Customer Contribution to Improving Service Quality in the Hospitality Industry

Quality Management in Services

Drago Constantin Vasile The Bucharest Academy of Economic Studies, Romania E-mail: [e-mail]

Abstract The actors on the today business stage have no more well-defined roles with clear and rigid borders between them. Hospitality industry in particular is a good example how it has been blurred the roles that customers play in dealing with service providers. The study reveals that customers can influence the quality of hospitality service through performing a qualitycontrol function. This involves a series of activities to be achieved by them: (1) on-the-spot quality control, (2) service failure control, (3) quality consultancy, and (4) co-production control. However there are some difficulties and the hospitality organizations need a structured approach to overcome them. Developing a strategy to enhance the effectiveness in performing this function is an important challenge for the hospitality organization management. Our study recommends five courses of actions to be included in such a strategy. They envisage (1) increasing the customer`s knowledge of the firm`s quality standards,(2) encouraging customers to voice their concerns, (3) training customers (and employees) to manage the interpersonal encounter, (4) motivating customers to involve in performing the quality-control function and (5) training customers about their tasks in coproduction. Keywords: quality, hospitality industry, hospitality service, service, customer JEL Classification: L83, M31, M11 Introduction The issue of quality has taken an increased importance in business, being associated with a competitive advantage that can ensure the firm`s profitability and survival (Maddern et al., 2007). The recognition of the nature and the important role of quality in business is the result of an evolution of quality ideas over time. To this respect, Dale and Cooper (1992) describe four stages (i) quality inspection, (ii) quality control, (iii) quality assurance,

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