Service Quality at Univrsity of Dar Es Salaam Business School.

Service quality is referred to a valuation of how good a delivered service meets the customer’s expectation. Upper management

Tangibility refers to the physical aspects of the services such as the cleanliness of the service area, personnel appearance, tools and equipment used the atmosphere and décor appearance if it is appealing, information on product and packages are provided for the provision of services. It is more concentrated on the visual aspects of the banks. It has been observed that customers prefer tangible dimension of service quality in United Arab Emirates banking industry (Jabnoun and Al-Tamimi, 2003).

There are two main aspects that describe and affect both service quality; the actual service customers expected (expected service) and services perceived (perceived service). Fitzsimmons & Fitzsimmons (2001) explains that the creation of customer satisfaction for a service can be identified through a comparison between service perceptions with service expectation, see Figure 1.

Service quality - refers to difference between the level of service that is expected from consumers and the perception of the service that is actually received. (Caruana,

* The difference between expectations of service for a given organization and perceived quality of delivery by the service provider

In the next phase of their research, Berry et al. (1985) found a high degree of correlation between, on the one hand, communication, competence, courtesy, credibility and security, and, on the other, between access and understanding; and so they created the two broad dimensions of assurance and empathy, that is, five consolidated dimensions. They then used the five dimensions – tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy – as the basis for their service quality measurement instrument, SERVQUAL (Parasuraman et al., 1988; Zeithaml et al., 1990). They reported further that, regardless of the service being studied, reliability was the most important dimension, followed by responsiveness, assurance and empathy. The intangibles were of least concern to service customers. These dimensions have been the subject of some criticism, though they have formed the basis for a considerable amount of research and application in the field of service management. Finn and Lamb (1991), for example, in a study of retailing, concluded that their results did not support Berry et al.’s (1985) belief that the instrument could be used to assess quality in a wide range of service firms. They found that the model’s five dimensions were insufficient to cover quality in a retailing setting. They questioned particularly

The service industry interacts with our lives on a daily basis. Services can be defined as deeds, processes and performances. When considering the differences between products and services, intangibility and the fact that a service cannot be touched, tasted, viewed or tried on are terms often used (McColl-Kennedy & Kiel 2000). Services differ from goods in essentially four ways: (1) intangibility; (2) inseparability; (3) heterogeneity; (4) perishability (Kotler, Brown, Adam, Burton, Armstrong 2006). To deliver a quality service, managers also pay attention to the importance of tangibles that support service delivery as well as service delivery blueprinting. Managers must also accept that service failures occur and be able to

Source : Adapted from A. Parasuraman, Valerie Zeithaml, and Leonard Berry, “A Conceptual Model of Service Quality and Its Implications for Future Research,” Journal of Marketing, 49 (Fall 1985)

Customer satisfaction and service quality are the two important components that direct anyone’s attention in every concept related to marketing, services, etc. (Spreng and Mackoy, 2006). In today’s competitive era, the success lies in

Researchers have developed several definitions for service. One such definition is that, a service is an economic activity that creates value and provides benefits for customers at specific times and places by a desired change in that bring about, or on behalf of, the recipient of the service (Lovelock and Wirtz, 2004). Another definition for service is that, service is the production of essentially intangible benefit that is in its own right or as important element of a tangible product, which involves some form of exchange that satisfies consumer need (Lashley, 1997).

There are two main aspects that describe and affect both service quality; the actual service customers expected (expected service) and services perceived (perceived service). Fitzsimmons & Fitzsimmons (2001) explains that the creation of customer satisfaction for a service can be identified through a comparison between service perceptions with service expectation, see Figure 1.

Service quality is a measurable set of standard established upon by a provider in delivering services to a client/customer. It can also be viewed upon as a degree of both tangible and intangible expectation coming from a customer’s perspective on how these services are realized by the supplier or by the product coming from the provider.

Obviously, from a Best Value point of view the measuring of service quality in the service segment ought to consider client desires of service and also impression of service. Be that as it may, as Robinson (1999) postulated that: "It is clear that there is little agreement of supposition and much contradiction about how to gauge service quality". One service quality estimation show that has been widely used is the SERVQUAL model created by Parasuraman et al . (1985, 1986, 1988, 1991, 1993, 1994; Zeithaml et al. , 1990). SERVQUAL as the frequently utilized tool for measuring service quality has been to look at clients ' desires before an service experience and their impression of the real service conveyed

Service quality represents a fundamental aspect of delivery, which strongly influences consumer satisfaction and, as a result, loyalty. In today’s global market a customer’s service expectation has to be met and exceeded eventually in order to retain customers as well as achieve success. Perceived quality of a product or a service is becoming one of the major competitive factors in the business world and has led to the innovation of the ‘Quality Era’ (Peeler, 1996). In simple words, the comparison of customer expectations with service performance is service quality. On the other hand, customer satisfaction is defined as a pleasurable fulfilment response toward a good, service, benefit, or reward (Oliver, 1997). Both of these

Zeithaml (1987) defines perceived quality as “the consumer's judgment about an entity's overall excellence or superiority". Stevens and et al (1995) describe it as, "perceived service quality is a function of the interaction among three independent variables: normative expectations, predictive expectations, and actual service quality. The lower the expectations the consumers have about what should happen, the better their perceptions of the actual service. And the higher their expectations about what will happen, the better their perceptions of the actual service". Whereas, Oliver (1981) gives the definition of satisfaction as," it is the highlighted psychological state resulting when the emotion surrounding contadict expectations is coupled with the consumer's prior feelings about the consumption experience" (p.27).