For example, a room of top quality standard as a hotel X’ objective, is not in a position
to compensate the unfriendly and inhospitable behaviour of the hotel staff. Several
small tourism enterprises base their processes on the concept of inspection or quality
control, independently of the national or regional quality requirements.
In view of the fact that the great majority of public and private tourism
organizations are aware of and interested in quality improvement in tourism, the
employment of inappropriate tourism quality systems has been associated with the
major source of current quality problems in tourism. These problems are reflected in
an increasing number of customers dissatisfied with their total tourism experience.
The lack and incapability of securing an advanced, comprehensive, and consistent
quality-management process constitutes the major weakness of tourism quality
systems. Shortcomings in the systems’ inputs and its relations with the suppliers make
it impossible for the quality systems of individual tourism enterprises to close the
quality perception gap and quality control gap. None of the existing tourism quality
systems is in a position to introduce the required changes that would enable them to
conform to the conditions of tourism quality enhancement. Therefore, a new tourism
quality system, based on co-operative links among private, public and voluntary
organizations and operating within a tourism destination area, has been proposed. The
establishment of a total quality tourism consortium, TQTC, within the framework of
this system enables quality enhancement inasmuch as the TQTC is in a position to:
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. secure adequate inputs and close the tourism quality perception gap;
. develop an advanced, comprehensive and consistent quality-management
process that converts the inputs into outputs (total quality tourism products);
and
. manage effectively the relationships with the external environment and the
suppliers in particular with the result of bridging the tourism quality control gap.
The conceptual model of service quality (SERVQUAL), developed by Parasuraman
et al. (1990), is regarded as an important tool for identifying quality improvement areas
within individual service organisations in relation to enhancing customer satisfaction.
The model measures tangible and intangible elements of the service and investigates
gaps in the customer-supplier chain to highlight target areas where quality may be
improved. These gaps include the gap between:
. customers’ expectations and management’s perceptions of customers
expectations;
. management’s perceptions of customers’ expectations and service quality
specifications;
. service quality specifications and service delivery;
. service delivery and external communications to customers; and
. customers’ expectations and perceived services.
The success of SERVQUAL as a concept depends, however, on circumstances in which
a tourism destination area attempts to survive, grow and improve the quality of tourist
products or services.