Customer Service in Hospitality Industry: Analysing Service Quality, Acid Test of Service Recovery and Survey Report with Recommendations

This report analyses the service quality and gaps in the hospitality industry using SERVQUAL and GAP models. It also discusses the acid test of service recovery and survey report with recommendations for providing superior customer service.

Customer Service

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
Analysing the service quality with specific focus on dimension and gaps............................1
Knowledge and understanding of acid test of service recovery within the hotel...................4
Maintain a survey report along with recommendations for providing superior services to its
customer.................................................................................................................................5
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Customer service can be defined as the process by which the businesses offer different
services to the consumers. It is just to take care of all the issues which are identified by the
consumers in the services provided to them. Every hospitality industry which is customer centric
industry in which there are divided into several different parts. Considering the hotels, where
different types of services are offered to the consumers so it is the duty of the manager to take
care of the things which has to be provided to the consumers(Bakalinsky and et. al., 2020).
When any of the customer is paying a amount to take any of the service then at that point it is the
responsibility of the manager to provide them so. The reason for this is that they will also want
that they are provided with lavish services according to the amount they are paying. Hilton hotel
is a hotel chain which is having its resorts and hotels in different countries. It is having its
headquarters in Virginia, U.S and was founded in the year 1919. This report will cover
SERVQUAL with its dimensions and gaps, acid test of service recovery and the survey report
with its recommendations which has been sent to the consumers.
MAIN BODY
Analysing the service quality with specific focus on dimension and gaps
Service quality refers to experience of the consumer in comparison with set standards or
expectations. The service quality in the hospitality industry is very essential as this drives the
customers towards the organisation(Houston III, Grandey and Sawyer, 2018). A hotel with high
level of quality in service is capable of satisfying the customer's need and wants. This gives the
respective hotel a competitive edge as this is the most essential thing in the accommodation
industry. In context of Hilton hotel, they continuously work on improving the quality of the
services, further in this report SERVQUAL model is applied to compare the service quality
performance with the needs and expectation of customers:
SERVQUAL model is short for service quality, this model was developed in order to
help the organisation to bridge the gap between the actual service quality and the needs of the
consumer. This model is discussed below in context of Hilton hotel:
 Tangible- This refers to the asset of the organisation that can be seen and touched. The
physical asset of a hotel is the employees that is the HR of the organisation. An asset of
1

the organisation which helps in giving a quality service to the customers. In context of
Hilton hotel, they have a good resources in tangible assets which helps in fulfilling the
needs and wants of the consumer. Tangible assets such as the employees of Hilton and
the facilities available at the hotel will help them in living up to the expectations of the
customers.
 Reliability- It is an considered as an essential dimension in the SERVQUAL model, it
revolves around providing the customers with the credibility so that they can trust the
services. In context of Hilton, they have major consistency in providing assistance to the
customers(Raza and et. al., 2020). This helps them in retaining the sense of reliability
from the customer's side. They strictly follow the commitments that has been made by the
hotel before offering them the services.
 Assurance- It means developing a sense of trust in the mind of the customers for the
hotel. This process helps in maintaining a good relationship with the customer during the
course of the business. In context of Hilton hotel, their goodwill helps them in
establishing a sense of assurance in the mind of the customer. Consumer trust the quality
of services provided by the management of the hotel, due to this the they are able to
deliver the service quality as promised.
 Empathy- This means listening and understanding the needs of the customer to ensure
that the customer is psychologically satisfied with what they are provided. The feeling of
empathy is developed only by good communication and comprehension skills. In context
of Hilton hotel, they develop the feeling of personal connection with the customer so they
will will welcomed in the hotel. They follow this because a lot of customers wants
empathy while staying at a different place.
 Responsiveness- This refers to the time taken by hotel management in order to resolve
the query of the customer. A good responsiveness means the problems of the customers
are addressed in a very short period of time. This dimension specially focuses on the two
factors that is promptness and willingness(Aktaş and Can, 2020). In context of Hilton
hotel, their services are prompt which assists the customers in their needs and problems.
They ensure that the customer gets the best service without any delay, this helps in
increasing the customer experience with the hotel. The employees of Hilton are entitled
to provide services in the right order and in the promised period of time.
2

From the above discussion of the five dimensions it can be evaluated that the hospitality
industry consider a lot of factors in order to fill the gap between the expected and actual service
quality provided by the hotel. By following this, the organisation would be able to bring
productivity in the services which will enhance the customer experience.
Gap Model:
The GAP Model of service quality helps the organisation in understanding the
satisfaction of the customers. It helps the hotel in understanding the deviations that are occupied
in the process of deliver the services to customers. This model is divided into five kind of gaps,
these gaps are evaluated below in context with the Hilton hotel:
Source- (The Gap Model of Service Quality)
3
Illustration 1: The Gap Model of Service Quality

 Gap 1: Gap between customer expectations and management perception- This gap is
created when the service provider of the hotel is unable to understand and analyse the
needs and wants of the customer. This game often arises due to lack of communication
between the managers and the employees. In context of Hilton, they have a good team to
analyse the needs and wants of the customer which helps them in avoiding this gap. In
case if this gap arises in future the hotel needs to effectively communicate the needs of
the consumers to the employees and the managers(Paek and Lee, 2018).
 Gap 2: Gap between service quality specifications and management perception- It
arises in case when the management is able to comprehend the customer requirements but
is not able to set a standard of performance in the business. In context of Hilton hotel,
they have a set standard fro the quality of services that they provide to the customers.
This helps them in matching up to the customer expectations(Khan, 2020).
 Gap 3: Gap between service delivery and the service quality specifications: This gap
may arise due to the lack of training and capability of the employees to meet the set
service standards. In context of Hilton hotel, they conduct several training and employee
development sessions which assists the employees in meeting the set standard.
 Gap 4: Gap between External communication and service delivery- Consumers gets
attracted to the hotel because of the representation and advertisement of the particular
hotel. This gap gets created when the organisation is unable to match the standards that
they advertised, this ends up in customer dissatisfaction. In context of Hilton, in past they
were unable to match the standards that they established in the promotion which created
this respective gap(Park, 2019). But later to address this they enhanced their services
which helped them in gaining customers.
 Gap 5: Gap between experienced and expected service- This is considered as
misunderstanding of the customer regarding the service quality of the hotel. This gap is
often created from the side of the customer. In context of Hilton, they communicate with
the customer in order to fill up this gap as communication is the only key to understand
the expectation and requirements of the customer.
Knowledge and understanding of acid test of service recovery within the hotel
Service recovery is the action which has to be taken by a hotel in terms of coping up with
the failure which the hotel is unable to do. Recovery is the stage in which the hotel makes the
4

identification of the things which is faced by the consumers in getting that service. For this,
hotels develops different methods and ideas by which they can help the consumer in providing
the best service so that the dissatisfied consumer becomes the most satisfied one. With the help
of acid-test technique it will be useful for the hotel to solve any of the issues which is faced by
the consumers. Hilton hotel can work on this, as the guest in it also have to face some problem
which needs to be resolved by the management team (Cholisati and et. al., 2019). As the guest in
a hotel are facing the problem of rude staff, room services are not available on time. These are
some of the issues which is faced by a Hilton hotel consumers and in this it is important for them
to work towards the service recovery thing. Thus, the hotel can use in it a acid-test system which
will be useful for the Hilton hotel in bringing more consumers.
 Apologies- It is a term which is generally used to make the apologies if any person is
facing an issue. In terms of hotel, when the consumers faces the problem of then the staff
of a hotel has to make apologize in front of the guest in facing any of the
discrepancy(Maggon and Chaudhry, 2018).
 Review- Reviewing is the best way which is useful for the hotel itself where they can
take the review of what issue is faced by the consumers in it. When the hotel will taking
review of the issues faced by the guest then in this case they can provide the solutions
which will be the best and effective option.
 Fix and follow up- This is the most important stage in acid test system, where the hotel
tries to fix the problem which is faced by the guest(Huang and Rust, 2021). Fixing the
problem or providing them the solution is the only way which will be helpful for the hotel
in establishing their objectives.
 Documentation- This is also the important stage in it where the management of the hotel
has to make the record of all the issues which is faced by the consumers. Keeping a
record is the best thing where they can plan there further activities on that basis.
Maintain a survey report along with recommendations for providing superior services to its
customer
Background of the survey:
This survey is conducted for a better understanding of needs and wants of the consumer,
so that the management can come up with ideas in order to provide a good quality of service.
Survey Questions:
5

These questions are prepared to analyse the customer experience with Hilton hotel, they
survey report is kept precise so that every customer can easily fill it. The questions in the report
are as follows:
1. Rate the experience with the front desk department on a scale of 1 to 5, along with the
reason of the rating. The reason should involve the experience facilities provided to the
guest during check in and check out(Chesnut, 2018).
2. Rate the promptness and quality of services provided by the managing department on a
scale of 1 to 5, where 5 being the highest.
3. Rate the quality of services provided by the housekeeping department, rate the below
points on a scale of 1 to 5.
Cleanliness- ___
Laundry- ___
Linens and towels- ___
Stocking the guest room amenities- ____
Analysis of survey report :
The survey was filled by 800 people during the span of a month, further characterisation
of the questions answered by the customer is discussed below.
Question 1- This question was answered by 80% of the respondent. Where a majority of the
people rated their experience as 5 stars, the rest of the people mentioned the reason of not giving
a five star rating(Storey and Larbig, 2018). One major answer was reported that the waiting time
to book a room is long, many customers faced problems as they stood for a long time to make a
booking in Hilton. To address this problem, the hotel will place another booking counter which
will assists the customer who are looking for on time booking.
Question 2- This question was answered by 75% of the total respondent. In this question the
hotel was able to get 5 star rating from the majority of the people which establishes that the hotel
is good in providing a prompt and quality services to the customer in terms of managerial aspect.
Question 3- This question was attempted by 90% of the respondent. Where the majority of
people rated low in the management of laundry, the hotel needs to develop their facilities of
providing clean and ironed laundry in the promised time. Promptness of this service is essential
6

as customers need their laundry right on time, an improvement in this service will enhance the
customer experience.
Recommendations of providing superior customer service- For this, it will be important for the
hotel to use very impressive things to the consumers so that get forced to stay in a hotel. This can
be done by them on the basis of providing discounts or making anything free which will
automatically attract many consumers. Other is to provide and inculcate in a hotel efficient
technology so that it can become very easy for the consumers also. Listening is the best solution
for resolving many of the problems of customers. If they will be listening to the issues which is
faced by the consumers then in this case they would be able to achieve the objectives.
7

CONCLUSION
From the above report it can be concluded that customer service plays an important role
for the success of a hotel. The first things which the customer service plays an important role is
that it helps in creating a good brand image of a company which is a musty for the success of an
enterprise. Also, it creates and provides different opportunities which are important for the
business in its development. But at some point of time, it has been seen that the business lacks in
providing the services to people which restricts the business to grow. So it makes a pressure on
the management of a company to work according to what has been defined by the consumers.
For this, the business management can take the survey in terms of identifying the issues which is
faced by a consumers. With this, they will be getting the things which is creating the problems
and for this they will be creating the solutions which will be the most suitable one.
8

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Aktaş, N. and Can, A.B., 2020, October. Recommendation System for Customer Service
Through Chat Channels. In 2020 28th Signal Processing and Communications
Applications Conference (SIU) (pp. 1-4). IEEE.
Bakalinsky, O. and et. al., 2020, November. Analysis of Trajectory of Client’s Attitude
Formation in Managerial Decisions for Improving the Customer Service Value.
In International Conference on Business and Technology (pp. 1947-1957). Springer,
Cham.
Chesnut, C., 2018. Restoration of visual loss with retrobulbar hyaluronidase injection after
hyaluronic acid filler. Dermatologic Surgery. 44(3). pp.435-437.
Cholisati, N. and et. al., 2019. The role of customer satisfaction on the effect of service quality
and corporate image on customer loyalty. MEC-J (Management and Economics
Journal). 3(3). pp.255-264.
Houston III, L., Grandey, A.A. and Sawyer, K., 2018. Who cares if “service with a smile” is
authentic? An expectancy-based model of customer race and differential service
reactions. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes. 144. pp.85-96.
Huang, M.H. and Rust, R.T., 2021. Engaged to a robot? The role of AI in service. Journal of
Service Research, 24(1), pp.30-41.
Khan, O., 2020. Towards understanding customer loyalty: An empirical study on emotional
attachment. International Journal of Innovations in Business. 1(3). pp.241-267.
Maggon, M. and Chaudhry, H., 2018. Exploring relationships between customer satisfaction and
customer attitude from customer relationship management viewpoint: An empirical
study of leisure travellers. FIIB Business Review. 7(1). pp.57-65.
Paek, J. and Lee, C.W., 2018. The effect of education and training on service quality, customer
satisfaction and loyalty in airline industry. Management Review: An International
Journal. 13(1). pp.49-64.
Park, E., 2019. The role of satisfaction on customer reuse to airline services: An application of
Big Data approaches. Journal of Retailing and Consumer Services. 47. pp.370-374.
Raza, S.A. and et. al., 2020. Internet banking service quality, e-customer satisfaction and
loyalty: the modified e-SERVQUAL model. The TQM Journal.
Storey, C. and Larbig, C., 2018. Absorbing customer knowledge: How customer involvement
enables service design success. Journal of Service Research. 21(1). pp.101-118.
9