Category

Relationship Between Rating And Expectations, Perceived Performance, And Satisfaction: A Comparison between Eva Air And United Airlines

[Your official name]

[Degree Title], [university], 20XX

Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfilment
Of the Requirements for the Degree of

[Name of program]

[Name of University]

 [Last month of quarter you plan to graduate] 20XX

ABSTRACT

The research problem of this study is two-fold. First is to understand the fundamentals on which the concept of high and low ratings of airline services is based upon and the factors that are involved in increasing or decreasing the rating of any airline. Whereas the second problem is to analyze two airlines of Taiwan and study the relationship of customer expectation and satisfaction found in these two airlines. This study is based on quantitative research design using questionnaire survey as data collection method and using regression and correlation to achieve the aims and objectives of this study. The study concludes that there is positive and statistically significant relationship between ratings and pre-flight expectations flight performance, and satisfaction. A number of factors that have positive influence on these aspects were identified in the study.

Table of Contents

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

Research Background

Air travel has become one of the most commonly used means of travel in today’s world and like every other service it is being marketed and sold to its consumers. The consumers that use air travel base their decisions on a number of factors that are associated with airlines. Some of which are; the price of the ticket, safety of the air plane, comfortable seats, quick check in and transit process, luggage processing, and welcoming airline staff (Baker, 2013). These factors are simple to influence as they can be easily improved upon by the airline itself and a majority of airlines are constantly updating their system to satisfy their loyal customers and attract new customers. But there are some factors which are difficult to influence by the airline itself such as the opinion projection of other customers, advertising on social media and personal needs of each customer. These are factors which are influenced more by the customer’s reviews and less by the airline itself. For this reason, customer reviews have gained much more importance than advertising by the airline company itself. As a whole all these factors collectively affect the customers’ expectations, their standard of perceiving performance and thus satisfaction caused.

Based on their performance and the number of customers they satisfy, different airlines are rated accordingly. These ratings are available for allpeople to see and so they purchase a ticket of the respective airline accordingly and again the vicious cycle of satisfaction starts. This is a cycle because one factor sets in motion the other and so on. This is an on-going process and can result in the rapid growth as well as rapid deterioration of the image of any airline.In this particular study, two airline companies of Taiwan are going to be studied and compared in terms of ratings, factors that influence their ratings and how future airlines can use this example to improve their ratings. One out of the two companies is Eva Air which is a high rated international airline company and the other is United Airlines which is a low rated international airline company. The reason for taking these two examples is to analyze the differences between the two airlines and how these differences have been created. The concept of ratings and perceived performance and satisfaction are interconnected to each other and so in this study we aim to find the relationship between these three factors and how understanding of this relationship can help other airlines to improve their ratings and image among people (Alekisieva, 2011).

Research Problem

The research problem of this study is two-fold. First is to understand the fundamentals on which the concept of high and low ratings of airline services is based upon and the factors that are involved in increasing or decreasing the rating of any airline. Whereas the second problem is to analyze two airlines of Taiwan and study the relationship of customer expectation and satisfaction found in these two airlines. This research problem as previous literature has taught us that the relationship of customer satisfaction has been related to the perceived performance of any particular service. But as this relationship has never been proved and how this relationship came about has also never been explained. It is due to this reason that this issue has been taken as the research problem and through analysis of secondary sources, the aim is to understand this problem and study about their consequences in the airline industry of Taiwan.

Research Aims and Objectives

In this particular research, the researcher aimed at analysing the relationship between rating and expectations, perceived performance, and satisfaction by comparing the two well-recognised airline companies in Taiwan, particularly EVA Air as high rating airline company and United Airlines as a low rating airline company. In order to achieve aim of the study, following research objectives have been proposed by the researcher:

  • To study the concept of high and low rating of airline services
  • To identify the factors affecting on customers’ expectation and satisfaction in airline industry of Taiwan
  • To study the relationship between rating and customer’s expectation, perceived performance, and satisfaction

To provide recommendation to the managers for increasing their service quality in order to achieve customers’ retention and satisfaction

Research Questions

  1. What is the concept of high and low rating of airline services?
  2. Is there any relationship between rating and customer’s expectation, perceived performance, and satisfaction?
  3. What are the factors affecting on customer’s expectation and satisfaction in the airline industry of Taiwan?
  4. What are the recommendations for managers through which they can increase their service quality in order to achieve customers’ retention and satisfaction?

Significance of the Research

From previous literature it is quite evident that this phenomenon is a real one and these trends can be easily studied in the various airlines present in the world today. Though there is some gap in the research and that is why this study has been undertaken, in order to overcome this gap in the research. There are evidences found in literature providing knowledge about how airlines have raised their standards over the years by increasing the provision of services one after the other. All of this has been done just so that the reputation of the airline can be improved and it is able to attract more customers. As the number of airline companies have also increased therefore it has become a competitive market where everyone tries to outrun the other company by introducing new and improving their previous services(Belobaba, P., Odoni, A., and Barnhart, C. (2015). To the vast amount of research available in this particular context there are still some areas that have not been described such as the relation of ratings found among airlines and what actually the rating is dependent upon. Thus this study aims to identify these factors that cause the increase or decrease in ratings and also to found how these ratings further cause customers to perceive the performance of any airline and how if these expectations are not met so they are satisfied or unsatisfied. In order to make things more understandable and relatable, an example of two airlines from Taiwan has been taken in order to aid in the study of this phenomenon. Further the results of this study can provide recommendations to future entrepreneurs to improve performance.

Structure of the Research

This research will consist of five chapters. After the abstract of the research is provided which is a brief overview of the overall study starting from the aims to the results achieved, the first chapter will begin. The first chapter is known as the introduction of the study. This chapter consists of the research background of the study, the aims and objectives, the research problem at hand, its significance and the last part which outlines the structure of the research. In this study, chapter 1 will provide an outline about the phenomenon that we are going to research about which are airline ratings, perceived performance and customer satisfaction. Chapter 2 of the study is known as literature review which provides the information of the main topic of the study through analysis of secondary sources as well provide theoretical framework which would be used in the study. This framework will outline the model that this study will be based upon and what factors will be studied. Also chapter 2 contains a conceptual framework sometimes which shows the relationship between the independent and dependent variables of the study by flowcharts etc. Chapter 3 of the study is known as methodology which is the most important part of the study as it describes the research approach that is going to be used, the strategy or philosophy used and the investigations that are going to be conducted respectively. For the purpose of investigation, the methods of data collection that will be used, the analytical procedure and limitations if there are any to the study. Chapter 4 of the study includes analysis and discussion of the result. It might include an interview analysis or survey analysis along with the discussion of the results found by the author in light of previous research. The final chapter 5 is the conclusion of the research which will provide a summary of the research and how successful was the author in answering it as well as providing any recommendations to future researchers.

References

Aleksieva, N. M. (2011). Service quality perception analysis to define loyalty in the airline industry.

Baker, D. M. A. (2013). Service quality and customer satisfaction in the airline industry: a comparison between legacy airlines and low-cost airlines. American Journal of Tourism Research2(1), 67-77.

Baker, D. M. A. (2013). Service quality and customer satisfaction in the airline industry: a comparison between legacy airlines and low-cost airlines. American Journal of Tourism Research2(1), 67-77.

Baker, R., Brick, J. M., Bates, N. A., Battaglia, M., Couper, M. P., Dever, J. A., …andTourangeau, R. (2013). Summary report of the AAPOR task force on non-probability sampling. Journal of Survey Statistics and Methodology, smt008.

Baltar, F., and Brunet, I. (2012). Social research 2.0: virtual snowball sampling method using Facebook. internet Research22(1), 57-74.

Basfirinci, C., andMitra, A. (2015).A cross cultural investigation of airlines service quality through integration of Servqual and the Kano model. Journal of Air Transport Management42, 239-248.

Belobaba, P., Odoni, A., and Barnhart, C. (2015). The global airline industry.John Wiley and Sons.

Bogicevic, V., Yang, W., Bilgihan, A., andBujisic, M. (2013).Airport service quality drivers of passenger satisfaction. Tourism Review, 68(4), 3-18.

Bölke, S. (2014).Strategic Marketing Approaches Within Airline Management: How the Passenger Market Causes the Business Concepts of Full Service Network Carriers, Low Cost Carriers, Regional Carriers and Leisure Carriers to Overlap. Anchor Academic Publishing (aap_verlag).

Chen, C. F., and Chen, F. S. (2010).Experience quality, perceived value, satisfaction and behavioral intentions for heritage tourists. Tourism management31(1), 29-35.

Creswell, J. W. (2012). Qualitative inquiry and research design: Choosing among five approaches. Sage publications.

Creswell, J. W. (2013). Research design: Qualitative, quantitative, and mixed methods approaches. Sage publications.

Dabholkar, P. A., and Sheng, X. (2012). Consumer participation in using online recommendation agents: effects on satisfaction, trust, and purchase intentions. The Service Industries Journal32(9), 1433-1449.

Diaconu, L. (2012). The Evolution of the European Low-cost Airlines ‘Business Models.Ryanair Case Study. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences62, 342-346.

Easton, G. (2010). Critical realism in case study research. Industrial marketing management39(1), 118-128.

Erdil, S. T., andYıldız, O. (2011).Measuring service quality and a comparative analysis in the passenger carriage of airline industry. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences24, 1232-1242.

Ernst, H., Hoyer, W. D., Krafft, M., and Krieger, K. (2011).Customer relationship management and company performance—the mediating role of new product performance. Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science39(2), 290-306.

Evans, N., Stonehouse, G., and Campbell, D. (2012). Strategic management for travel and tourism.Taylor and Francis.

Freathy, P., and O’Connell, F. (2012).Spending time, spending money: passenger segmentation in an international airport. The International Review of Retail, Distribution and Consumer Research22(4), 397-416.

Gnanlet, A., andYayla-Kullu, H. M. (2013).Impact of International Presence on Service Supply Chain Quality. International Journal of Supply Chain Management2(3).

Goedeking, P. (2010). Networks in aviation: strategies and structures. Springer Science and Business Media.

Goldkuhl, G. (2012). Pragmatism vs interpretivism in qualitative information systems research. European Journal of Information Systems21(2), 135-146.

Graham, A. (2013). Understanding the low cost carrier and airport relationship: A critical analysis of the salient issues. Tourism Management36, 66-76.

Hsu, C. L., and Wu, C. C. (2011). Understanding users’ continuance of Facebook: An integrated model with the unified theory of acceptance and use of technology, Expectation disconfirmation model, and flow theory. International Journal of virtual communities and social networking (IJVCSN)3(2), 1-16.

Jahn, D. (2011). Conceptualizing Left and Right in comparative politics: Towards a deductive approach. Party Politics17(6), 745-765.

Kärnä, S. (2014).Analysing customer satisfaction and quality in construction–the case of public and private customers. Nordic journal of surveying and real estate research2.

Kassim, N., andAsiah Abdullah, N. (2010). The effect of perceived service quality dimensions on customer satisfaction, trust, and loyalty in e-commerce settings: A cross cultural analysis. Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics22(3), 351-371.

Kim, D. J. (2012).An investigation of the effect of online consumer trust on expectation, satisfaction, and post-expectation. Information Systems and E-Business Management10(2), 219-240.

Kim, Y. K., and Lee, H. R. (2011).Customer satisfaction using low cost carriers. Tourism Management32(2), 235-243.

Krippendorff, K. (2012). Content analysis: An introduction to its methodology. Sage

Loïc, P. L. É., Lecocq, X., andAngot, J. (2010). Customer-integrated business models: a theoretical framework. M@ n@ gement13(4), 226-265.

Maxwell, J. A. (2012). Qualitative research design: An interactive approach (Vol. 41). Sage publications.

Meng, S. M., Liang, G. S., and Yang, S. H. (2011). The relationships of cruise image, perceived value, satisfaction, and post-purchase behavioral intention on Taiwanese tourists. African Journal of Business Management5(1), 19.

Monroe, C. (2012). Challenging in Delivering Quality Services: Balancing Customer Expectations and Perceptions in Airline Industry.

Oliver, R. L. (2014). Satisfaction: A behavioral perspective on the consumer. Routledge.

Orlikowski, W. J. (2010). Practice in research: phenomenon, perspective and philosophy. Cambridge handbook of strategy as practice, 23-33.

Pearson, J. (2016). The competitive strength of Asian network airlines in competing with low-cost carriers and the use of low-cost subsidiaries (Doctoral dissertation, © James Pearson).

Robinson, O. C. (2014). Sampling in interview-based qualitative research: A theoretical and practical guide. Qualitative Research in Psychology11(1), 25-41.

Romani, S., Grappi, S., andDalli, D. (2012). Emotions that drive consumers away from brands: Measuring negative emotions toward brands and their behavioral effects. International Journal of Research in Marketing29(1), 55-67.

Sadler, G. R., Lee, H. C., Lim, R. S. H., and Fullerton, J. (2010).Recruitment of hard‐to‐reach population subgroups via adaptations of the snowball sampling strategy. Business Research12(3), 369-374.

Saeidi, S. P., Sofian, S., Saeidi, P., Saeidi, S. P., andSaaeidi, S. A. (2015). How does corporate social responsibility contribute to firm financial performance? The mediating role of competitive advantage, reputation, and customer satisfaction. Journal of Business Research68(2), 341-350.

Saunders, M. N. (2011). Research methods for business students, 5/e. Pearson Education.

Siddiqi, K. O. (2011). Interrelations between service quality attributes, customer satisfaction and customer loyalty in the retail banking sector in Bangladesh. International Journal of Business and Management6(3), 12.

Smith, J. A. (Ed.). (2015). Qualitative psychology: A practical guide to research methods. Sage.

Tam, J. L. M. (2011). The moderating effects of purchase importance in customer satisfaction process: An empirical investigation. Journal of Consumer Behaviour10(4), 205-215.

Taylor, P. C., and Medina, M. N. D. (2013). Educational research paradigms: From positivism to multiparadigmatic. The Journal of Meaning-Centered Education1(2), 1-13.

Thanasupsin, K., Chaichana, S., andPliankarom, S. (2010). Factors influencing mode selections of low-cost carriers and a full-service airline in Thailand. Transportation Journal, 35-47.

Tolpa, E. (2012). Measuring customer expectations of service quality: Case airline industry.

Turner III, D. W. (2010). Qualitative interview design: A practical guide for novice investigators. The qualitative report15(3), 754.

Udo, G. J., Bagchi, K. K., andKirs, P. J. (2010).An assessment of customers’e-service quality perception, satisfaction and intention. International Journal of Information Management30(6), 481-492.

Williams, C. (2011). Research methods. Journal of Business and Economics Research (JBER)5(3).

Yee, R. W., Yeung, A. C., and Cheng, T. E. (2010).An empirical study of employee loyalty, service quality and firm performance in the service industry. International Journal of Production Economics124(1), 109-120.

View More Samples

pdf

Economics Dissertation Samples

  • Dissertation
  • 5 Pages
pdf

Marketing Dissertation Samples

  • Dissertation
  • 5 Pages
pdf

Full Dissertation Samples

  • Dissertation
  • 4 Pages