Obsidian Hill Hotel: A Case Study on Service Quality Evaluation

This case study evaluates the service quality of Obsidian Hill Hotel, focusing on customer feedback and the SERVQUAL five dimensions: tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance, and empathy. The analysis reveals poor ratings across these dimensions, with issues in room appearance, service r...Read More

Running head: SERVICE QUALITY 1
Title
Student’s name
Institution’s name

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Executive Summary
The aim of this case analysis was to evaluate the quality of service that Obsidian Hill Hotel
provides to its customers. The study also aimed to evaluate the service quality built on the
SERVQUAL five dimensions of quality. The study also aimed to determine the service quality
gaps which the hotel presents. The case study also reviewed on the service management
strategies based on what the hotel has achieved and what it needs to improve on. To achieve this,
the customer feedback was used for evaluation. From the findings, Obsidian Hill Hotel had a
poor rating as based to the five dimensions of quality. Its tangibles appearance is not attractive.
The rooms are old and cramped. Most customers were not impressed with the appearance of the
room. The service provided to customers was not reliable. The hotel staff was very responsive to
customer requirements. The customers were not assured of the service and the workers were not
empathetic towards customers. The hotel’s three major departments are not delivering proper
service to customers. Staff is not very welcoming and the departments are not united.
Recommendations were made for this study on how to improve the quality of service delivered
to customers. The human resource department needs to make defined work roles for the workers.
There was a recommendation that the departments of the hotel be united for better service
delivery.

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Evaluation of Service Quality in the Hospitality Industry
Introduction
The quality of a service is the perception of a service expected performance to the
customer’s desired expectations. Quality service will usually exceed the expectations of a
customer. The quality of a service will determine the profitability and the ability of business
compete. Service providers usually assess the customer requirements before providing a service.
This is to ensure that the customers are satisfied which improves their chances of customer
retention. In relation to the hotel industry, all the departments work together to ensure that a
customer is satisfied. For example; room service, food and beverage service, leisure service and
front desk service. How a customer is treated in any of these areas highly determines the
customer review of the hotel (Saleem, & Raja, 2014). The intention of this case analysis is to
evaluate the quality of service delivered by the staff of Obsidian Hill Hotel to its customers. It
will include the service management industry analysis, issues concerning the measurement of
customer satisfaction and strategies to address service organization processes. The case analysis
will also include the recommendation strategies to improve service management in that hotel.
Evaluation of Service Quality (Servqual 5 Dimensions)
The SERVQUAL is a research instrument which applies the dimensions of service
quality to assess customer anticipations and insights of a service. Depending on the customer’s
actual observation of the service experience, the service quality is confirmed or disconfirmed. It
therefore means that if service providers have these dimensions in place, they have a high chance
of gaining customer loyalty. The five dimensions on which the SERVQUAL is based include
tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy (Goldstein, Johnston, Duffy &
Rao, 2002).
The first one is the tangible dimension. This dimension focuses on the outlook of
facilities. It also includes the appearance of personnel and even the communication tools.
According to the customer feedback, they were not impressed with the room. It was oddly
shaped, cramped and the bathroom was not very welcoming (Bailly, & Léné, 2012). “The
bathroom and toilet looked to be near the end of their porcelain lives.” The customer also
complained that the boardroom was worn out. The customer was therefore not satisfied with the

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physical facilities of the Obsidian hotel. There is a likelihood that the customer was never going
to return to their hotel. They therefore lost one major customer.
Customers expect the service deliverer to accomplish the guaranteed service reliably and
correctly. This will ensure that a customer can rely on the service being delivered. The customer
will also be able to request the service again or recommend it to other people (Dillard, Browning,
Sitkin & Sutcliffe, 2000). According to the customer feedback, they did not have the hotel room
ready at the promised time. The hotel servants kept on giving excuses for not having their room
on time. The customer says that they had a horrible experience during their stay. The hotel
cancelled the customer’s reservation with no explanation at all. After much argument they were
given a room not of their choice. The worst thing is that the staff didn’t apologize to the
customer even after realizing that it was the hotel’s mistake.
Customers expect the service deliverers to be responsive. The customer expects the
deliverer to respond quickly and instantly. They do not want to wait for a whole day to have their
calls returned. The staff has to be willing to help customers. It increases the customer rating on
them. Obsidian hotel had quite some reviews when it came to responsiveness (Benavides-
Velasco, Quintana-García, & Marchante-Lara, 2014). The customer says that the concierge was
very helpful. He always greeted them like they were valued guests. The hotel was instantly
responsive when the customer called back to have their room cleaned again. The first cleaner had
done a shoddy work but the second one did an amazing job.
Customers have a need to feel assured of the service they are getting from the service
provider (Kandampully, Zhang & Bilgihan, 2015). According to SERVQUAL research, it is
significant for service suppliers to communicate their expertise to clients. This way, the
customer’s confidence is boosted. According to the customer feedback reviews of Obsidian
Hotel, the first impression of the staff to the customer was not assuring. The customer was not
greeted by anyone or welcomed to the hotel. A staff grabbed the bell cart from the customer
with no excuse, they mispronounced the name of the customer and they didn’t have a tag to
prove they worked for that hotel. The staff should have had a badge to prove who they were. He
or she should have greeted the customer and explained nicely that he would get the customer’s
bags instead of grabbing the cart.
Empathy means that the service deliverer cares about the customer and not just the
service. As much as the service is delivered according to specifications, the deliverer is required

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to show care to the customers in the process of delivering the service (Aghamolaei, et al 2014).
Despite providing service that did not match the customer specifications, the staff at Obsidian
Hotel didn’t show empathy to the customers. The customer complains that the doormen mostly
seemed to be chatting away and not welcoming the clients. The front desk and lobby bar was
also very uninviting. This is because it was always cramped. The customer did not feel like the
staff really cared about customers as they were very unwelcoming.
Service Quality Gaps
According to Parasuraman, Zeithaml and Berry (1985), there are service quality gaps
which should be adhered to in any organization. Obsidian Hill Hotel has some of the service
quality gaps. The first gap that exists is the perceived service gap. Customers always expect
quality products and services. One customer complains about how workers did not know what
they were doing. She complains that they chose the hotel because they expected more but most
of the staff members did not know what they were doing (Knutson, Stevens, Wullaert, Patton &
Yokoyama, 1990).
Communication to customers is another gap that exists in this hotel (Berry, Parasuraman
& Zeithaml, 1988). One customer complains that they were not even greeted when they arrived
at the hotel. The doormen are supposed to be welcoming customers. They however seem to be
chatting away instead of communicating with the guests. The staff members did not apologize to
the customer after they accidentally cancelled their reservation.
Service delivery gap exists in this hotel. The customers have a high expectation of the
hotel’s service. They expected polite staff that would also be friendly. However, the client says
that they had a horrible experience. They complain that most of the staff had a bad attitude (Xie,
Zhang, & Zhang, 2014). The guest also complains that the staff did not respect their privacy.
They kept on disturbing them even when they had the “no disturb” sign on.
Service Management
The quality of service given to customers determines the level of their satisfaction.
Satisfied customers have loyalty to the company and have a likelihood of recommending the
business to other people. Service management strategies in the hotel industry play a major role.
The hotel is divided into three main functional areas (Bitner, Booms, & Tetreault, 1990). All of
these areas require strategic management to ensure better rating from customers.

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The first functional area is the Front Desk, Reservations, security and housekeeping. This
is categorized as the room division. The Front desk is accountable for checking customers in,
checking them out and receiving payments (Bailly, & Léné, 2012). It is also responsible for
receiving customer complaints, determining the availability of rooms and even giving out any
additional rooms. Obsidian Hill Hotel front desk was quite responsible. According to the
customer feedback, they allocated them a nice room. They were able to check in early and check
out late. The reservation department failed the customer. Due to traffic, the customer was
delayed. The customer’s reservation was cancelled for no apparent reason. The staff didn’t even
apologize to the client after realizing their mistake. The hotel needs to improve on this area.
According to customer feedback, the housekeeping was done poorly by one of the staff. When
the customer complained, the other staff did a thorough cleaning job. The hotel can improve on
this by training the staff on housekeeping (Benavides-Velasco, Quintana-García, & Marchante-
Lara, 2014). A customer also complained that they were occasionally disturbed even though they
had the “do not disturb” sign on.
The second division is the Foods and Beverage. This division include the bar area,
Banquets and the room service (Stefano, Casarotto Filho, Barichello, & Sohn, 2015). A customer
complained that he or she was denied an opportunity to order off the menu. The customer was
not impressed that they forced him or her into a breakfast of not their choice. The hotel needs to
improve on this area. They need to show empathy to customers, customers need to have a
freedom to choice of the food they consume while in that hotel. Consequently, another customer
complained that the bar was always cramped. The hotel needs to find some form of order in the
bar area.
The third division is the staff and support unit. This includes the major departments of the
hotel such as management, accounting, human resources and even the contracted units. This
category needs to ensure teamwork in order to achieve customer satisfaction (Dedeoğlu, &
Demirer, 2015). Obsidian Hotel needs to improve on teamwork. A staff complains that it is
tiresome to check customers in when there is a delay in room cleaning. Sometimes the Front
Office is unwilling to perform duties outside their specifications at busy times. This just proves
how the departments of this hotel are not working together. The hotel should however keep up
on its management strategies. The manger has been trained on how to better manage the workers.
He also puts the interests of the hotel above his.

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Management strategies
The management first strategy that the management needs to check on is the working
conditions of the staff. The staff are pressured, overworked and receive low wages. They
manager should adopt strategies to motivate the staff. The management system of this hotel is
bureaucratic. The staffs have not been given power to independently serve customers. They have
to be answerable to each one of their decisions (Mitreva & Saneva, 2017). The trust and
empowerment policy is supposed to encourage workers to create experiences with the hotel
guests. However in Obsidian Hotel, there is no clear guidance on how the workers can
implement this policy.
The human resource department should focus on proper recruitment and developing the
staff. It needs to focus on hiring qualified staff. Training skills should also be extended to
workers. A staff complains that some of the workers do not act in a professional way. Duties of
the staff need to be well specified to ensure they are aware of what is expected of them (Saleem
& Raja, 2014). The workers should be placed to job categories which match their qualifications.
The staff also complains that some of his workmates in the customer service do not qualify to be
in that category. He says that they friendly but they are not efficient for that position.
The management needs to enhance the communication strategies of workers. The staff
seems to encounter challenges in communicating through departments. According to the
employee feedback, the front desk has not established a clear communication with the room
service department. Sometimes they want to assign a guest to a room but the room is not ready.
This is a clear sign of lack of proper communication.
Recommendation Strategies
In conclusion, there are different ways in which the Obsidian Hotel can improve on the
quality of service they deliver to their customers. They need to have defined work roles. Each
staff has to be aware of which part he or she is expected to play in the hotel. It will reduce delays
in cleaning rooms which holds up the Front Desk role of checking in customers. This will limit
customer service delays in general. The workers need to be trained in their specific areas. This
will help avoid a case where a staff is under qualified. Training is also important to ensure
employee satisfaction. The satisfaction of employees motivates them to do quality work.

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The one dimension that the management of this hotel should focus on is reliability. This
is the most important dimension while delivering service quality. The customers have to feel like
they can really rely on your service. For example, the staff should have hotel rooms ready as per
the agreement. From the customer feedback, one customer complains that the staff kept giving
excuses as to why they didn’t have her room ready. This already proves to the customer that they
cannot be relied on.
Teamwork is of essence in this hotel. All the departments need to work together for
efficient customer service. For instance, the management needs to trust the staff and delegate
responsibilities to them. This will ensure that they are motivated to make the right decisions
concerning the customers. Teamwork will reduce overworking of employees. It will reduce the
problem of delays in some departments which end up affecting the other departments. For
instance, the Front office staff does not chirp in to help in other departments during busy days.
Through teamwork, this behavior will be conquered. All the stuff will be united to work together
to enhance provision of service to the hotel guests.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the Obsidian Hill Hotel should needs to service quality. The quality of a
service highly determines the success of any organization. Service quality and customer
satisfaction are considered to be two different things. However, these two are closely related and
they are interdependent.

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