Recent Researches in Business Administration, Product Design and Marketing

Customer satisfaction measurement in Letterkenny Hotels

IOANA CRISTINA COLBU, GABRIELA ARIONESEI, PAUL-PANFIL IVAN
Faculty of Economic Sciences and Public Administration
Stefan cel Mare University of Suceava
13, Universitatii Street
ROMANIA
ioanac@seap.usv.ro, gabrielag@seap.usv.ro, pauli@seap.usv.ro,
Abstract: The aim of this paper is to determine the important attributes to be considered when measuring
customer satisfaction with a hotel experience and identify the key factors for overall satisfaction. As the service
quality is known to be an antecedent of customer satisfaction, we will examine various definitions of service
quality and customer satisfaction and the relationship between them. The motivation of examining service
satisfaction in the hotel industry came from the recognized importance of customer satisfaction, although many
hotels focus their strategies on customer acquisition rather than increasing the customer satisfaction and build
loyalty.
The identification of key attributes of customer satisfaction and the dissemination of this information
throughout the hotels, as a basis for action is critical to achieve market orientation. The overall goal for hotels is
a satisfied customer with the hotel experience, either visiting the hotel for a meal or a banquet or other events
such as conferences or weddings and ultimately to create an enduring relationship, which leads to repeated
visits and recommending the hotel to others.

Key-Words: hotels, customer satisfaction, service quality, satisfaction measurement, overall satisfaction
the US, 80 per cent of hotels are owned by chains
whereas in Europe the proportion is reversed, 80 per
cent of hotels are individually owned, therefore the
business style and customer approach is different.
Previous studies indicate that customers in hotels
will utilize and assess service encounters in different
departments, including reception, food and beverage
and housekeeping, as the basis of evaluating the
service and the results of those evaluations will have
a major impact on the overall satisfaction with the
hotel experience.
In a competitive environment as the hospitality
industry, where the quality of service is vital and
with the increased access to information technology,
customers have become more discerning and
knowledgeable, the demand for customer
satisfaction measurement and its influence on
loyalty and retention is obvious.
The difference between customer satisfaction and
the attitude construct is that while guests hold preconsumption attitudes or expectations, consumer
satisfaction/dissatisfaction occurs only after the
product/service has been consumed. The guests that
completed the questionnaires were present at that
moment in the hotel or visited the hotel at least once
over the past three months.

1 Introduction
As Peter Drucker mentioned, the purpose of
marketing is to know and understand the customer
so well the product or service fits him and sells
itself. With emphasis on customer means, marketing
has to bring forward the necessary data to measure
the companys performance, with a shift from
activity-based measurements to customer-related
measurements.
The future of customer service in hotel industry is
highly likely to focus on at least three key elements:
increased personalization, further applications of
technology and increased awareness of changing
demographics. Customers in the hospitality industry
will no longer stand for being treated as one
demographic category and they will not tolerate a
one-size-fits all mentality. They will demand
individually designed products, services and
communication and only successful hotels will
manage to communicate with each customer as an
individual with special needs and expectations.
As many modern economies are dominated by
services,
building
and
maintaining close
relationships with customers can evolve into rich
and fulfilling partnerships. The US hotel market is
quantitatively different than the European one, as
the ownership and operation of hotels is different. In

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Recent Researches in Business Administration, Product Design and Marketing

study, both methods to evaluate attributes

importance are used, stated and statistically inferred
importance.
Customers were also asked to state their overall
satisfaction with their stay and to identify the
attribute that makes them recommend and return to
the hotel.
A total of 120 questionnaires were distributed at the
three hotels during the data collection period and 97
questionnaires were completed by customers. The
questionnaire was divided into ten different sections
as follows:
- First section covers the following aspects: length
of stay, nature of visit, frequency of visit;
- Second section covers general satisfaction levels
with general aspects of the hotel;
- Third section covers aspects related to customer
service received;
- The fourth section presents satisfaction levels with
staff in restaurant or at reception;
- Fifth section satisfaction levels with
accommodation features;
- Sixth section satisfaction levels with food in the
restaurant;
- The seventh section satisfaction levels with
conference room;
- Eighth section satisfaction with the hotels
website and the ninth section covers customer
loyalty aspects.
The type of questions was mainly closed-ended,
because each variable contained enough information
divided into different categories.

2 The case study preparation

This empirical study was carried out in the field of
hospitality industry in a group of hotels in Ireland,
Hotel C and Hotel B in Letterkenny, which have a
higher percentage of leisure guests and Hotel A in
Letterkenny, county Donegal.
Ability to deliver superior levels of customer
satisfaction is a key source of competitive
advantage, creating and maintaining strong and
profitable relationships with guests. The study was
performed because management of all three hotels
chosen for analysis are interested in attribute
categorization - what aspects of satisfaction are
more important -to support investment decisions and
resource allocation in order to increase revenue and
positive recommendations.
The target population was limited to corporate and
leisure travellers and the sampling frame was
defined as all customers staying in one of the hotels
included in the study during the data collection
period, regardless the length of stay, nature of visit,
frequency of visit, gender, age and so forth, using
judgemental sampling technique. In all three hotels
the questionnaires were distributed directly by
recruiting guests at check-in or check-out.
Questionnaires were used as data collection
instrument, as there is evidence that customer
satisfaction surveys are not effectively used in
organisational decision-making processes.
For this research, customer satisfaction survey was
used to determine customer attitudes and
perceptions of the quality of service they received in
the hotel.
The research had the following objectives:
- To identify the most important attributes of
customer satisfaction that have an effect on
consumer decision-making in the hotel sector.
- To determine the relative importance of each
attribute for overall customer satisfaction in the
departments chosen for analysis.
- To determine overall satisfaction levels according
to the attributes identified.
- To determine what specific attributes explain the
variation in overall satisfaction.
- To identify whether higher customer satisfaction
will lead to loyalty and further recommending the
hotel.
- Identify similarities and differences between the
three hotels in Donegal in what concerns overall
guest satisfaction.
The research was carried out in one phase- survey
type with leisure and corporate guests at Hotel A,
Hotel B and Hotel C in Letterkenny, Ireland.
To determine the most important attributes of
customer satisfaction in the hotels chosen for this

ISBN: 978-960-474-325-4

Table 1: Linking research objectives with the

research methodology

1.

2.

3.

118

Research Objectives
Identify
the
most
important attributes of
customer
satisfaction
having an impact on
decision-making
To determine the relative
importance
of
the
attributes
in
each
department;
To
examine
guest
satisfaction
levels
to
each
according
attribute

Determine
overall
satisfaction levels with
the hotels services

Research Methodology
Analysing the strength
of correlation
between the dependent
variable and key
independent variables
1. Secondary data/past
research.
2. Multiple regressions
using SPSS to determine
how much of the
variance
of
overall
satisfaction is explained
by the variance in each
attribute.
Dummy
variable
regression with OCS as
dependent variable.
Descriptive
analysis,
main findings
Regression analysis

Recent Researches in Business Administration, Product Design and Marketing

4.

Determine
what
attributes explain the
variation in OCS

5.

Determine
attributes
which will create loyalty

6.

Differences/similarities
between the three hotels

4a, 4b, 4c Regression

analysis with dummy
variables
for
each
attribute
Analysing
correlation
between variables 62
(question 19) and 62.1
(question 20) and the
dependent variable.
Descriptive analysis of
data

3 Findings and analysis of the case

study
The first part of the analysis presents the descriptive
data analysis, using frequency tables and graphs for
the main analysis variables, such as Overall
satisfaction, satisfaction with various aspects of the
hotel, classification variables, nature of stay,
purpose of visit, reasons for choosing the hotel.
The second part of the analysis involves explaining
the derived importance, meaning the strength of
correlation between attribute performance and
overall satisfaction levels. This analysis was
performed using the data collected from
questionnaires entered in the Statistical Package for
Social Sciences (SPSS).
Since the dependent variable is categorical
polytomous, it has been decided that multinomial
logistic regression is the most suitable method to
explain the differences in the overall satisfaction
with each hotel. The dependent variable Overall
satisfaction with the hotels service was recoded
from a 5-item scale into a 3-item scale with the
following categories: Satisfied, Neither satisfied
Nor dissatisfied and Dissatisfied. The first
category serves as reference category for the crosssectional analysis.
The descriptive analysis begins with the
presentation of overall satisfaction with the service
at the chosen hotels. Figure 1 show the frequencies
and percentages of respondents overall satisfaction
with the product/service. A high percentage varying
from 89% of B customers to 93% of A guests and
respectively 93% of Hotel C guests stated that they
are satisfied with the hotel. Hotel C showed the
highest percentage of customers who declared
themselves dissatisfied with the hotel, but the figure
is quite small, of 3.3 per cent out of the total number
of interviewed customers.
Out of these customers, more women than men
declared that they are satisfied with the service
received, respectively nineteen women at who have
visited Hotel B and eighteen women from C and
Hotel A. 15 men who have visited Hotel B declared
that they are satisfied with the hotel compared with
ten men who have visited the other two hotels.

Three demographic characteristics of respondents

were captured in questions twenty-three, twentyfour and twenty-five, respectively respondents
gender, age category and income category.
Questions one, three, five, six, fifteen, twenty-one
and twenty-two are nominal dichotomy variables.
Questions fourteen, sixteen, seventeen are multiple
choice questions. Questions four, seven, eight, nine,
ten, eleven and twelve are Likert scales. Questions
eighteen, nineteen and twenty are semantic
differential scales.
Three departments were included in the study:
reception, the food and beverage department
(restaurant and bar in the questionnaire) and the
housekeeping department. There are several reasons
for choosing these departments. First, the core of
hotel A operation is the ability to satisfy basic
needs, such as sleep and food. The three selected
departments represent the operations necessary to
fulfil those needs. Additional offerings such as
conference services are considered peripheral
services. The limitation to three departments was
considered optimal both in terms of avoiding a
lengthy questionnaire and also for better capturing
the core of the service.
Sampling methods adopted for guests survey had to
be made through judgemental sampling technique.
The sample consisted of 97 guests, which have
previously stayed or visited over the last three
months one of the three hotels chosen for analysis.
At Hotel C and Hotel B, 35 per cent of customers
are staying for corporate purposes and 65 percent
are leisure guests. Therefore, the majority of
answers for these two hotels came from leisure
guests, visiting the hotel for dinner purposes,
attending a wedding or other leisure purposes, as
tours.
Because in-room distribution shows a low response
rate, the most effective way is to recruit guests at
check-in / check-out to fill in the questionnaires.

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Recent Researches in Business Administration, Product Design and Marketing

Fig 1. Overall satisfaction with the service by

gender of respondent
Fig. 3 Overall satisfaction with hotel by gender
for each hotel
It can be noticed from the figure above that there are
a few young guests that declared that they were not
satisfied with the service received, although this
percentage is very small over the sample. At the
Hotel C almost half of guests interviewed declared
that they were satisfied with the service, as well as
guests staying at Hotel B, respectively 13 out of 35
and 15 out of 30 guests. A small percentage of
guests in all three hotels declared that they were not
satisfied with the service and they belong to either
18-34 category or over 55 category. For the 45-54
age category, 10 customers which have visited Hotel
A declared that they were satisfied with the service,
compared to 4 guests from Hotel B and respectively
7 guests interviewed at Hotel C, therefore there is
enough place for improvement at Hotel C and also
at Hotel B in what concerns serving guests of this
age category, which are in general more travelled
and with more disposable income.
Figure 4 presents the satisfaction levels with the
hotel service for different income categories and
shows that guests with incomes between 40,000
and 59,999 per year declared that are satisfied with
the hotel, respectively 36.3% of customers
interviewed at Hotel A, followed by 35.3% of
customers of Hotel C and respectively 31.4 % of
customers responding at Hotel B.

Fig. 2 Degree of satisfaction with various hotel

aspects
With regards to different tangible and intangible
hotel elements, respondents of all three hotel stated
that are highly satisfied with hotel booking, checkout waiting time and parking space available,
scoring 4.80 on a 1 to 5 scale. Customers gave the
lowest scores for the variable Value for money,
respectively 3.99 out of 5. In all hotels guests stated
that they are satisfied with staff responsiveness to
customers special requests (4.59 out of 5), with
cleanliness in public areas (4.64 out of 5) and with
the range of services (4.61 out of 5).

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the highest percentage of respondents satisfied with

the service were aged 35-44.
A female staying at Hotel C, aged 45-54, has 46
times more chances to be satisfied rather than
neither satisfied nor satisfied with the hotel,
compared to a women of 18-34 age category.

4 Conclusions
Comparing the results of all three regressions, it can
be concluded that a woman, aged 45-54, earning
between 40.000-59.999 per year, who chose
quality of restaurant/bar, room quality and
professionalism of employees as most important
reasons for choosing Hotel C is more likely to be
satisfied rather than neither satisfied nor dissatisfied.
A man staying at Hotel B, aged over 55, who chose
the hotel for the professionalism of employees and
family facilities provided has higher odds to be
more dissatisfied than satisfied.
Hotel A has in common with Hotel C the fact that
women, aged 45-54, which chose the hotels for the
quality of restaurant/bar, room features and
professionalism of employees have higher odds to
be satisfied rather than dissatisfied with the overall
service.
The youngest category of respondents have higher
odds to be dissatisfied with the hotel service, which
confirmed again the results of the descriptive
analysis.
The multinomial logistic regression confirmed some
of the findings of the descriptive analysis, although
not so many variables included in the regression
were statistically significant.
The design of questionnaire with eight Likert scale
did not allow for a more in-depth analysis using a
regression analysis.
Some of the limitations of the study are related to
the sample of hotels selected for the analysis which
was restricted only to Donegal. Also issues related
to organisational culture, such as power distance,
delegating authority and number of employees were
not considered but influenced highly the results of a
customer satisfaction study, although these variables
cannot be introduced in a guest questionnaire, but in
an employee questionnaire.

Fig. 4 Overall satisfaction with the service by

income category for each hotel
Overall, there are more women than men who
declared that they are satisfied with the hotels
(Figure 5).

Fig. 5 Overall satisfaction by gender

When comparing Hotel C, Hotel A and Hotel B in
terms of overall satisfaction with hotel service, the
odds of being satisfied rather than neither satisfied
nor dissatisfied are: 0.93 times lower for females
than males, 4.68 times higher for people age 45-54
rather than 18-34 category; 1.60 times higher for
people with incomes between 40.000-59.999 per
year compared to respondents with incomes lower
than 20.000 per year. Other significant variable
were quality of restaurant and bar which confirms
the findings of the descriptive analysis and also past
literature, as being one of the most important
tangible aspect which can influence overall
customer satisfaction.
The results of the regression analysis did not
confirm the descriptive analysis which showed that

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ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This paper has been financially supported within the
project entitled Doctorate: an Attractive Research
Career,
contract
number
POSDRU/107/1.5/S/77946,
co-financed
by
European Social Fund through Sectorial
Operational Programme for Human Resources
Development 2007-2013. Investing in people!

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Recent Researches in Business Administration, Product Design and Marketing

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