Improving Service Quality and Customer Satisfaction at Grapevine

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CONSULTANCY FOR HOSPITALITY
GRAPEVINE COFFEE AND TAPAS BAR

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION........................................................................................................................1
LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................................................................ 2
POTENTIAL FOR THE GRAPEVINE TO MEASURE AND IMPROVE THEIR SERVICE QUALITY........4
TOOLS THAT CAN BE UTILISED TO MEASURE THE SERVICE QUALITY AT GRAPEVINE...............6
RECOMMENDATIONS TO IMPROVE THE GRAPEVINE’S SERVICE QUALITY...............................8
CONCLUSION.......................................................................................................................... 10
REFERENCES........................................................................................................................... 11
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INTRODUCTION
The hospitality industry is one of the fastest growing sectors of the economy in present.
Consultancy is one of the most important activities in the hospitality industry. The
hospitality consultants play a major role in providing the best quality services to the
customers. They are responsible for designing programs and giving advice within the
organisation. Consultancy in the hospitality sector also helps in coaching, guiding and
training staff members (Brandon-Jones, et al., 2016). This consultancy report will support
the Grapevine coffee and tapas bar by discussing the consultancy process in a hospitality
organisation. It will enable the organisation to conduct appropriate research within and
outside the boundaries of the company to consult the company in improving its service
quality and creating customer satisfaction. This consultancy report will discuss about the
contribution of service quality and customer satisfaction on the success of Grapevine
Company. The hospitality organisations face several issues and challenges in maintaining
and improving its service quality. In order to enhance the service quality and create higher
customer satisfaction a hospitality organisation highly relies on its human resource. The
human resource is on the frontline for serving to the customers and creating satisfied
customers in the hospitality sector. It can easily state that the employees are the brand
ambassadors of a hospitality organisation like grapevine.
Grapevine coffee and Tapas bar is an independent coffee shop by day and a tapas bar by
night. The organisation is committed to providing a best quality products and services to its
customers. Being in a customer-driven and quality-focused industry the organisation is
highly dependent on its human resource for delivering the best quality services to the
customers (The Grapevine, 2018). It is important for the company to manage its human
assets to satisfy customer needs to achieve the ultimate goal of the company. This
consultancy report will be prepared based on the experience gained through the actual visit
to the Grapevine that will support in providing meaningful recommendations to the
company to support in improving its service quality and customer satisfaction.
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LITERATURE REVIEW
The human resource is directly linked with the service quality in the hospitality industry. As
described by Wood (1997), the global tourism and hospitality industry largely relies on
‘marginal workers' such as young workers, students, women, casual employees, migrant
workers and a high number of part-time workers. Thus, maintaining service quality and
customer satisfaction become critical for the organisations in the hospitality sector as the
majority of human resource lacks in experience and proper training.
According to Chand (2010), Service quality and customer satisfaction are critical for the
survival of companies in the hospitality industry. The term customer satisfaction is a
psychological concept involving the feeling of pleasure and well-being that are the result of
customer's hopes and expectations from a product or service. Customers always have
personal expectations about the service or performance before purchasing any product or
service. After purchasing the product or service, if the results are equal to better than
expectations it results in positive confirmation. As opposed to this if, the product or service
performance is below the expectations it result in dissatisfaction among the customers.
However, customer satisfaction is different between different customers due to personal
assumptions, experience and needs. According to Dominici and Guzzo, (2010), Service
quality in the hospitality industry is the most important factor for gaining sustainable
competitive advantage and customer trust in the highly competitive marketplace. The
service quality is consisting of three dimensions: physical facilities, employees and materials.
It also includes three dimensions such as functional quality, technical quality and
environment.
According to Ryu, et al., (2012) the quality of the physical environment, food and service are
the major determinants of the company's image in the hospitality industry. These factors
are the significant predictors of the perceived value of customers and the customer's
perceived value affects the level of customer satisfaction. The maintenance of service
quality in the hospitality sector is very crucial and important for the growth and success of
any organisation in the service industry. The service quality and customer satisfaction is
closely related to each other and creates an overall organisational value in the eyes of
customers.
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Most of the hotels and businesses in the hospitality industry needs a proper presentation
and improvement in the qualities of the services in order to serve their potential customer
in a better way and hence eventually exceeds the expectations of the people. Technology is
playing a very important role in the same and is very helpful in making the businesses more
successful that ever. People can plan, decide, book, stay, roam, eat and accommodate easily
with the help of some easy clicks on their mobile phones nowadays which is a very long
process traditionally (Amin, et al., 2013). Service quality can be defined as the most effective
operational process in the hospitality industry that can help in attaining the business goals
and objectives for the management and the business downers in hospitality industry.
The quality of services decided the rate of retention of the customers at present and also
helps in enhancing the customer attraction towards the business. The fact that the people
prefer choices on the basis of hotel services, quality, reliability, pricing and some additional
factors but everything relies on the effectiveness of the customer satisfaction activities. In
addition to this, there are numerous other hotels or units that facilitates the similar kind of
services to the customers and hence it becomes a vital business area to serve people with
the best and unique quality services (Chen and Chen, 2010). In the long run, this is one of
the primary aspect that can help in maintaining the sustainability if the firm with other
present businesses of the markets. maintaining the brand value and position in the markets
is also important in order to achieve the targets, the customer satisfaction and vale creation
are the most general and impactful tasks for the management, studies defines that the
relationship of the staff management. Bergman and Klefsjö (2010) defines that these two
shares a very disperse and potential relationship with each other and is helpful in making
the customers satisfied in future. The enhancement in the quality of the services can be
done through several business operational areas and is still capable to enhance the sales
and profits to a business in the countries like UK. The service quality at present, gets
affected by several forces from within the business and from external forces and hence
needs to be strategically planned.
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POTENTIAL FOR THE GRAPEVINE TO MEASURE AND IMPROVE THEIR
SERVICE QUALITY
Grapevine is a coffee shop by day and a tapas bar by night. The company is successful in
carrying its business in the hospitality sector. The service quality is an important factor for
any organisation in the hospitality industry. Thus, in order to grow the business successfully,
the company must focus on improving its service quality to provide a better experience to
the customers and to create higher customer satisfaction among them. when it comes to
services, especially in the hospitality industry, three are several challenges posed by the
intangible nature of the services (Clemes, et al., 2011). The customers are mainly interested
in the service outcomes or experience s they have during the service delivery. Therefore, it
becomes very difficult to measure service quality at the hospitality organisation. The
challenges to deliver the best service quality can be overcome by following a structured
approach to measure, analyse and improve service quality.
In order to improve the service quality, the first step is to measure the service quality and
identify the potential for improvements in an organisation. In the report, Mystery Shopping
approach is done to test the service quality and to identify the potential for measuring and
improving the service quality at Grapevine (Amin, et al., 2013). Through personal
observation, it has been founded that the Grapevine hotel has several shortcomings that
adversely affects its service quality. The behaviour of employees is not proper and the
customer orders are also delayed. The ambience of the company is well designed but does
not maintain properly. The stairs are dirty and the music is very loud. It has been also
founded that the employee is not happy as they are not provided with any training and had
to work on their experience. they are not satisfied with the working conditions that directly
affect the quality of the delivered services. The menu is also not presented properly and
missed major food items that may discourage customers to utilise the services of the
company. The employees also fail to keep cleanliness and hygiene at the organisation.
It can be stated that the company is failed to offer reliable services to the customers and the
staff at the company are not able to connect with the customers that negatively affects
customer trust and loyalty. The responsiveness of employee is also not up to the mark.
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There is a high need for improving the service quality at the Grapevine Company to satisfy
the needs and demands of its customers and to create a good level of satisfaction among
them.
By measuring and improving the service quality, the Grapevine Company could effectively
gain a competitive advantage in the market. It helps in retaining existing customers and
attracting new customers and supports in the branding of the company through word-of-
mouth publicity. When the reputation of the company is good, the company's profitability
and demand in the market is also increasing (Bhasin, 2018). The employees’ feel enthusiast
work with the company and employee morale and confidence increases. Thus, increased
service quality creates a great potential for the Grapevine in the hospitality industry of UK.
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TOOLS THAT CAN BE UTILISED TO MEASURE THE SERVICE QUALITY
AT GRAPEVINE
Some of the major tools that can be used by Grapevine for measuring service quality are
discussed below:
SERVQUAL
The most common tool for measuring service quality is SERVQUAL. It is used for measuring
the subjective elements of the service quality. It involves the measurement of service
quality through a customer survey (Mok, et al., 2013). The survey questions must cover the
five elements of service quality:
 Reliability: it involves an ability to deliver the promised services to the customers in
an accurate and consistent manner.
 Assurance: it involves the politeness and knowledge level of staff and the extent to
which they create trust and confidence among the customers.
 Tangibles: it involves the building, equipment, employees and website that creates a
complete appearance of a company.
 Empathy: it is the extent to which individual attention and care provided by the staff
(Mok, et al., 2013).
 Responsiveness: it involves the willingness of employees to offer prompt and speedy
services to the customers.
POST SERVICE RATING
This method involves the practice of asking customers to rate the services of the company
right after the service delivery. Different rating scales are used for the post-service rating
but most commonly, a number rating from 0-10 is widely used by the majority of
organisations. The rating scale must be robust to cultural differences and suitable for
capturing service quality (Pascal, 2016). The post service can be done through live chat with
use, phone support and mobile applications.
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FOLLOW-UP SURVEYS
Under this method, the customers are asked to rate the service quality through an e-mail
survey. For instance, google forms can be sent through e-mail. it is more advantageous than
post service rating. It enables customers to provide responses that are more detailed by
giving them proper time and space. It also supports having a more holistic view of the
company’s Services. It helps in assessing the overall opinion and experiences of the
customers.
SOCIAL MEDIA MONITORING
With the rise of social media, the method of social media monitoring has to gain
momentum. Social media serves as an outlet for sharing their views, experience, and
unleash their frustrations. It becomes a perfect place to hear the unfiltered opinions of
customers (Pascal, 2016). Facebook, Instagram and Twitter are the main social media
platforms that could support the companies in having honest reviews about the service
quality and customer experience at the company.
CUSTOMER SATISFACTION SURVEY
A customer satisfaction survey is a standard approach used for collecting data on customer
satisfaction and experience. This approach is consisting of asking customers about their
satisfaction level with or without the follow-up questions. The customer satisfaction surveys
can be done through In-App surveys, emails and post-service surveys. The in-app survey's
methods have a high response rate and can be done by integrating a feedback bar inside the
company's website with around one or two questions (Qualtrics, 2007). In this method, the
customer opinions are asked while they are engaged with the company.
The above-discussed tools can be effectively utilised to measure the service quality and
customer satisfaction among the customers. With the help of these tools, Grapevine can
effectively measure the current level of customer service and take proper steps to improve
the quality of services within the company.
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RECOMMENDATIONS TO IMPROVE THE GRAPEVINE’S SERVICE
QUALITY
In order to create greater customer satisfaction and building customer loyalty, the company
must focus on improving service quality and minimising the service gap. The company can
follow the following recommendations to improve the service quality at the company:
 Open up more channels for customer feedback: in order to ensure the best quality
services according to the customers’ expectations, Grapevine is required to have a
proper communication system within the company. The different kind of customers
needs different means of communication to share their opinions and views on the
company’s services (Davis, 2017). A proper feedback system should be adapted to
provide effective tools of sharing experience and opinions to the customers. This can
be done through a feedback box, email, social media or an evening focus group.
 Hire for customer service team: the customer service largely depends upon the
teamwork. Therefore, it is very important to hire a great team to deliver the best
quality services to the customers. The hiring of suitable employees should be based
on the kind of customer service culture in the company. The hiring of the customer
service team will enable the organisation in ensuring the delivery of quality services
to the customers in every way.
 Empower employees to resolve issues: by empowering the employees, the
managers can enable them to resolve the customer service issues on their own
initiatives (Davis, 2017). This helps in providing instant response to the customers
and creating greater customer satisfaction.
 Providing a rich learning environment for the employees: the company should also
an emphasis on providing a proper learning and working environment to the
employees where they can work and learn and develop their skills and knowledge to
deliver better services to the customers. the continuous up-skill of customer service
team could make a great difference in the performance of employees (Davis, 2017).
 Set clear and consistent work standards: the clear and consistent organisational
standards should be set to direct all the employees in the company. It will support
staff members to provide service as per the set quality standards.
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 Establishing key performance indicators (KPI’s): the company should also establish
key performance indicators that provide a clear understanding of the company's goal
(Golriz, 2016). It also helps in motivating employees to put their best efforts.
 Regular monitoring and evaluation: regular monitoring and evaluation support the
company is continuously improving its service quality and performance. the regular
monitoring and evaluation can be done through meetings and individual
performance evaluation (Golriz, 2016). This would enable grapevine in identifying
any loopholes in individual or team performance and taking a relevant step to
correct them.
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CONCLUSION
In a nutshell, managing and improving the service quality for a hospitality organisation like
Grapevine is extremely important to survive in the current dynamic business environment.
Service quality of the company directly affects the customer satisfaction that in turn reflects
in the company’s sales and profitability. This consultancy report has revealed the drawbacks
in the service quality of Grapevine coffee and Tapas Bar and has discussed the potential for
improvements in the service quality of the organisation. It has been founded that the
Grapevine Company lacks at several grounds in providing quality services to its customers.
That also affects the satisfaction level of customers. The employees are also required
developing essential skills to create customer trust and satisfaction. Different tools for
measuring service quality such as SERVQUAl, post service survey, follow-up survey, social
media monitoring and customer satisfaction survey has also been elaborated to support
Grapevine in effectively measuring the service quality at the company. Lastly, some
recommendations have also been made to enable Grapevine to overcome the issues in
delivering quality services to the customers and improve service quality at the company.
With the help of this report, the company can effectively develop new strategies for
improving its service quality and enhance customer satisfaction that would lead to the
attainment of higher profitability and competitive advantage for the company.
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