Gaps Model

of
Service Quality

By
Prof. Ashok Kumar Patnaik
Head Marketing and Communication-AIMS

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 What is GAP
• The customer gap is the difference
between customer expectations and
perceptions.
• For e.g. when you buy an expensive car/
buy a business class ticket you expect a
high level of service, considerably superior
to the other cheaper options available.

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Five Dimensions of Service Quality
• Reliability: Delivering on promise
• Responsiveness: Being willing to help
• Assurance: Inspiring trust and confidence
• Empathy: Treating customers as
individuals
• Tangibles: Representing the service
physically

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Example: Car repair
• Problem fixed at the first time and ready
when promised
• Accessible; no waiting; responds to
requests
• Knowledgeable & skilled mechanics
• Acknowledges customer by name;
remembers previous problems and
preferences
• Repair facility; waiting area; uniforms;
equipment
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 Example: Airline
• Flights to promised destination; departure
and arrival on schedule
• Prompt and speedy system of ticketing, in-
flight baggage handling
• Trusted name; good safety record;
competent employees
• Understands special individual needs;
anticipate customer needs
• Aircraft; ticketing counters; baggage area;
uniforms
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 The customer gap

Expected Service

Customer Gap

Perceived Service

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 The customer gap (Restaurant)

Expected Service
(hygiene, temperature, service style, superior quality ingredients)

Customer Gap

Perceived Service
(experience you get at the end of the day)

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Basis for Gaps model
• Closing the gap between what customers
expect and what they perceive is critical
to delivering quality service.

• It aims at understanding the customer

better and better than any thing else as
customer is the critical component of
services marketing.
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 The provider gaps
• These gaps occur within the organisation
providing the service:
– Gap1: Not knowing what customers expect
– Gap2: Not selecting the right service designs
and standards.
– Gap3: Not delivering to service designs and
standards
– Gap4: Not matching performance to promises

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

Not knowing what customer expect
• It is the difference between customer
expectations of service and company
understanding of those expectations.

Few Reasons:
– Managers don’t interact with customers directly
– They may be unwilling to ask about expectations
– They may be unprepared to address them

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Key factors leading to
providers gap-1A
• Inadequate marketing research orientation
– Insufficient marketing research
– Research not focused on service quality
– Inadequate use of market research

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Key factors leading to
provider gap-1B
• Lack of upward communication
– Lack of interaction between management and
customers
– Insufficient communication between contact
employees and managers
– Too many layers between contact personal
and top management

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Key factors leading to
provider gap-1C
• Insufficient relationship focus
– Lack of market segmentation
– Focus on transactions rather than
relationships
– Focus on new customers rather than
relationship with existing customers

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Key factors leading to
provider gap-1D
• Inadequate service recovery
– Lack of encouragement to listen to customer
complaints
– Failure to make amends when things go
wrong
– No appropriate recovery mechanism in place
to service failures

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not having the right service quality
designs and standards
• Accurate perceptions of customer’s
expectations are necessary but not
sufficient for delivering superior quality
service.
• Another perquisite is the presence of
service designs and performance
standards that reflect those accurate
perceptions.

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not having the right service quality
designs and standards
• Customer driven standards are different
from the conventional performance
standards that companies establish for
service.
• There are operations standards set to
correspond to customer expectations and
priorities rather than company concern s
such as productivity or efficiency.

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not having the right service quality
designs and standards
• Poor service design
– Unsystematic new service development
process
– Vague, undefined service designs
– Failure to connect service design to service
positioning

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not having the right service quality
designs and standards
• Absence of customer driven standards
– Lack of customer driven standards
– Absence of process management to focus on
customer requirements
– Absence of formal process for setting service
quality goals

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not having the right service quality
designs and standards
• Inappropriate physical evidence and
service escape
– Failure to develop tangibles in line with
customer expectations
– Servicescape design that does not meet
customer and employee needs
– Inadequate maintenance and updating of the
servicescape

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not delivering to service designs
and standards
• Deficiencies in human resource policies
– Ineffective recruitment
– Role ambiguity and role conflict
– Poor employee technology job fit
– Inappropriate evaluation and compensation
systems
– Lack of employment, perceived control and
teamwork

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not delivering to service designs
and standards
• Customers who do not fulfill roles
– Customers who lack knowledge of their roles
and responsibilities
– Customers who negatively impact each other

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not delivering to service designs
and standards
• Problems with service intermediaries
– Channel conflict over objectives and
performance
– Difficulty controlling quality and consistency
– Tension between employment and control

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not delivering to service designs
and standards
• Failure to match supply and demand
– Failure to smooth peaks and valleys of
demand
– Inappropriate customer mix
– Over-reliance on price to smooth demand

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not matching performance to
promises
• Lack of integrated services marketing
communications
– Tendency to view each external
communication as independent
– Absence of interactive marketing in
communication plans
– Absence of strong internal marketing
programme

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not matching performance to
promises
• Ineffective management of customer
expectations
– Absence of customer expectation
management through all forms of
communication
– Lack of adequate education for customers

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not matching performance to
promises
• Over promising
– Over promising in advertising
– Over promising in personal selling
– Over promising through physical evidence
cues

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Not matching performance to
promises
• Inadequate horizontal communications
– Insufficient communication between sales and
operations
– Insufficient communication between
advertising and operations
– Differences in policies and procedures across
branches or units

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

CUSTOMER
Expected Service

Customer
gap
Perceived Service

External
COMPANY Service Delivery Communication to
Customers
Gap3 Gap4

Customer Driven
Gap1 Service Designs
and Standards

Gap2 Company perceptions

of Consumer
Expectations
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 Factors that influence service
expectations
Personal needs
Explicit and implicit
service promises
Word of mouth
Desired past experience
Beliefs about
services
What is possible
ZONE
OF
TOLERANCE

Perceived Predicted
Adequate
services service
services

Situational
factors

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Consumer Behaviour in
Services
By
Prof. Ashok Kumar Patnaik

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 “Memorable are experiences
and not gadgets”
- Daniel Bethamy

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Consumer behaviour
in service settings
• “For companies who want to successfully
enter the Indian market, there is no
substitute for a deep understanding of the
Indian consumer…..Companies doing
business in India need to capture the
differences in consumers’ needs and
aspirations and the barriers and triggers to
change”
– Keki Dadiseth, Ex Chairman, HLL India
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 The purchase process of services
Awareness of Need

Information search

Evaluation of alternative service suppliers

Request service from chosen supplier

Service delivery

Evaluation of service performance

Prof. Ashok Patnaik Future Intentions

 Pre-purchase stage
• Seeking information from respected personal
sources (family, friends, peers)
• Relying on a firm that has a good reputation
• looking for guarantees and warranties
• Visiting service facilitates or trying aspects of
the service before purchasing
• Asking knowledgeable employees about
competing services
• Examining tangible cues or other physical
evidence
• Using the internet to compare service offerings
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 An understanding of CB lies at the
heart of services marketing
• Why do customers buy one service and not the
other?
• Who or what influences their decisions and their
brand preferences?
• What criteria do they evaluate possible
alternatives?
• Why do they buy this type of service when a
different type of service might have provided a
better solution to their needs?
• What drives these needs in the first place?

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Perceived risks in purchasing and
using services-2
• Physical risk (personal injury or damage to
possessions)
• Psychological risk (personal fears and
emotions)
• Social risk (how others think and react)
• Sensory risk (unwanted impacts on any of
the five senses)

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Customer decision making and
evaluation of services
Need Information Evaluation of
Purchase
reorganization search alternatives

Consumer
Experience

Post experience
evaluation

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Need recognition
• Physiological needs are such as biological
needs such as food, water and sleep.
• Safety and security needs include shelter,
protection and security.
• Social needs are for affection, friendship
and acceptance.
• Ego needs are for prestige, success,
accomplishment and self-esteem.
• Self actualization involves self-fulfillment
and enriching experiences.
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 Information search
• Personal and non-personal sources
• Perceived risk

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Understanding user costs for
services
• Price and other • Non-financial
financial expenditure outlays and burdens
– Search costs – Time expenditures
– Purchase and use costs – Physical effort
– After costs – Psychological burdens
– Operating costs – Sensory burdens
– Incidental expenses

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Perceived risks in purchasing and
using services-1
• Functional risk (unsatisfactory
performance outcomes)
• Financial risk (monetary loss, unexpected
costs)
• Temporal risk (wasting time,
consequences of delays)

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Understanding difference among
consumers
• The role of culture
– Values and attitudes differ across culture
– Manners and customs
– Material culture
– Aesthetics
– Educational and social institutions

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Understanding difference among
consumers
• Group decision making
– Households
– Organisations
• The initiator
• The gatekeeper
• The decider
• The buyer
• The user

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Consumer expectations of
service

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Customer expectation
• It is the beliefs about service delivery that
serve as standards or reference points
against which performance is judged.
• Customers compare their perceptions of
performance with these reference points
when evaluating service quality, through
knowledge about customer expectations
is critical to service matters.

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Types of service expectations
• Ideal expectations or desire: Every one
says this restaurant is as good as one in
France and I want to go somewhere very
special for my birthday.
• Normative “should” expectation: As
expensive as this restaurant is, it ought to
have excellent food and service.

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Types of service expectations
• Experience based norms: Most times this
restaurant is very good, but when it gets
busy the service is slow.
• Acceptable expectations: I expect this
restaurant to service me in an adequate
manner.
• Minimum tolerable expectations: I except
terrible service from this restaurant but
come because the price is low.
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 Sources of adequate service
expectations
• Temporary service intensifiers
• Perceived service alternatives
• Self-perceived service role
• Situational factors

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Issues in customer service
expectations
• What does a service marketer do if
customer expectations are unrealistic’?
• Should a company try to delight the
customer?
• How does a company exceed customer
service expectations?
• Do customer service expectations
continually escalate?
• How does a service company stay ahead
of competition in meeting customer
expectations?
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 Customer perception of
service

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Consumer perception
• Satisfaction vs service quality
• Transaction vs cumulative perception

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Determinants of customer
satisfaction
• Product and service features
• Consumer emotions
• Attributes for service success or failure
• Perceptions of equity or fairness
• Other consumers, family members and
co-workers

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Service encounters
• Types of service encounters
– Remote encounters (interaction to bank
through ATM, railway ticket from internet)
– Phone encounters (customer service, general
enquiry and order booking)
– Face-to-face encounters (maintenance
personal, ticket counter, food and beverage
services etc.)

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

Pleasure and displeasure in service
encounters
• Recovery- employee response to service
delivery failures
• Adaptability- employee response to
customer needs and requests
• Spontaneity-unprompted and unsolicited
employee actions
• Coping –employee response to problem
customers
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 Listening to customer through
research
• Companies think that they believe they
know customers should want and deliver
that, rather than finding out what they do
want.
• Listening to customers uses marketing
research to understand customers and
their requirements fully.

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Research objectives for services
• To discover customer requirement or
expectation for service
• To monitor and track service performance
• To assess overall company performance
compared with that of competition
• To assess gaps between customer
expectations with perception
• To identify dissatisfied customers, so that
service recovery can be attempted
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 Research objectives for services
• To gauge service effectiveness changes in
service delivery
• To appraise the service performance of
individuals and teams for evaluation,
recognition, and rewards
• To determine customer expectations for a
new service
• To monitor and forecast changing
customer expectation in an industry
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 Criteria for an effective service
research programme
• Includes both qualitative and quantitative
research
• Includes both expectations and perceptions of
customers
• Balances the cost of the research and the value
of the information
• Includes statistical validity when necessary
• Measures priorities or importance of attributes
• Occurs with appropriate frequency
• Includes measurement of loyalty, behavioral
intentions or actual behavior
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 Complaint soliciation
• To identify /attend to dissatisfied
customers
• To identify common service failures

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Critical incident studies
• To identify best practices at transaction
level
• To identify customer requirements as input
for quantitative studies
• To identify common service failure points
• To identify systemic strength and
weaknesses in customer contact services

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Requirement research
• To identify customer requirements as input
for quantitative research

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Relationship surveys
• To monitor and track service performance
• To assess overall company performance
• To determine links between satisfaction
and behavioural intentions
• To assess gaps between customer
expectations and perceptions

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Trailer calls
• To obtain immediate feedback on
performance of service transactions
• To measure effectiveness of changes in
service delivery
• To assess service performance of
individuals and teams
• To use as input for process improvements
• To identify common service failure points
Prof. Ashok Patnaik
 Service expectation meetings and
reviews
• To create dialogue with important
customers
• To identify what individuals large
customers expect and then to ensure that
it is delivered
• To close the loop with important
customers

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

Process checkpoint evaluations
• To determine customer perceptions of
long term professional service during
service provision
• To identify service problems and solve
them early in the service relationship

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Market oriented ethnography
• To research customers in natural settings
• To study customers from culture other
than India in an unbiased way

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Mystery shopping
• To measure individual employee
performance for evaluation, reorganization
and reward
• To identify systematic strengths and
weaknesses in customer contact services

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Customer panel
• To monitor changing customer
expectations
• To provide a forum for customer
expectations

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Lost customer research
• To identify reasons for customer
defections
• To assess gaps between customer
expectations and perceptions

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Future expectations research
• To forecast future expectations of
customers
• To develop and test new service ideas

Prof. Ashok Patnaik

 Data base marketing research
• To identify the individual requirements of
customers using information technology
and database information

Prof. Ashok Patnaik