Zarządzanie jakością usług hotelarskich

Abstract

Tourism, referred to in the mass media as the industry of the 21st century, ranks among those branches that guarantee the fastest return on investment. Therefore it should be considered as a promising opportunity for Poland’s economy. Thorough analysis of objectives and marketing strategies appears nowadays as the most urgent need of enterprises. The times of easily predictable firms pursuing unchangeable market strategies have gone long ago. Today the market is the ‘war zone’, where ever new competitors appear, introduce new technologies, establish new rules and change marketing policy. The clients, always hunting up the best offers, became less loyal than in the past. Having an immense variety of goods and services from which to chose, they are increasingly demanding with regard to products, services and prices. High quality of services and products is the priority. Faced with almost unlimited choice, the clients opt for offers that meet their needs and expectations, taking into consideration subjective value of given service or product. The main goal of this paper is to identify and quantify service quality determinants in hospitality as seen from the point of view of the hotel guests – the principal quality testers. The service quality evaluation methods formerly employed such as cate-gorization and recommendation neglect the relationship between the service provider and the client. This is an important consideration as mutual satisfaction can be achieved only with regard to the interests of both parties concerned. The client must be provided with the best possible service during his hotel stay for a relatively fair price. On the other hand, the hotel as a service provider should generate profit by minimizing costs incurred by hospitality service. To identify and quantify service quality determinants in hospitality as seen from the point of view of the hotel guests the Servqual method and the critical incident technique have been used. The latter allowed to analyze the clients’ satisfaction degree, which is a resultant of service quality adequate for the client. Both methods allowed to evaluate the conformity of clients’ expectations and needs with actual standard of provided services. The research led to identi-fication of a group of determinants influencing service quality in hospitality. This paper also includes an attempt to adapt the Pareto-Lorenz analysis and the FMEA – methods widely used for evaluation of service quality in manufacturing – to the service sector.