Title: Service quality of ski group package tours: a modified importance-performance analysis

Authors: Shih-Hao Liu; Chin-Hsiang Tsai

Addresses: Department of Tourism, Ming Chuan University, 5 De Ming Rd., Gui Shan District, Taoyuan City 333, Taiwan ' Department of Leisure and Recreation Management, Chihlee University of Technology, No. 313, Sec. 1, Wenhua Rd., Banqiao Dist., New Taipei City 22050, Taiwan

Abstract: This study develops service quality attributes for ski group package tours (SGPTs) based on the SERVQUAL scale; it explores the perceived importance and performance of these items for SGPT customers in Taiwan. A questionnaire was used to collect data from 456 respondents. This study used importance-performance analysis (IPA) to analyse SGPTs' service quality and employed impact-asymmetric analysis to compensate for the shortcomings of the original IPA by estimating the asymmetric effect of service quality attributes on overall customer satisfaction. Subsequently, five service quality attributes of SGPT were extracted. IPA was also conducted for each gender and ski level segment. The results indicate that the perceived importance and performance of service quality attributes differ significantly among different market segments.

Keywords: service quality; tourism; important-performance analysis; impact-asymmetric analysis; ski tourism; ski group package tours; SGPTs; adventure tourism; ski instructor; active sport; customer.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSOM.2023.133413

International Journal of Services and Operations Management, 2023 Vol.46 No.1, pp.35 - 59

Received: 07 Dec 2020
Accepted: 04 May 2021
Published online: 15 Sep 2023 *

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