Turnitin uk originality report

1. 3/8/13 TurnitinUK Originality Report
TurnitinUK Originality Report
Assessing Quality and Customer Satisfaction with service delivery of mobile
telecommunication networks in the UK. by VIMAL VIJAYA SARATHY
From Dissertation (Postgraduate Dissertation - 2009-10)
Processed on 16-08-10 7:51 AM BST
ID: 7309325
Word Count: 15833
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paper text:
261. INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background to the study: During the last few years,
the
Telecom industry has experienced an enormous growth across the world and there has been a rapid
growth in the wireless technology (Bharat Book Bureau, 2008). According to an industry market study, by
2013 the telecommunications industry is anticipated to attain revenue of $2.7 trillion with an average
growth rate of 10.3 percent an year (Bharat Book Bureau, 2008). In the present dynamic and interactive
market place, the organisations are proposing various strategic methods to achieve effective Customer
Satisfaction (CS) strategy decisions and eventually increase the CS success rates to sustain
103long term relationship with the profitable customers (Chien and
Su, 2003; Gronroos, 1994).
12"Loyal customers are reported to have higher customer retention rates,
commit a higher share of their category spending to the firm, and are more
likely to recommend others to become customers of the firm." (Keiningham et
al., 2007,
p. 362). Hence the organisations are becoming more customer centric, giving more importance to retaining
old customer as the business would end up spending an approximate of five times more in attracting new
customers than retaining the existing customers in terms of time, money and resources (Reichheld, 1996;
Pizam and Ellis, 1999). As the growth of the organisation and its survival in the market is driven by
customer loyalty and customer retention, each of these companies is continually improving on their service
quality standards to survive in this highly competitive market (Keiningham et al., 2007). Hence, in order to
maintain these service quality standards, organisations frequently adopt new measures to check
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3if the customers are satisfied with the service quality
provided. For e.g. by conducting customer surveys and analysing the acquired data statistically, which
would help them
83make the right decision to increase customer satisfaction and eventually
customer
loyalty among their customers (SPSS White Paper, 1996). Organisations adopt both quantitative and
qualitative methodologies to evaluate CS and the data obtained from these measures provide constructive
feedback to help the organisation know the satisfactory level of its customers with its products, which would
help the organisation to: i) take reliable steps to improve the quality of service, ii) adding more value to its
customers and iii) achieving high customer satisfaction rates (Amaratunga et al., 2002). 1.2 Overview of
the UK Telecommunications Market: Telecommunications is one of the best growing sectors of the UK
economy. The competition developed strongly in 1984 after the privatisation of British Telecom (BT) and
as of 2004, the UK had an approximate of 170 fixed telecommunications provider and 59 mobile service
providers (CWU research, 2004). The market for fixed telephone network has been declining since the
evolution of mobile / cellular phone networks and in 2003 due to flat call volumes and pricing competition, it
fell by £400m (CWU research, 2004). Eventually, the consumers preferred the cellular phone networks as
the mode of communication which was faster and easier than the fixed telephones (CWU research, 2004).
According to the
70UK Mobile Operator Subscriber Data, Statistics and Market Share
2006 -
192008, there are five primary cellular network operators in the UK:
76Vodafone, Telefonica O2, T-Mobile, Orange and 3 UK
and it was reported to have 73.1 million cellular service
19subscribers in the last quarter of 2007, which represents almost 9% of the
total European mobile subscriber market and another statistical report from IE market research Corp
reveals that the wireless market is anticipated to achieve 126% by 2010 and gradually the total subscribers
would also
75reach 78 million by 2010 (Telecoms Market Research, 2008). 1.3 The
current state of telecommunication industry in the UK: Today, the telecommunication industry has
undergone a rapid transformation creating a lot of new challenges for infrastructure and service providers.
The rapid advances in technology and increased market turbulences have added a lot of value to the
telecom industry (Lia and Whalley, 2002). Recently T-Mobile and Orange merged becoming a giant in the
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telecom industry having 28.4 million customers and now they are the largest cellular service provider in the
UK with an approximate of
9437% of the entire mobile market (BBC News, 2009;
The Register, 2010). The 3G network is up to 40 times faster in data than the 2g or the GSM networks.
This high connection speed adds on more features such as sending Pictures, MMS (Multimedia Messaging
Service) or video clips and also promotes high quality sound (Robins, 2003). However this rapid growing
mobile market is expected to face capacity-crunch i.e. due to the increasing existence of several MVNOs,
the mobile data traffic has gradually increased 200% in 2009 and according to the reports of Ofcom, few
service providers such as O2 are about to hit that capacity (Xln Business Community, 2010). Hence, this
capacity- crunch may bring down the quality of service delivery necessitating the network operators to take
precautions in order to maintain their service delivery standards. The
28market share of mobile telecom industry in the UK as of September 2009:
Fig 1.3a
28Market Share of Mobile telecom industry in the UK (Source: Guardian
News, 2009) The
Fig 1.3a indicates that, as of September 2009, T-Mobile / Orange had 37% of market share being the
highest, followed by O2 with 28%, Vodafone with 23% and 3-mobile with the least at 5.8%. The total
number of subscribers for the UK's mobile telecom industry as on September 2009: Fig 1.3b Number of
subscribers for the UK's mobile telecom industry (Source: Guardian News, 2009) The Fig 1.3b indicates
that, as of September 2009, T-Mobile / Orange had 28.4 million customers being the highest followed by
O2 having 21.5 million customer, Vodafone with 17.7 million customers and 3-mobile having the least at
4.5 million customers. 1.4 Problem Identification & Purpose of the Study: Though majority of the customers
for UK mobile telecommunication networks use all of their mobile services like text, data and mobile internet
services, they are dissatisfied with the service-availability and it's quality; especially the network coverage
is a crucial concern to all of its consumers. (Telecom paper, 2009) Due to the existence of several MVNOs
(Mobile Virtual Network Operator), customers switch to different service providers frequently and they are
also concerned about the self- regulatory schemes by their network providers (Telecom paper, 2009).
Customers are known to have reported that there is no network clarity and coverage. They are not being
told if they would have network coverage in their area before they could sign a contract with the company
and they are unhappy with the after sales service that is being provided to them (Poulter, 2009). "A study
on 5,000 people revealed the telecom giants are nearly twice as bad at dealing with issues and complaints
compared with their successors British Gas." (Xln Business Community, 2009). The customers don't get
reliability and assurance in the services they are being offered, as they have to go through a sequence of
inconsistencies such as waiting in long queues to speak to representative, incompetent employees who do
not understand the correct issue that is being faced and bear with their rude behaviour at times (Xln
Business Community, 2009). These situations create a bad impression in the customer's mind and lead
them to change the service provider. Also, this word of mouth communication can spoil the image or
reputation of the company. Hence the main research aim of this study would be: To measure and critically
7analyse the level of customer satisfaction with regards to
service delivery among different mobile service providers (Mobile Telecommunication Networks) within the
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UK. 1.5 Research Questions: How the customers' satisfaction with the service quality is described in the
UK's MTNs with and without respect to the customer's service providers? Which attributes of service quality
do the customers perceive to be of more importance that lacks attention from the service providers in the
UK? 1.6 Research Objectives: To find out the level of customers'
4satisfaction with the service quality offered to them by the
UK's MTNs with and without respect to which network customers subscribe to.
33To find out which dimensions of service quality
are the customers satisfied/dissatisfied with in the UK's MTNs. To identify the Service Quality dimensions
that the customers perceive to be of high importance in the UK's MTNs. 1.7 Significance and Limitations of
this dissertation: This study is significant in various ways to business consultants and business partners.
The results and findings of this study would be helpful to the management of UK's cellular service
providers, as it provides a reliable scientific measure to evaluate customer satisfaction level with the
services delivered by them. It will reveal the
11dimensions of service quality which are considered more important from the
customer's perspective, which would provide them with a priceless empirical support to make right strategic
decisions in the required areas of operations and over-all it would act as reliable guide to improve their
service delivery standards and create customer-value. This dissertation would provide enormous valuable
information to business partners such as share-holders and investors which would help them provide
useful suggestions to their respective mobile service providers to improve their service delivery standards.
The dissertation enables the customers to analyze the ratings of the various dimensions with respect to the
service providers so that bringing in awareness among customers. The limitations of this dissertation are
that, the research would not have access to every locality
74in the UK and as the research is mostly done in the city of
London. But London, being a cosmopolitan city, gives us a gist of UK and a right place to conduct the
research. It doesn't allow us to conduct the analysis on large samples, which is a prerequisite to have more
reliability on surveys (Saunders et al., 2007). But, as the MTNs are a public service and have millions of
users, the samples are obtained from a much diversified respondents to obtain the best possible results.
842. LITERATURE REVIEW 2.1 Purpose of Literature review: The literature
review aims at critically exploring the existing knowledge and theories that are relevant to the research
objectives, so that we can develop and refine the key areas of our research (Saunders et al, 2007). To
generate and refine the research ideas the 'Relevance Tree' technique is used in this review of literature
i.e. a broad concept is studied from the view of various authors via which a new sub-concept is developed
and as we proceed deep into the subject new ideas are formulated (Saunders
87et al, 2007). The customer satisfaction is measured through the
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service quality dimensions defined for that particular product or service. These dimensions are based on
different models created by academics which I critically analyse in the literature and adopt those that best
suit the aim of this dissertation. 2.2 Customer Psychology: A 'Customer' is usually the final user of any
product where the purpose of it being made gets fulfilled (Hayes, 1997). Understanding the psychology of
customers plays a very important role in determining their satisfaction over a product or service. This
includes designing
31a product according to the needs of the customer. The satisfaction of
a customer starts well before manufacturing the product rather than the moment after sale. During the
service encounters the customers' values, perceptions, beliefs and expectations motivate them to choose
one service provider rather than another (Lynch, 1992; Pizam and Ellis, 1999). At any point of sale, there
are four options available for the customer to choose: Purchase – where the customer is convinced to buy
a product or service, Rejection – where the customer rejects the offer, Postponement – where the
customer is partly convinced and postpones the offer to think at a later date and substitution – where the
customer compares the product with other contemporary offers. Hence influencing the customer's choice
to purchase a product is very crucial (Lynch, 1992; Pizam and Ellis, 1999). Therefore,
88it is very essential for us to know the customer
expectations and their requirements, to understand customer's view and perspective about the
104quality of services and products they need (Pizam and
Ellis, 1999). 2.3 Role of
46Customer Satisfaction: Customer Satisfaction (CS) is said to be the
customer's post-purchase evaluation of services or a product. When the
CS level of an organisation is high, even the market share and profits of the organisation grow higher
leading the company
82to a stronger competitive position in the market place (Turkyilmaz and
Ozkan, 2007). The customer satisfaction is built on the varied experiences, positive and negative that the
customer has come across at different points of time (Satari, 2007). The impact of customer care in service
quality system would maximize profits and help the organisations grow by providing
54customer satisfaction and building great customer experiences. Customer care
is
therefore a key to gain the competitive advantage among the competitors (Lynch, 1992).
21"Satisfaction of customers also happens to be the cheapest means of
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promotion
and therefore,
14customer satisfaction is recognized as of great importance to all
commercial firms because of its influence on repeat purchases and word-of
mouth recommendations." (Pizam and
Ellis, 1999, p. 326). Hence, it becomes important for the organisation to offer customers a good experience
that exceeds their expectation and if the customers have bad experiences, then the reputation of the
company reduces rapidly due to word-of-mouth communication. Satisfaction of customers over a
telecommunication product can be two dimensional: i) It can be component specific – i.e. service specific,
over the MMS services, 3G services, speed etc. and ii) It can be product specific – satisfaction
7on the overall performance and responsiveness of the mobile service provider
(Cronin and
Taylor, 1992). These dimensions require us to measure the satisfaction level of the customers in different
particular components as well as on the whole. 2.4 Measuring Customer Satisfaction: In order to take
managerial decisions, the CS needs to be measured in an organisation and this Customer Satisfaction
Measurement (CSM) is used to determine the
10customer satisfaction level based on the valuable feedback from the
customers and identifying the
customer expectations (Crosby, 1991). The service quality can be achieved only by knowing the
customer's total needs or customer expectations and with the help of this data, the service standards and
processes may be altered to achieve customer satisfaction (Crosby, 1991). After in depth research on
CSM, nine distinct theories were developed such as: Expectancy disconfirmation (Parasuraman et al,
1988), Assimilation contrast, Comparison level (Gronroos, 2001), Value precept (Zeithaml, 1988),
Cognitive dissonance, Equity, Generalised negativity, Contrast and Attribution (Kauppinen et al., 2007).
Most of these theories were based on cognitive psychology, but they were developed with no empirical
research. However, among these, only two of them were widely accepted i.e. the expectancy
disconfirmation theory and customer satisfaction indices (Pizam and Ellis, 1999) because all the theories
mentioned above use these two models as a common base
17(Parasuraman et al, 1988; Gronroos, 2001; Zeithaml, 1988; Kauppinen et al.,
2007). Therefore, we would review the customer satisfaction indices and disconfirmation models which
would form the crux of this study. 2.5 Customer Satisfaction Indices (CSI): This model focuses more
48on customer's overall satisfaction with a product or
the services offered to them till date and it is based on a cumulative view of satisfaction (Turkyilmaz and
Ozkan, 2007).
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18"The CSI model is a structural model based on the assumptions that
customer satisfaction is caused by some factors such as perceived quality
(PQ), perceived value (PV), expectations of customers, and image of a firm."
(Turkyilmaz and Ozkan, 2007, p. 673). The Swedish Customer Satisfaction Barometer (SCSB) is reported
to be the first national customer satisfaction index (NCSI) which was developed in 1989, then the model
was followed by the Germans, they named it as German Customer Barometer (Fornell, 1992). The
Americans adapted this model in 1993, it was developed by Claes Fornell, who was the founder of SCSB
and they named it as the
43American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI). The ACSI is a
cause and effect model using the responses from the respondents to form a 'Multi-Equation Econometric'
model. The responses were collected according to different variables in a 0-100 scale (Turkyilmaz and
Ozkan, 2007; Fornell, 1992). The
25European Organisation for Quality (EOQ) and European Foundation for
Quality Management (EFQM) jointly developed the European Customer
Satisfaction Index (ECSI) in 1999. Then gradually many other countries followed the CSI model (Turkyilmaz
and Ozkan, 2007). The ECSI model included the 'Corporate Image' as a component on top of the ASCI
model. But, these indices do not measure the CS levels for specific components and overall CS together
(Turkyilmaz and Ozkan, 2007). The Workforce Centre developed the Minnesota Customer Satisfaction
Index (MnCSI). The MnCSI model is specifically used to evaluate over-all customer satisfaction with service
delivery of the MTNs on a single scale (Positively Minnesota, 2007). This model uses the variables of
disconfirmation models: both desire disconfirmation as well as expectation disconfirmation and it combines
three questions which includes the disconfirmation models also (As discussed earlier disconfirmation
models are the second CSM tool which was widely accepted) It also gets more stable when there are three
questions instead of one. In addition, it is comparatively flexible and best suited for any number of
responses (Positively Minnesota, 2007). 2.6 Disconfirmation Models:
9According to Parasuraman et al. (1988), customer expectations are one of the
most important factors
of CS, as they
13play a major role of ascertaining customer satisfaction. Even the
SERVQUAL model uses the disconfirmation model as its base and it is basically used for conceptualizing
service quality
29(Parasuraman et al., 1988). The disconfirmation model was
tested and confirmed in a lot of studies conducted across the world and there are two different types of
disconfirmation models - Desire-Disconfirmation model and Expectancy disconfirmation model (Pizam and
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Ellis, 1999; Parasuraman et al., 1988). The expectancy disconfirmation model states that quality is
assessed by comparing perceived and expected performance i.e. to examine if the customer expectations
were met during the service delivery process (Oliver and DeSarbo, 1988; Kang and James, 2004).
According to Oliver (1980), the expectancy disconfirmation model has got two internal attributes, which are
known as positive disconfirmation and negative disconfirmation.
29If the performance of the product or service
exceeds the customer expectations
24and when the customer is highly satisfied with the product or service
delivered, then it is called as value disconfirmation. However, if the customer's expectations are met and
he/she is satisfied with the product or services offered, then it is positive disconfirmation and finally if the
product or service perceived is below his/her expectations, then it is called negative disconfirmation
(Oliver, 1980). This theory focuses more on the antecedents of satisfaction, which occurs at the initial
stages of the service-delivery process (Oliver, 1980; Oliver and DeSarbo, 1988; Kang and James, 2004).
Recently Khalifa and Liu (2002) built a theory that embedded both desire as well as expectancy
disconfirmation theory. They have proved that both these factors impact the over- all customer
satisfaction, as they both are of cognitive standards and it is hard to evaluate which one of these factors
explains CS better. 2.7 Service Quality: Service Quality means the service that meets all the customers'
expectation and satisfies their needs and requirements or it
45is defined as "a consumer's judgment about an entity's overall excellence
or superiority."
(Kang and James, 2004, p. 267) This term is purely customer oriented. Hence excellence in service
requires an understanding of customer needs and expectation (Edvardsson, 1998). As there was an
enormous growth in
7mobile telecommunications market in the last few years, the
customers are more conscious about the quality of services being offered to them (Kumar and Lim, 2008).
According to Kumar and Lim (2008), the service quality in MTNs can be perceived through the technical
47as well as the functional attributes of mobile services in which the
technical attributes include the pricing/tariff plan, the
23network quality & data services and the functional attributes
include the
23customer service quality and the billing system.
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23"Overall perceptions of service quality are formed by a consumer's
evaluation of multiple quality dimensions."
(Kumar and Lim, 2008, p. 569). Hence in order to enhance the customer's perceived value and their
satisfaction level, it is important for the organisations to create positive perceptions of service quality
among its customers (Kumar and Lim, 2008). Service quality enhances the organisation's operational
efficiency as well as improving the retention rate of its firm (Edvardsson, 1998). The customers assess the
product quality in various tangible ways such as its colour, style and feel. But in most of the cases only few
of these tangibles exist and meet the customers' expectation
37(Parasuraman et al., 1985). According to Parasuraman et al. (1985), as the
services being
1intangible in nature, most of it cannot be measured and
their heterogeneous nature makes them vary from time to time and customer to customer. Hence because
of these natures, it becomes hard
13to evaluate the service quality of
an organisation. Gronroos (2001) introduced the concept of Consumer Perceived Quality (CPQ), which
evaluates to what extent the service delivered, meets the customer's expectation. It compares the
consumer's expectations and the customer's perception of service received. According to this theory, over-
all satisfaction of the customer with the organisation is based on every encounter or experience he had
with that organisation. Hence they claim
17that service quality and customer satisfaction are distinct conceptually but
they are closely related constructs
3(Kang and James, 2004; Sureshchandar et al., 2002).
A recent study has proved that "the CPQ influences profitability directly as well as indirectly through market
share." (Crosby, 1991, p. 6). Hence it is equally important to take CPQ under consideration
3for this research. According to Parasuraman et al. (1988), the
long term and global evaluation of a service
61is related to the service quality perceived by the customers and the
customer satisfaction can be obtained by evaluating specific service transactions and they have also
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clearly pointed out that the customer
54experience with the provided service, influence the
perceptions of service quality. Hence,
85it could be said that both service quality and
CS are closely related terms. 2.8 Relationship between
52Service Quality and Customer Satisfaction: The relationship between
service quality and customer satisfaction
has gained
50a lot of attention in the last few years
and they are considered to be the two core components that frame a crux of the marketing theories
(Sureshchandar et al, 2002). In the current competitive market, the companies can sustain its competitive
advantage by providing service quality of higher standards, which would
31result in satisfied customers (Sureshchandar et al,
2002). Customers are
73one of the important assets of an organisation as they are the
only ones who keep the business running. As it was already discussed earlier
95that retaining existing customers is more essential than generating new ones,
108it is important to have service quality
in every stroke
102to build a long term relationship with the customers,
which adds more value to the consumers as well as the company (Nguyen et al, 2007). Based on the
7quality of service delivered, is the consumer's commitment to
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renew/continue our service consistently in the future (Nguyen et al, 2007). Figure 2.8: Five
4critical factors of customer perceived service quality Source:
(Sureshchandar et al., 2002) The figure 2.8 indicates the five
15critical factors of customer perceived service quality, in
which the core services refer to the content of the services i.e. the different features
15offered in a service. The human element of
services refers to the empathy, assurance, reliability and responsiveness i.e. includes the factors that
affect the human behaviour. Standardisation of services refers to the systematizing and simplifying the
systems, processes and the procedures. The
71tangibles refer to the physical facilities available, equipments and the
appearance of
their workers and finally the social responsibility refers to encouraging ethical behaviour in every aspect,
which would improve the image of the company and also promote customer loyalty and overall customer
satisfaction (Sureshchandar et al., 2002). 2.9
10Service Quality Dimensions: According to Johnston (1995),
90it is crucial to identify the determinants of service quality
before we proceed with the service research. Hence this becomes a central concern, as it is necessary
33to find out the determinants of service quality to define measures
and control customer perceived service quality. In 1980s,
42Parasuraman et al. (1985, 1988, 1994) developed the SERVQUAL model
to determine what service quality meant to the consumers, followed by the measures they developed
strategies
31to meet customer's expectations. It is considered to be the
most popular instrument, which is widely used by many researchers and practitioners to measure service
quality (Sureshchandar et al., 2002). 2.10 Service Quality Models: Many models were developed to
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capture the quality of service at different points of time to suit different business objectives (Nitin et al,
2005). The earliest ones were that of Gronroos', (1984) 'Technical and Functional Quality Model' where
the perceived quality was compared with the Expected Service with reference to the Functional and
Technical dimensions. The next popular model was
49Parasuraman et al.'s (1985) GAP model. This model analysed the gaps
21between the customers' expected and perceived service forming a base for
the
SERVQUAL model with several dimensions like Tangibles, Reliability etc. However, the SERVQUAL model
has been subjected to a lot of criticisms and there have been many scholars who had tried to modify or
restructure this model conceptually (Kang and James, 2004). The next model designed by Haywood (1998)
called as 'Attribute ServQual Model' incorporated 3
58attributes: 'Physical facilities and process', 'People's Behaviour' and
'Professional Judgement'
into the SERVQUAL components. Haywood (1998) also said that all the three attributes needs to have a
balance and if not leads to fall in quality. The 'Synthesized ServQual Model' by Brogwicz et al. (1990)
explained the importance of the customer's perception of the brand and image before even the product
launched. This model added up the 'Company Image' component and its elements to the SERVQUAL
model. Meanwhile,
9Cronin and Taylor (1992) developed 'SERVPERF', the 'Performance Only
Model' which
states that the consumers' perceptions on the brand actually predict the service quality and the perception
index is a worthy indicator of the Service Quality. It also criticises that the SERVQUAL model mixes
satisfaction with perception. But the perception cannot always be a proper service quality indicator
because perceptions do change with time, and the organisation that provide unmatched service excellence
always lead even when started with comparatively lesser brand awareness and marketing system. The
Mattson's (1992) 'Ideal Value Model' calculates the Service Quality in comparison with the Ideal Industry
Standard rather than the Customers' perceptions. This model may strive to provide the best service in line
with the technological capability but the innovation may not be focussed on the customer's requirements.
The 'IT Alignment Model' (Berkley and Gupta, 1994) introduced Information Technology for improving the
service quality. Meanwhile, Dabholkar (1996) introduced the 'Attribute and Overall Affect Model' which
examines the technology used self service options to minimize labour costs. The PCP Attribute (Philip and
Hazzlet, 1997) egg prioritized the dimensions as Pivotal, Core and Peripheral. Oh (1999) depicted the
importance of Customer Value.
27Frost and Kumar (2000) proposed the 'Internal Service Quality'
dimensions based on the GAP model for the Internal Customers of the organisation. In the
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27'Internal Service Quality DEA model' (Soteriou and Starvinide, 2000),
the Data Envelope Analysis maps the depreciation in service quality from the client base to branches.
37Santos' (2003) 'e-Service Quality' is developed on the antecedents of service
quality using e-
commerce. 2.11
53SERVQUAL: SERVQUAL is a multiple item scale developed to measure the
Service quality
and this instrument illuminates the different dimensions of customer's perception and helps assessing the
1service quality (Parasuraman et al., 1985, 1988).
It has illuminated five dimensions via which customers perceive and assess service quality of the
organisation and each dimension has a sub-set called 'items' via which the dimensions are being
measured
86(Parasuraman et al., 1988). The five dimensions are:
1.
13Tangibles: This includes the physical facilities available, equipments and the
appearance of
their workers. 2. Assurance: This includes the courteous nature and the product knowledge of the
employees and also if they are confident and trust worthy.
643. Responsiveness: Providing quick service and their willingness to help the
customers. 4.
Empathy: Caring for the customers with more individualised attention. 5. Reliability: Providing accurate
service and performing the promised commitments (Parasuraman et al., 1988). The required
57data is collected via structured questionnaire or surveys from a sample of
customers in which
many questions are formulated
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72based on the key service quality dimensions (Parasuraman et al., 1988,
1994). Before reviewing other models based on SERVQUAL, it is better to look into the advantages and
disadvantages of SERVQUAL. Advantages and Disadvantages of SERVQUAL: SERVQUAL has overlooked
at some of the
15important factors of service quality such as the social responsibility of the
organisation, core service and standardisation of service delivery
and
17there is also a general agreement towards the 22 items scale, that they are
reasonably good predictors of service quality
(Sureshchandar et al., 2002). Most of the research models till date have used SERVQUAL as its base for
development (Sureshchandar
9et al., 2002). The SERVQUAL model has also been
severely criticized in many cases. The contents of the service quality dimensions obtained from the
SERVQUAL model has not been accepted by everyone, as
100service quality is generally viewed as a multi-dimensional
construct and it focuses mainly on the service delivery aspects and there are many additional factors also
to be considered for e.g. Considering only the functional attributes to predict customer's behaviour may
have low predictive validity, the semantic differences are not being withstanded in each dimension, etc.
3(Kang and James, 2004; Sureshchandar et al., 2002).
The criticisms also
5include "the use of difference scores, dimensionality, applicability and the
lack of validity of the model, especially with respect to the dependence or
independence of the five main variables" (Kang and
James, 2004, p. 267). Hence considering all these criticisms that SERVQUAL is renowned for its
widespread use by other researchers and scholars and it also has got lot of disadvantages it is advisable
to look into other models based on SERVQUAL.
9In 1992, Cronin and Taylor developed the Performance only model, which
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they called it SERVPERF. It states that service quality can only be assessed by perceptions and it is not
necessary to measure expectations (Cronin and Taylor, 1992). The author views service quality as a link
between purchase intentions and customer satisfaction and they challenged the SERVQUAL framework
101by Parasuraman et al. (1985), that perceptions are the only predictors of
service quality where as SERVQUAL model confuses consumer satisfaction with attitude of the consumers
1(Cronin and Taylor, 1992). Similarly, Brogowicz et al. (1990) argued that
there are many chances for the service quality gap to occur well before the customer experiences the
service, as the customer may learn through various ways
50such as word-of-mouth communication and advertisements. It integrates the
traditional managerial framework to the service quality which comprises of three factors: image, traditional
marketing activities and external influences and the model was called
27synthesized model of service quality (Brogowicz et al., 1990).
Another study by Haywood-Farmer (1988) suggests that the attributes has to be separated into three
groups: professional judgement, processes & facilities and consumer's behaviour and each of the
attributes comprises of various factors. It also states that all the three groups must be given equal
importance, in case if any one of the attribute is given more importance than others, then it may lead to a
disaster (Haywood-Farmer, 1988). Similarly,
26Parasuraman et al. (1985) had stated that service quality cannot be assessed
only with service outcomes but even the
26service delivery process needs to be evaluated, the
SERVQUAL is composed of only functional dimension of service quality and they lack technical dimension
and corporate image. Both these dimensions are inter correlated. The attributes of functional quality refers
to the American perspective of service quality but however according to the European perspective, the
service quality needs two more attributes in addition, which are technical quality and the corporate image
(Kang and James, 2004). The Gronroos SERVQUAL model includes all the three attributes i.e. necessary
from the European perspective. Moreover, the Gronroos' ServQual model was used in an empirical
research in the telecommunications field, which had proved
5that Gronroos model is more appropriate to represent service quality
in telecommunications industry
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105(Kang and James, 2004). 2. 12 Gronroos' Model of
SERVQUAL: It is a multi dimensional model. According to this model there are
5two service quality dimensions, firstly the technical aspect (what kind of
service is provided) and the functional aspect (how is the service being
provided). They introduced the
corporate image concept, as one of the other important element
98in the perceived service-quality model, as the
customers would bring their perceptions and past experiences with the firm in each encounter with the
organisation (Kang and James, 2004). If a positive image about the firm is created in the mind of a
customer, then they wouldn't bother much about the minor mistakes that happens and in case there is a
negative image about the firm, then the mistakes would be magnified in their mind (Gronroos, 1994;
89Kang and James, 2004). In the mobile telecommunications industry
the customers look for both – How they are being served (functional dimension) as well as the nature of
services and service outcomes which constitute the technical dimension (Kang and James, 2004). Hence
these three dimensions (technical dimension, functional dimension and corporate image) are considered
the most important. 2.13 Addressing the Research Questions As discussed earlier in the 'current state of
telecommunication industry in the UK' and 'Problem Identification' in the introduction (section 1.3 and 1.4),
the network operators are likely to face capacity crunch which induces network coverage and clarity
issues. This in turn shall reduce the service quality standards to a new low. Moreover, even the reliability,
assurance and responsiveness factors are not addressed with proper concern increasing the customer's
switching intention. At this juncture
49it is important to know the service quality dimensions
valued more by the customers and to give more attention towards those in order to achieve positive
customer service experience. These problems led to the main research objectives specified. Based on the
reviewed literature the research objectives can be obtained using the following theoretical models which
has been justified in this chapter: i) The MnCSI model, Disconfirmation models (both desire and
expectation) and over-all satisfaction measure is used to assess and describe the level of customers'
4satisfaction with the service quality offered to them by the
UK's MTNs with and without respect to which network customers subscribe to. ii) The expectation
disconfirmation model is used in order to find which
7dimensions of service quality the customers are satisfied or dissatisfied with in
the
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UK's MTNs. iii) The Gronroos'
13Servqual model is used to identify the service quality dimensions that the
customers perceive to be of high importance in the UK's MTNs. The research question one: 'How the
customers' satisfaction with the service quality is described in the UK's MTNs with and without respect to
the customer's service providers?' is answered by critically analysing the results obtained from the first
research objective and the research question two: 'Which attributes of service quality do the customers
perceive to be of more importance and lacks attention from the service providers in the UK?' is answered
by critically analysing the results obtained from objectives two and three. 3. RESEARCH
1METHODOLOGY 3.1 Research Purpose: According to Saunders et al. (2007),
research
is a systematic or a step by step procedure to increase the knowledge of a new or an existing subject. The
41purpose of this research is to key out the main service quality
dimensions/attributes as perceived
7by the customers and find out how
satisfied they are with these attributes and also to explore the reasons for their the intention to change
their service providers (Saunders et al., 2007). 3.2 Research Philosophy: Research philosophy brings up
different philosophical assumptions and beliefs that would support this research and help us selecting the
appropriate research strategy and phenomenon. It has two core traditions: 'Positivism' and
'phenomenological approach' (Saunders et al., 2007). Positivism deals with the fundamental laws
perceived by us and their scientific explanations. 'Phenomenological' helps in trying to understand a
particular phenomenon (Saunders et al., 2007). The three main characteristics of positivism are: ? The
explanations and knowledge attained in this method are similar to that of natural science. ? The
'hypothetico deductive methodology' which is followed by positivism is same as natural science. ? It treats
its' subject matter (i.e. mobile telecom networks in UK, in this study) just like how a natural scientist would
treat the world (of natural forces/things) (Saunders et al., 2007). Hence, it implies that positivism deals with
observable social reality. So, this research is built on this approach as it involves customer perceptions
and identifying relationships through different theoretical frameworks.
13.3 Research Approach: According to Saunders et al., (2007), there are two
92broad methods of reasoning: deductive approach and inductive approach.
The
deductive approach is based on the top-down approach mode where
1a theory is developed and subjected to
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more observation after hypothesis as shown in the fig 4.3. It works from more general to specific reasoning
91(Saunders et al., 2007). Conversely, the inductive approach is based on
the bottom-up approach model i.e. the theory is developed based on the data collected during research.
However, the deductive approach is also said to have degrees of uncertainty
36(Saunders et al., 2007) and moreover, as this research is based on
theoretical considerations, our research employs the deductive approach. Fig 3.3: Deductive Approach
THEORY HYPOTHESIS OBSERVATION CONFIRMATION 3.4
43Research Method: There are two different groups of research methods:
'quantitative' and 'qualitative'. In
quantitative analysis, we obtain statistical data that represents the concepts empirically. This data is further
measured using the quantitative statistical methods which links the data to concepts (Neuman, 2006). On
the other hand, qualitative analysis explains the social phenomena which involve interviews and
observations from real life situations (Saunders et al., 2007) and the data here includes written/spoken
words, physical objects, sounds or visual images measured simultaneously while collecting the data
(Neuman, 2006). This research uses both quantitative as well as qualitative methods to get accurate
results. The quantitative measurement uses the following models as justified in the literature review:
Gronroos' SERVQUAL model (Gronroos, 1994) to evaluate CS with the Service Quality dimensions
(functional dimensions, Technical dimension and Corporate Image); 'Disconfirmation models' to analyse
and evaluate customer's desires and expectations both with and without respect to their service provider
(Oliver 1980; Parasuraman et al., 1988) and the MnCSI model to evaluate the over-all customer
satisfaction with service delivery of the UK's MTNs with and without respect to which Mobile Telecom
Network customers subscribe to (Positively Minnesota, 2007). According to Neuman (2006, pg. 412),
"Researchers often combine focus group with quantitative research, and the procedure has its own
specific strengths and weaknesses". The strengths are: the lively setting that allows respondents to
express their opinions or ideas freely and interpretation of ideas is facilitated (Neuman, 2006). This helps
in bridging rich ideas and data in a continuing and interactive manner via which we could have a better
understanding of the subject in a bigger view and these strengths overwrites the weaknesses which are:
'polarization effect' and limitation in the number of topics discussed in a session (Neuman, 2006). Hence
focus group interview is the chosen Qualitative method as the research also includes quantitative
measurement. The focus group interview uses the Delphi technique to refine the research ideas. This
process involves employing a group of people who can contribute some more value to the research idea
(Saunders et al., 2007). The members of the group were initially briefed about the research idea and were
asked to suggest other important elements to measure the service quality. According to respondents,
among these attributes they consider the balance between quality and cost as the most important. It was
then derived as another dimension to the Gronroos SERVQUAL model called as 'Value for Money (VFM)'.
This focus group interview lasted for 60 minutes and the details of which is described in Appendix-A. All the
Service Quality Dimensions and its items (variables) used are listed in table 3.4. Each dimension is
represented with indicators as shown in the table below. For e.g., Tangibles is TN, Reliability is RE, etc. A
set of 3 items were added for every dimension based on its properties except VFM which has 2 items. The
items/variables under each dimension are defined in the Appendix-H. Table 3.4: Service Quality
dimensions and its comprising items No. of Service Quality Dimensions No. of Service Quality Dimensions
Items Items 3 TANGIBLES (TN) 3 ASSURANCE (AR) 3 RELIABILITY (RE) 3 TECHNICAL QUALITY (TQ) 3
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RESPONSIVENESS (RP) 3 CORPORATE IMAGE (CI) 3 EMPATHY (EP) 2 VFM (Value for Money) (VM)
According to Neuman (2006), structured questionnaire is the most viable option for quantitative
measurement to get precise information in all respective areas and also because of its ease of use nature.
Since this research analyses several areas of service quality, the quantitative method is used via closed-
ended survey or structured questionnaire designed based on all the items mentioned in Table: 3.4 to
evaluate customer satisfaction with service delivery. A questionnaire was deployed for capturing the
10perceptions of customers about their mobile service provider. The
questionnaire consists of
three sections with several items as represented in Appendix-B: The first section includes age, sex and
service provider to get variety of responses, and help us set a pattern for that specific group. The pattern
analysis helps in satisfying the needs of specific groups in the society. The second section consists of
disconfirmation measures (desire and expectation) derived from 'Disconfirmation Models', 'Over-all
customer satisfaction' measure and 'Service quality' dimensions derived from Gronroos' SERVQUAL model
and focus group interview (VFM). The third section includes all Service Quality dimensions and asks the
customer to rate the importance of each dimension from their perspective, which is
63measured on a five- point likert scale ranging from 'Least Important' to 'Most
important'. The
items in section 2 and 3 extensively analyzes the requirements of all groups of customers ranging from
basic to advanced mobile services as well as the after sales service provided by their service provider. 3.5
Operationalisation of Concepts: 3.5.1 Minnesota Customer Satisfaction Index (MnCSI): This index may
have up to 5 responses for 3 questions by which the customer satisfaction levels are evaluated. The
responses are measured
56using a likert scale of 1 to 5 i.e. '1' being least satisfied and '5'
being highly satisfied. The three questions asked to the customers are:
7Overall, how satisfied or dissatisfied you are with the services being provided
by
your network? How well does the service fulfil your expectations? To
8what extent did the services you received from them match your desired set
of services?
The questions mentioned above are rated on a five point likert scale i.e. each response would have a
value from '1' to '5'. Table 3.5.1a: Measuring MnCSI model on 5-point Likert scale RESPONSES 1 2 3 4 5
Question 1 Very dissatisfied Dissatisfied Neutral Satisfied Very Satisfied Question 2 Much worse Much
better Equal to Better than
68Much better than expected than expected expectation expected than
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expected
Question 3
8Much worse than desired Worse than desired Equal to my desire Better than
desired Much better than desired
The table 3.5.1a indicates the three questions with its corresponding values ranging between 1 and 5
where '1' indicates the customer's very dissatisfaction with the services and '5' indicates the very
satisfaction with the services. Then the answers to these three questions are then calculated using this
formula (Positively Minnesota, 2007): Further, it is calculated using the following procedure: ? ? Step A:
Frequency of each scale has to be found for all three answers. Step B: The weight of each response must
be calculated as shown
69in table 3.5.1b Table 3.5.1b:
Weight of each response Responses 1 2 3 4 5 ? Step C: The frequency of each response obtained from
the customer is then multiplied with the response weight for all the three answers. ? Step D: The Sum of
the values for all three answers is then evaluated ? Step E: The total sum is divided by (sample size-1) i.e.
in our case it is 4. The Minnesota Customer Satisfaction index is evaluated using these steps. Then a
description for customer satisfaction level is given to the derived value as shown in the table below: Table
3.5.1c: Description for each MnCSI value MnCSI Value Description 81-100 Very High 61-80 High 51-60
Fair 31-50 Low Below 30 Very Low Table 3.5.1c indicates that MnCSI value between 81-100 is marked
'Very High' implying the high level of customer satisfaction, and subsequently low as the range decreases
until Below 30 which is marked 'Very Low' implying the low level of customer satisfaction level (Positively
Minnesota, 2007). 3.5.2 Defining Hypothesis: Now we explain how the research objectives are transformed
into hypotheses and executed. The following hypotheses are being used for this study: H1: Customers
dissatisfied with services offered by cellular network in the UK with and without respect to which cellular
network customers subscribe to. Sub-Hypotheses H1a H1b H1c H1d Dissatisfied with Vodafone O2 T-
Mobile/Orange 3-Mobile H2: The Disconfirmation models impact the over-all CS positively in UK's MTNs.
H2a: Expectancy disconfirmation impacts the over-all CS positively. H2b: Desire disconfirmation impacts
the over-all CS positively. 3.5.3 Disconfirmation Models: As justified in the literature review we use both
desire as well as expectation disconfirmation models to measure satisfaction. The table 3.5.3 shows the
indicators for these variables. Table 3.5.3: Variables for Disconfirmation models DD ED Desire
Disconfirmation To
8what extent did the services you received from them match your desired set
of services?
Expectation Disconfirmation How well does the service fulfil your expectations? Both these variables are
measured using a 5-point likert scale. For DD, the scales vary
11from 'Much worse than desired' to 'Much better than
desired'. Similarly, for ED the scales varied
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28. 3/8/13 TurnitinUK Originality Report
11from 'Much worse than expected' to 'Much better than expected'.
It refers to the customer's over-all judgement on the service quality delivered by their service provider.
Here, we use only one indicator as shown in table 3.5.4 below, using a single question, to which the
respondents rate their over-all satisfaction with service quality on the 5
3-point likert scale which vary from very dissatisfied to very satisfied.
Table 3.5.4: Variable for over-all Satisfaction Measure OCS Over-all Customer Satisfaction Overall, please
rate how satisfied or dissatisfied you are with the services being provided by your network. 3.5.5
Procedures to test Hypotheses: hypotheses. The following describe how the research objectives are met
and tested with the Research Objective One (RO 1) To find out the level of customers'
4satisfaction with the service quality offered to them by the
UK's MTNs with and without respect to which network customers subscribe to. The procedure outlined for
MnCSI model (as described in section 3.5.1) is used. 3.5.5a Testing Hypotheses 1a to 1d (as mentioned in
3.5.2) under RO
201 One-Sample T test is used to
test hypothesis H1a to H1d with and without respect to the subscribed cellular network. Cut-off points 3 and
4 are chosen for disconfirmation measure and Over-all customer satisfaction measure respectively with
40significance level of 0.05. The null hypothesis
assumes that customers are satisfied for both with respect to and irrespective of cellular network. We take
3 as the cut-off value for DD and ED because in disconfirmation scales, any rating between 3 and 5
indicates that the customer is satisfied. However, 1 and 2 indicates the customer's dissatisfaction. Cut-off
point 4 is chosen for OCS measure, because in over-all satisfaction scale, ratings from 1 to 3 indicates the
customer's dissatisfaction and ratings 4 and 5 indicate that the customer is satisfied with the service
delivery. Procedure to test first hypothesis: Step1: The Null hypothesis: H0: x ≥ 3 (Equal to / Better than
desired or expected) H1: x < 3 (Worse than / Much worse than desired or expected) H0: x ≥ 4 (Satisfied /
Very Satisfied) H1: x < 4 (Neither dissatisfied nor satisfied, dissatisfied / very dissatisfied) Step2: One-
Sample T test is conducted at significance level 0.05 Step3: The t-statistics, confidence intervals and p-
value (Critical value) is extracted from SPSS output. Step4: The null hypothesis is rejected under the
following 2 conditions. Firstly, in case the mean difference is significantly negative and secondly, if the
confidence interval is showing negative. It is not rejected if the mean difference is significantly positive or
any value under confidence interval includes a positive value. 3.5.5b Testing Hypothesis two and sub
hypotheses (as mentioned in 3.5.2) Here a linear regression is used as each sub hypothesis involves one
independent and one dependent variable. The three models that have to be tested are as follows: M1:
Over-all CS = n + ED + DD + x M2: Over-all CS = n + DD + x M3: Over-all CS = n + ED + x Where 'n' is a
constant and 'x' is the error-term and here
38the null hypothesis states that there is no significant relationship between
both the disconfirmation models (DD and
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29. 3/8/13 TurnitinUK Originality Report
ED) together and OCS. The procedure to test these three models is mentioned below: Step1: The Null
hypothesis: H0: DD ≤ 0 Variable DD is not significantly greater than 0 H1: DD > 0 Variable DD is
significantly greater than 0 H0: ED ≤ 0 Variable ED is not significantly greater than 0 H1: ED > 0 Variable
ED is significantly greater than 0 Step2: Linear regression F test is conducted at significance level 0.05
Step3: p-value (critical value) is extracted from the SPSS output Step4: The null hypothesis is rejected
under following two conditions: If the
6p-value is less than the significance value 0.05 and if the
co-efficient is positive. 3.5.5c Research Objective Two (RO 2)
33To find out which dimensions of service quality
are the customers satisfied/dissatisfied with in the UK's MTNs? As discussed earlier in Research Method
(in section 3.4), customer satisfaction is measured for four service quality dimensions: functional, technical,
image and VFM dimensions. Items under each dimension are defined in Appendix-H. One
34-Sample T test is used to verify the significance of the mean
differences with significance level of 0.05 and test-value 3 in order to split the entire sample into satisfied
and dissatisfied customers
81for each of the items in each dimension of service quality. The
following procedure is being used: Step1: The Null hypothesis: H0: x ≥ 3 (Equal / better than expected) H1:
x < 3 (Worse than / Much worse than expected) Step2: One-Sample T test is conducted at significance
level 0.05 Step3: Confidence intervals and p-value (Critical value) is extracted from SPSS output. Step4:
The null hypothesis is rejected under the following two conditions: If the mean difference is significantly
negative and if the confidence interval is showing negative. It should not be rejected if the related mean
difference is significantly positive or any value under confidence interval includes a positive value. 3.5.5d
Research Objective Three (RO 3) What Service Quality dimensions do the customers perceive to be of
high importance in the UK's MTNs? One-Sample T test is conducted at significance level 0.05 with a cut-off
value 3 to split the service quality dimensions that are considered important by the customers from those
that are unimportant. Then each service quality dimension is ranked in an order of magnitude to point out
the importance of each dimension from the customer's point of view. 3.6 Sample Selection and Data
Collection: According to Neuman (2006), the sample size for focus group interview must range from 6 to 12
people. Hence, initially a sample size of 12 respondents are selected to conduct a focus group interview,
the selection was based on purposive sampling method because the respondents had to pass the eligibility
criteria before they could participate (Neuman, 2006). All the respondents were students doing their
masters and they all were mobile telecom users, who had wide subject knowledge regarding the quality
concerns in mobile telecom networks in the UK. The data was also collected via structured questionnaire
which targeted only the mobile telecom users. In this survey-process, emphasis was given to include
people of all groups within the UK (age groups, sex, etc), but more attention was given to the younger
generation and student sector, as they are considered to be
25one of the most active cell phone
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30. 3/8/13 TurnitinUK Originality Report
users (Clickz, 2005). From the sample frame of 78 million cellular service subscribers in the UK (Telecoms
Market Research, 2008), a sample size of 100 respondents are selected due to the time and cost
constraints. The time limit provided to complete this research was very less and using a larger sample size
may require huge financial resources, which was unaffordable. Two different types of survey instruments
are used here for the collection of data. Firstly, out of the total sample size of 100 respondents, 33
respondents responded via simple random sampling method. This method was chosen because the
population comprises of mobile service providers in the UK, each constituting a stratum. All these
respondents were students of UEL using UK cellular service. The survey was hosted on survey monkey
website and the link <http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/SGVRP5X> was sent to all the students of UEL via
university's webmail and the link was also posted on several social networking sites such as Facebook,
Twitter and Orkut. Secondly, the remaining 67 respondents were selected randomly using the 'personal
contact' approach from different areas of London (Stratford, Bow Road, East Ham and Barking). In this
method, the respondents from the different areas are approached in person and they are explained in
detail about this survey. Out of the total 100 questionnaires collected through various survey instruments,
17
1are partially filled and hence it is being rejected for data analysis. Overall
there are 83 questionnaires that are usable for further analysis. 3.7 Reliability:
97Reliability refers to the consistency of measurements. A
test is considered reliable, if the test yields similar results repeatedly for similar set of inputs. In this study
we use the
14Cronbach's Alpha test is used to assess the internal consistency of
the chosen likert scale and measure reliability of different service quality dimensions. It is calculated using
the formula mentioned below Where 'K' is the
21number of items or components in the questionnaire and (Pallant, 2005). is the
mean of
With the help of reliability co-efficient Cronbach's alpha we are checking the internal consistency of each
scale. Table 3.7: Results of Chronbach's α test Service Quality Chronbach's α value No. of
items/components Dimensions Tangibles 0.972 3 Reliability 0.963 3 Responsiveness 0.967 3 Empathy
0.975 3 Assurance 0.964 3 Technical-Quality 0.966 3 Corporate Image 0.981 3 VFM(Value for Money)
0.930 2 Importance of dimensions 0.973 8 Table 3.7 indicates that all the items under each dimension are
1above the minimum scale of 0.7.
Hence these values
1indicate that all of these dimensions are reliable and
internally consistent. 3
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31. 3/8/13 TurnitinUK Originality Report
106.8 Validity: Validity is concerned with accuracy of the
measurements. It
9is one of the most important factors for
an experimental research. In other words, it is about testing the data analysis procedure, if it is measuring
in a right way and in an accurate manner. Validity is of two types: Internal and external validity (Saunders
et al., 2007). To ensure validity in this research, there were many steps taken: All the relevant theoretical
frameworks, models and literature were examined in an exhaustive manner i.e. viewed from different
author's/researcher's perspective. Most of the questions are based on the theoretical frame works and
literature, except the service quality dimension- 'VFM (Value for Money)' derived from the focus group
interview. Still to ensure criterion validity, the structured questionnaire was compared with other validated
SERVQUAL models, which are similar to the one created. Pilot testing: According to
47Saunders et al (2000) and Malhotra et al., (2007) the
structured questionnaire must be pre-tested before final administration. Hence the preliminary draft of the
questionnaire was pre-tested by the members of focus group interview to check the clearness and
significance of the questions and it was also checked thoroughly by 3 employees and 2 managers who
work for different mobile telecom networks in the UK. Most of the parameters and wordings were changed
based on their advice, so that respondents can understand the questions clearly. Then it was pre-tested to
a sample size of ten telecom users who were selected through simple random method. This sample size
was suggested by Fink (2003b in
48Saunders et al 2007), who had mentioned that it is adequate to
have a minimum of ten members for the pre-testing. Before giving the questionnaire, each of these
members were described about the purpose of the questionnaire and ensured confidentiality and
anonymity. It was also ensured that the questionnaire was filled by the mobile telecom users of UK only, in
both via e-survey as well as personal contact approach.
324. DATA ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION 4.1 Introduction: This chapter focuses
on statistical analysis of quantitative data which was collected during the
process of surveying. It comprises of data presentation that covers demographic profile of respondents,
32measurement of customer satisfaction, customer satisfaction with different
service quality dimensions and
relative importance of those dimensions. The discussion includes analysis of different hypotheses and
their relative results and findings
11in order to answer the research questions. 4. 2 Demographic profile: This
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