERVQUAL is one of the few service quality measurement 
tools that are used, but it is the most reliable and its validity has been assessed through 
an intensive empirical studies as well as it’s the most utilized for measuring subjective 
elements of service quality. (Parasuraman et al. 1988, 28) 
INTSERVQUAL on the other hand was developed following the original gap model 
(figure 5) by Frost & Kumar (2000) and then followed to focus on the internal aspects 
and processes which lead to service delivery. Mainly focussing on Gaps 2 and 3 of the 
original gap model, INTSERVQUAL focusses around the processes of support staff 
and service delivery staff and creates 3 internal gaps. 

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Figure 7 shows the internal gaps between front line staff and support staff. 
Figure 7. Internal Quality Gap Model (Frost & Kumar, 2000, 367) 
An interesting fact is seen as to how front line staff has no influence on the translation 
of service quality specifications. This may impair correct judgement on what 
specifications are important since it’s the front line staff that feels changes in demand 
and acts up on any changes which should there for allow them to be involved, yet 
aren’t. 
Furthermore, internal Gap 1 is based on difference between support staff’s perception 
of Front line staff’s expectation. Here the same five dimensions of service quality are 
used to determine service quality. 
Internal Gap 3 is based on the difference between service specifications and actual 
delivery of service. For this gap, there are key factors influencing this. Figure 8 
represents these factors. 

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Figure 8. Contributing factors to Internal Gap 3 (Frost & Kumar, 2000, 368) 
Internal Gap 5 goes about to understand the difference between front line staff 
expectations of perception of support staff service quality. 
Interesting enough, both internal gaps 1 and 5 go about understanding each other and 
are done following the same five dimensions of service quality.