Customer satisfaction towards service quality in 5star hotels industry in Paphos
Purpose - This research project aims to assess the views of customers about the service quality which tourism receive in 5star hotels in Pafos, Cyprus. Thus it is essential that service providers understand and assess customer's expectation and perception level towards service quality offered by 5star hotels in Pafos in five dimensions: tangibility, reliability, responsiveness, assurance, and empathy. Methodology/approach/design - The objectives of this research have been achieved through review of various literatures in service quality management and quality measurement of tourism. This work has begun with the concept of quality of service and shown the model of the gaps of service quality. The paper results have been obtained through a survey. Approximately 300 questionnaires were distributed to three 5star hotels in Pafos area. The number of respondents who participated was 230. SERVQUAL model/Gap Model was used to measure customer expectations and perceptions of service quality. Findings - The main findings of this research work are: the quality may be regarded as a philosophy for guiding tourism organization/destination when taking decisions related to tourism services. Tourism business environment in 5star Hotels, in overall score of the five dimensions, does not support customer satisfaction, is still a need for things to be done, such as improving environmental conditions, internal improvement of the quality of services and improving the level of safety and protection. Research limitations/implications -There is a number of constraints which faced this research paper, they are: • The sample size is small, compared with the size of total population 5star Hotels had yearly, that was reflected on the level of reliability of the research results. • the limited time allowed to the respondents was reflected on the validity of the research outcomes, because they interviewed at the last time of their journey by the time they are ready for departure. • The questionnaire had no use of weights at the questions, or classification of the customers based on their sex, age and if they are repeaters or not, the results of the research can be very useful to the hotel management in order to improve the service level of this specific unit. Practical implications - A useful source of information about service quality management and how practitioners can measure it. It provides general guidelines for improving the quality service for tourism services in total manner in 5star Hotels in Pafos area and in Cyprus in general.