Strategies for Service Quality

Abstract

That someone can make us feel good is a quality in itself. There has been much talk within British government circles, for example, about “the feelgood” factor, which is constantly reminding us that it is just around the corner! Whether or not we can believe in this is another matter but it certainly displays an awareness that making other people feel good can also have positive benefits for ourselves. How this can be achieved will differ depending on our particular line of business. Having a good‐quality product does not in itself guarantee success as service quality must also be taken into account. This is where the feel‐good factor comes into play. It is all very well, for example, going to a restaurant to have a top‐class meal (in that the food was good), only to have it thrown at you. Quality, therefore, must not be seen as a separate entity, but more as a package deal. Service quality is important if you wish to retain your customer base as acquiring new customers can be both time‐consuming and costly. It quite often takes very little apart from good manners to keep customer loyalty as in the case of the restaurant. Other factors can, however, start creeping into the framework such as efficiency, timeliness and good communication. Is there, for example, a time limit on how long you can reasonably be expected to wait for your meal before it arrives at the table, and if there is a delay is this communicated to you? In other words, we all have expectations as to what is acceptable and what is not. The clever part is for the organization to learn by what criteria the customer judges its service quality performance.