The Impact Of Service Quality On Customer Behaviour For Cargo Firms: Individual Consumer Research

In recent years, particularly increased on-line shopping together with proliferation of e-shopping has led to an increase in cargo firms’ business volumes and changes in customer profiles. In cargo sector there is fierce competition between national and international actors. With the increased importance of cargo firms, their services quality becomes more critical for all sides. Determining and developing the service quality of cargo firms is beneficial in terms of providing customer satisfaction and developing repurchase behavior. In literature although service quality has been examined for various service industries such as banking, retailing, health, tourism and education frequently, there are limited studies about cargo service providers. In this study, service quality of cargo firms and the impacts of service quality on customer satisfaction and repurchase behavior were examined. In this context the aims of this study are i. to determine the validity and reliability of SERVPERF scale in identifying cargo firms’ service quality ii. to determine the dimensions of cargo firms’ service quality and iii. to examine the impacts of service quality on customer satisfaction and repurchase behavior. In order to measure customer perceptions, the SERVPERF scale which has 22 variables was used. Consumer satisfaction and repurchase behavior were measured by two variables. In the survey 7 point Likert Scale was used. Data was collected through face to face interviews from Niğde University students. In the analysis, firstly, service quality dimensions were determined by using exploratory factor analysis. Then, confirmatory factor analysis was used to verify the consisting dimensions. Finally, structural equation modeling was used to test the research model. The results of the study showed that service quality of cargo firms has five dimensional structure including tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy. Almost two-thirds of total variance was explained by this structure. The values of reliability and responsiveness dimensions was more important than tangibles, empathy and assurance dimensions to affect general service quality perceptions of customers. So it can be suggested to cargo firms that taking into consideration reliability and responsibility preferably during planning and serving stages of their services. Besides, the results of the study showed that service quality has important direct effects on both customer satisfaction and repurchase behavior. And also analysis revealed that there is an effect of customer satisfaction on repurchases intention. These findings showed that there was no mediating effect of customer satisfaction between service quality and repurchase behavior. In other words increasing service quality effects customer’s service repurchase directly. But according to analysis results service quality’s effect was lower than service quality’s effect by means of satisfaction. So it can be said that customer satisfaction has a strengthening role on the effect of service quality on repurchase behavior. It can be suggested to cargo firms that caring about and developing customer satisfaction in addition to service quality. The results of the study contribute providing a valid and reliable scale which can be used for service quality determination; realizing the dimensions in quality development efforts; being aware of the relationship between customer satisfaction and repurchase behavior to the cargo firms. Also the analysis results of revealing validity and reliability of SERVPERF scale to measure the service quality of cargo firms will contribute to the development of limited literature knowledge.