Measuring and applying

the PAKSERV service

quality construct
Evidence froma South African cultural context
Stephen Graham Saunders
Department of Marketing, Monash University, Berwick, Australia
Abstract
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to examine the PAKSERV service quality measure in a
South African cultural context.
Design/methodology/approach In order to test and conrmthe dimensionality of the PAKSERV
service quality construct a conrmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used. The data were collected
through a survey of over 300 Black South African banking customers.
Findings The results of the CFA conrmed that PAKSERV is a valid measure of service quality in
a South African cultural context, consisting of six dimensions: tangibility, reliability, assurance,
sincerity, personalisation and formality.
Research limitations/implications A major limitation of this study is that PAKSERV was only
validated for the banking sector. To ensure validity across a variety of industries and cultural
contexts, further replication would be needed.
Practical implications By measuring and evaluating service quality dimensions that are
culturally relevant to customers, marketing managers can focus on the dimensions of service quality
that are not adequately captured in the SERVQUAL instrument. The paper recommends three useful
managerial applications of the service quality construct. The ndings are particularly valuable to
international services managers who what to move away from a single international service strategy
and embrace a exible service delivery strategy that is culturally sensitive.
Originality/value The study contributes by providing further validation for the PAKSERV
service quality measurement scale. This is also one of the few studies to test and conrm a culturally
sensitive service quality construct in Africa. Furthermore, the study questions the notion that the
PAKSERV measurement scale is culturally specic and argues that PAKSERV should be seen as a
generic measurement scale that can be used across a variety of countries and cultural contexts.
Keywords Customer services quality, Culture, South Africa, Banking
Paper type Research paper
Introduction
The rapid development and competition of service industries, in both developed and
developing countries, has made it important for companies to measure and evaluate the
quality of service encounters (Brown and Bitner, 2007). Even though most service
companies recognise that excellent service quality is of vital importance to
international success (Berry et al., 1989), service companies that operate in a variety
of cultural contexts are nding that the most popular generic measure of service
quality (i.e. SERVQUAL) is less applicable and meaningful outside of developed
countries (Malhotra et al., 2005). Consequently, this has led to unsatisfactory and
inappropriate marketing strategies in these countries and/or cultural contexts (Laroche
et al., 2004).
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0960-4529.htm
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Managing Service Quality
Vol. 18 No. 5, 2008
pp. 442-456
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
0960-4529
DOI 10.1108/09604520810898820
While there is evidence that there is a growing international consumer culture that
shares values, norms and beliefs across cultures and political boundaries, most
developing country consumers are not (yet) a member of this consumer group (Alden
et al., 1999). This is particularly the case in the international services industry where
service is often customised (rather than standardised) to accommodate local service
cultures (Witkowski and Wolnbarger, 2001).
The way services are delivered often depends on the appropriate expression of
culturally acceptable emotions (e.g. sincerity) and behaviours (e.g. formality and
personalisation) towards the customer (Ashforth and Humphrey, 1993; Winsted, 1997;
Raajpoot, 2004; Malhotra et al., 2005). For example, Ashforth and Humphrey (1993)
established that in many Muslim cultures, smiling at the customer during the service
experience was deemed a culturally unacceptable emotion. As service encounters are
quite different between countries in terms of cultural value systems, international
service managers must gain an understanding of the different dimensions of service
quality and accordingly emphasize the various dimensions of service quality
differently (Malhotra et al., 2005, p. 256).
In order to measure the dimensions of service quality adequately in a variety of
country and/or cultural contexts, the most popular measure of service quality
SERVQUAL is often adapted to specic cultural contexts. Weekes et al. (1996), in fact,
believe that the main strength of SERVQUAL, over other measures of service quality
such as SERVPERF (Cronin and Taylor, 1992), is its ability to be adequately adapted.
Even though SERVQUAL has been used as a measure of service quality for over 20
years, it is only really in the last ten years that researchers have seriously questioned
SERVQUALs relationship to cultural dimensions (Donthu and Yoo, 1998; Espinoza,
1999; Furrer et al., 2000; Kueh and Voon, 2007; Tsoukatos and Rand, 2007). Donthu and
Yoo (1998) studied the effect of consumers cultural orientation on their service quality
expectations of banking customers, concluding that culture inuenced overall service
expectations and the dimensions of those expectations. These ndings were supported
by Espinoza (1999), Furrer et al. (2000), Kueh and Voon (2007), and Tsoukatos and
Rand (2007) who established that the SERVQUAL dimensions were related to cultural
dimensions.
Moreover, researchers began to question the adequacy of SERVQUAL to capture
cultural dimensions, suggesting a need for culturally specic measures of service
quality (Winsted, 1997; Witkowski and Wolnbarger, 2001; Raajpoot, 2004; Kueh and
Voon, 2007). Witkowski and Wolnbarger (2001, p. 153) found that in countries such as
Thailand and Japan, formality (dened as interpersonal communications, both verbal
and non-verbal, that express courtesy and proper etiquette and maintain social
distance) is a discriminable dimension of service quality and should be included in
SERVQUAL. To fully capture this formality service quality dimension, Raajpoot
(2004) developed a culturally sensitive service quality measurement scale (PAKSERV)
that was an extension of SERVQUAL. Raajpoot (2004) established internal reliability
and discriminant validity for the multi-item scale in Pakistan. Despite this research,
Kueh and Voon (2007) and Ladhari (2008) advocate that further research into culture
and service quality is desirable and that adapted SERVQUAL measurement scales
require continued validation in different cultural contexts.
The objective of this research is threefold. First, from a modelling perspective, the
researcher seeks to conrm that the PAKSERV service quality construct is valid in an
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African cultural context. While Raajpoot (2004) would argue that PAKSERV is only
suited for use in an Asian culture, this studies seeks to conrmthat the study is valid in
other cultural contexts. Once the PAKSERV service quality construct is conrmed, the
researcher then proceeds to the second objective which is to apply the instrument to
the banking sector in an African cultural context to determine the relative importance
of the dimensions in inuencing customers overall service quality perceptions. Finally,
the researcher measures perceived service quality across the service dimensions,
before statistically testing the perceived difference in service quality across the main
banking groups in South Africa. The study will conclude by providing
recommendations and directions for future research in international services
marketing.
Service quality and culture
Pioneering research by Parasuraman et al. (1988) suggested that perceived service
quality is based on multi-dimensional factors relevant to the context. Parasuraman et al.
(1988) research identied ve dimensions of service quality that customers rely on to
form their judgement of perceived service quality. These are:
(1) Reliability: ability to perform the promised service dependably and accurately.
(2) Responsiveness: willingness to help customers and provide prompt service.
(3) Assurance: employees knowledge and courtesy and their ability to inspire trust
and condence.
(4) Empathy: caring, individualised attention given to customers.
(5) Tangibles: appearance of physical facilities, equipment, personnel, and written
materials (Zeithaml et al., 2006, p. 117).
A scale, known as SERVQUAL, was developed to operationalise the ve dimensions of
perceived service quality. This scale is probably the most popular service quality scale
used in the United States and Europe, despite some of the criticism it has received for
conceptual and operational shortcomings (Babakus and Boller, 1992; Cronin and
Taylor, 1992; Teas, 1993; Brady and Cronin, 2001). The extensive reviews and critiques
of SERVQUAL are adequately summarised by Buttle (1996), Morrison-Coulthard
(2004) and Ladhari (2008).
While the theoretical link between customers perception of service encounters and
the cultural context is not new, there is some disagreement amongst researchers on
SERVQUALs adequacy in capturing cultural differences. In this regard, researchers
could potentially be placed into two distinct groups.
First, researchers that hold that the SERVQUAL dimensions adequately capture the
service quality dimensions for all cultures, even though different cultures interpret the
dimensions somewhat differently (Malhotra et al., 1994; Akan, 1995; Donthu and Yoo,
1998; Furrer et al., 2000; Kueh and Voon, 2007; Tsoukatos and Rand, 2007). They
explain these different interpretations through Hofstedes (1980) dimensions of
national cultures. In other words, perceptions of service quality are dened by each
cultures position on Hofstedes dimensions. For example, Western consumers are more
likely to rely on tangible cues to evaluate service quality (such as the appearance of
physical facilities), whereas Asian consumers are more likely to rely on empathy cues
(Mattila, 1999). While these studies accept the SERVQUAL dimensions, they do
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highlight the need to interpret the impact that cultural differences may have on the
evaluation of service encounters and to emphasise the dimensions of service quality
accordingly. For example, Malhotra et al. (2005) found that perceptions of service
quality were signicantly different between the USA and both India and the
Philippines. The USA was selected as an example of a developed country that has an
individualistic society (based on Hofstedes dimensions) while India and the
Philippines were selected as examples of developing countries that have collective
societies.
Second, researchers that hold that the SERVQUAL dimensions do not entirely
capture the service quality dimensions for non-Western cultures and recommend the
use of culturally specic service quality dimensions (Winsted, 1997; Imrie et al., 2002;
Raajpoot, 2004). Winsted (1997) conducted a study to determine how consumers
evaluate service encounters within the USA and Japanese restaurant industry. A key
nding was to identify a set of relational dimensions including genuineness of
behaviour, perceived control, courtesy and formality which are not adequately
captured by SERVQUAL.
Imrie et al. (2002) conducted a qualitative study to develop a conceptual model
depicting the service quality construct in a non-North American context. Ethnic
Chinese within Taiwan were chosen as the sample population as the Chinese broadly
display the opposite cultural characteristics to North Americans (based on Hofstedes
cultural dimensions). The ndings conrmed four of the ve SERVQUAL dimensions
but failed to conrm the empathy dimension. The empathy dimension (i.e. caring,
individualised attention given to customers) failed to capture the interpersonal
relationships that play a central role in Chinese life and business. Instead, Imrie et al.
(2002) identied another dimension, tentatively entitled the Confucian relational ethic.
This dimension was reected by the supposed Confucian values of sincerity, politeness
and generosity.
Raajpoot (2004) adapted and extended SERVQUAL, so developing a culturally
sensitive multiple-item scale (PAKSERV) consisting of six dimensions and 24 items
to measure service quality in a Pakistani cultural context.
The PAKSERV ndings conrmed SERVQUAL dimensions of tangibility,
reliability and assurance but replaced responsiveness and empathy with three new
dimensions:
(1) Sincerity: consumers evaluation of the genuineness of the service personnel.
(2) Formality: consumers evaluation of social distance, form of address and ritual.
(3) Personalisation: consumers evaluation of customisation and individualised
attention.
Raajpoot (2004) research appears to verify the premise that cultural dimensions of
service quality are important when customers evaluated service encounters. Not only
did customers use the three new (cultural) dimensions to evaluate service quality, but
their interpretations of the conrmed SERVQUAL dimensions were also quite
different. Raajpoot (2004) indicated that the implication from his research is that
service companies not only need to include cultural dimensions when measuring
service quality but also need to be open and aware of different interpretations of the
more common dimensions. For example, in Pakistan, reliability was interpreted as the
ability to perform a promised service within an appropriate timeframe, accepting that
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there may be service failure during this time period. In other words, there was a level of
tolerance during the service delivery period, provided that the appropriate time frame
was adhered to (Raajpoot, 2004). This interpretation is quite different to the generally
accepted interpretation amongst service managers that reliable service must be
accurate (Zeithaml et al., 2006).
Research design
In order to test and conrm the dimensionality of PAKSERV, the researcher used a
conrmatory factor analysis (CFA). The CFA is appropriate to this study as the
construct (service quality) is well grounded in theory and empirical research. In CFA,
the structural relationship between the items (observed measures) and dimensions
(latent variables or factors) are postulated a priori and then statistically tested.
More specically, CFA tested the hypothesis that service quality is a
multi-dimensional construct composed of the six PAKSERV factors: tangibility,
reliability, assurance, sincerity, personalisation and formality. The 22-item scale
consisted of ve items for tangibility, three items for reliability, four items for assurance,
three items for sincerity, four items for personalisation and three items for formality.
For the purposes of this study Black South Africans who were banking
customers were identied as the cultural unit. Following Farley and Lehmann (1994)
belief that culture is only loosely related to a country state, the study chose to focus on
a specic within-country cultural unit. Moreover, another reason for excluding other
cultural groupings (i.e. Caucasian) in South Africa was to ensure maximally
homogeneous respondents. Homogenous cultural contexts would be preferred in this
type of research, as according to Calder et al. (1981), homogenous units often lead to
stronger tests of a theoretical model than heterogeneous units.
Bankingwas chosenas the service industry, as the bankingsector is considereda major
contributor to the service economy in South Africa and continues to be a vital driver of
economic growth (STATSSA, 2006). Moreover, the banking industry has increasing
began actively marketing its products and services to the Black South African population.
Despite this focus on the banking sector, there has been very little academic research into
the service quality perceptions of Black South African customers.
The sample data were collected through a survey. The survey was conducted
through an anonymous self-completed structured questionnaire. The questionnaire
consisted of two parts. The rst part contained questions pertaining to basic
demographics and current usage of banking services. The second part contained 22
statements representing the six PAKSERV dimensions. Respondents were requested,
on a seven-point Likert scale (from strongly disagree to strongly agree), to indicate
their opinion on statements relating to banking service quality.
The questionnaire was administered to a convenience sample of 329 Black South
Africans at a South African banking mall. Convenience sampling was deemed acceptable
for this study as its purpose of this study was to test the PAKSERV scale in a cultural
context that has the potential to refute the theoretical model. In this case, a representative
sample is not required because statistical generalisation of the ndings is not the primary
goal (Calder et al., 1981). All respondents were screened to determine if they were recent
users of banking services. A recent user was classied as someone who had engaged in
banking services in the last three months. This screening process ensured that the
respondents had a bank account and were familiar with the services offered by
their bank. A total of 329 questionnaires were collected, of which 311 were usable.
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Once the data had been collected, it was captured and collated using SPSS. Table I shows
some of the key characteristics of the respondents.
According to Bickman et al. (1998) the collected data are useless unless it is accurate,
valid and reliable. In order to establish both internal and external validity it was
necessary to address the issue of construct validity. Supportive evidence of construct
validity in this case is if the CFA is supported by the theory that the PAKSERV service
quality construct produces six meaningful factors. A popular diagnostic measure of
reliability Cronbachs a coefcient was used to test the consistency of the
construct. For the service quality constructs to be reliable, Hair et al. (2006) afrms that
the generally agreed lower limit for Cronbachs a coefcient is 0.70. For the service
quality construct as a whole, the Cronbachs a was 0.90, exhibiting high reliability.
Model assessment
The goodness-of-t test for the hypothesised model (model 1) is presented in Table II.
The model indicated a signicant x
2
value of 516.98 (df 203), indicating that the model
Per cent
Gender
Male 55.6
Female 44.4
Age
16-20 12.8
21-24 24.8
25-29 23.2
30-34 16.8
35-49 19.0
50-60 3.4
Employment status
Full time 46.6
Part time 22.2
Student 23.5
Retired or employed in the home 1.2
Unemployed 6.5
Education level
No education 1.2
Some primary school 0.9
Primary school completed 0.6
Some high school 10.3
High school completed 29.8
Tech diploma/degree 30.4
University degree 20.7
Other 2.7
Unspecied 0.3
Banking institution
Absa 28.1
First National Bank 32.7
Nedcor 9.0
Standard Bank 25.6
Post Ofce 2.5
Other 0.9
Table I.
Respondent
characteristics
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did not t well. This is supported by the other goodness-of-t tests that also indicated
that the model did not t the data. The RFI and CFI values of 0.797 and 0.775,
respectively, are deemed less than the acceptable value of 0.80. The RMSEA value of
0.075 is also quite high even though it is deemed acceptable. In general, then, there
seems to be some degree of mist in the hypothesised model.
To locate the source of the mist, the modication indexes for covariance (MIs) were
examined. The MI values represent the expected drop in the overall x
2
value if the
parameter were to be freely estimated in a subsequent run. In reviewing the MI values,
only the parameter representing a covariance error between item p2 (err19) and f1
(err22) appears to be of any interest (Figure 1). It indicated that if the model was
re-estimated with this parameter specied as free, the overall x
2
value could drop by at
least 57.75. According to Byrne (2001) error covariance is often an indication of
perceived redundancy in item content. This seemed to be the case as items p2 and f1
appeared to elicit responses that did not make a distinction between being addressed by
name (personalisation construct) and being addressed by title and family name
(formality construct). On the basis that respondents did not make a distinction between
these two items, it was deemed appropriate to re-estimate the model with the error
covariance between items p2 and f1 specied as a free parameter.
The goodness-of-t tests for the re-specied model (model 2) are also presented in
Table II. In comparison with the hypothesised model (model 1) in which no error
covariance was specied, the re-specied model (model 2) yielded an improvement in
the x
2
value to 451.69 (df 202), indicating a better t. This is supported by the other
goodness-of-t tests that also indicate that the model tted the data better. The RFI
value of 0.882 was representative of a reasonable t, whereas the CFI value of 0.906
was considered evidence of a good t. This was supported by the RMSEA value of
0.065, thus indicating that the model ts the sample data and was not mis-specied.
The graphical model is displayed in Figure 1.
In reviewing the estimates for the regression weights (factor loadings) of model 2, it
was found that they were all statistically signicant, suggesting that the factor
loadings are correctly specied and valid. The covariance between the error terms
(err19 and err22) was also signicant with a correlation coefcient of 0.46, suggesting
that not all error terms associated with each item would be uncorrelated. In reviewing
the estimates for the variances it was found that res3 (i.e. the residual item for the
assurance construct) and res4 (i.e. the residual item for the sincerity construct) were not
statistically signicantly. Overall, however, on the basis that the goodness-of-t test
indicates that the model ts well, the adequacy of the unstandardised and standardised
solutions, and little justication for further freeing of parameters, model 2 was
considered to best represent the service quality construct. Construct validity was
therefore inferred as the CFA supported the theory that the service quality construct
produces six meaningful factors.
Model x
2
(df ) x
2
/df Probability RFI CFI RMSEA
Model 1 516.98(203) 2.55 0.000 0.797 0.775 0.075
Model 2 451.69(202) 2.24 0.000 0.882 0.906 0.063
Table II.
Goodness-of-t indexes
for the CFA
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Figure 1.
Service quality model
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construct
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Managerial applications
Three useful applications from the results of the PAKSERV CFA will be discussed in
this section.
Service quality tier structure
The rst useful application is to determine the relative importance of the dimensions in
inuencing customers overall service quality perceptions (Lai et al., 2007). The results
of the CFA illustrated in Figure 2 show that that assurance and sincerity have the
highest factor loadings and could be labelled rst-tier dimensions (i.e. the most
important dimensions in determining customers perceived service quality).
Tangibility has the lowest factor loadings and could be labelled a third-tier
dimension (i.e. the least important dimension in determining customers perceived
service quality), while formality, personalisation and reliability are in between
and could be labelled second-tier dimensions.
Customers perception of service quality
The customers perception of the service quality dimensions were measured and ranked
for all six dimensions. The results presented in Table III indicate that customers
Figure 2.
Service quality tier
structure
Mean SD Mean rank
Tangibility 4.69 1.370 1
Reliability 4.42 1.583 2
Assurance 4.32 1.542 3
Sincerity 4.08 1.699 4
Formality 3.85 1.718 5
Personalisation 3.58 1.701 6
PAKSERV 4.20 1.280
Table III.
Service quality dimension
scores
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perceptions of the tangibility, reliability and assurance dimensions ranked higher than
perceptions of the personalisation, formality and sincerity dimensions. The standard
deviations for the three highest ranked dimensions were also less than that of the three
lowest ranked dimensions. This implies that the responses to the three lowest ranked
dimensions were more widely spread than the three highest ranked dimensions. It is
interesting to note that the three high-ranked dimensions (tangibility, reliability and
assurance) are generic dimensions to both the SERVQUALand PAKSERVinstruments;
while the three low-ranked dimensions (personalisation, formality and sincerity) are the
unique PAKSERV dimensions that replaced the SERVQUAL dimensions of
responsiveness and empathy.
Competitive analysis
Another useful application from the results of the PAKSERV CFA is to compare the
perceptions of service quality across the major banking groups in South Africa in order
to provide the banking groups with suggests for improving service quality relating to
the tier structure (Beach and Burns, 1995). One-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) was
used to test the null hypothesis that the mean service quality across the banking
groups is equal. As over 85 per cent of respondents banked either with Absa, First
National Bank or Standard Bank, it was decided to only test the mean service quality
across these three banking groups.
Table IV shows the results of the one-way ANOVA. The results indicate that the
null hypothesis is not rejected (signicant ,0.05) for all but one service quality
dimension. For the reliability dimension, the null hypothesis is rejected (signicant
,0.05), meaning that there was a signicant mean difference on this dimension across
the three banking institutions. On performing a Bonferroni post-hoc test to determine
which pairs of means are statistically different from each other, it was found that First
National Banks perceived reliability was signicantly less than both Absa and
Standard Bank.
Discussion
A major contribution of this study was to conrm the PAKSERV service quality
construct. The results of the CFA conrmed that PAKSERV is a reliable and valid
measure of service quality in a cultural context outside of Asia, consisting of six
dimensions: tangibility, reliability, assurance, sincerity, personalisation and formality.
Based on the results of the CFA it was possible to classify the relative importance of
the six service quality dimensions into a three-tier structure. The rst-tier included
assurance and sincerity, the second-tier included formality, personalisation
and reliability, while the third-tier included tangibility. This suggests that banks
could better service customers by focusing on assurance and sincerity than on the
tangible dimensions of the servicescape. This nding is consistent with Mattila (1999)
and Lai et al. (2007) whom found that Asian customers placed far less importance on
tangible dimensions than Western consumers. Malhotra et al. (2005) argues that the
reason for this is that consumers in developing countries place more importance on
the core benets of the banking product which cannot be substituted by an agreeable
servicescape. As Bitner (1992) explains, the servicescape inuences higher order
emotions of the customer rather than the lower order core service that is of primary
importance to customers in developing countries. Nevertheless, further investigation
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would be needed to understand why Black South African consumers place low
importance on tangible dimensions of the service encounters.
The results of the summated scores for the six service quality dimensions showed
that Black South African banking customers perceived tangibles to have the highest
score. This means that while Black South African banking customers place less
importance on tangibles, they rate the tangible dimension of the service quality highly.
The results also showed that Black South African banking customers perceived
personalisation to have the lowest score, suggesting that this is an area in which the
banks could improve the service encounter to banking customers. Issues such as
receiving individual attention, being addressed by name, getting immediate attention
and customising solutions to suite the customer are all areas that need to be addressed to
improve the personalisation dimension of service quality. According to Gronroos (2000)
services are inherently relational where personalisation and knowledge of the customer
are the basis of the relationship. The low personalisation scores in this study seem to
conrmMalhotra et al. (2005) ndings that relationship marketing is not emphasised for
developing country customers and that further effort should be made on understanding
and knowing the customer. Gronroos (2000) maintains that service quality measures do
not capture the dynamic nature of relationships and suggests that international service
Sum of squares df Mean square F Signicant
Tangibility
Between groups 5.850 2 2.925 1.568 0.211
Within groups 479.572 257 1.866
Total 485.422 259
Reliability
Between groups 16.223 2 8.112 3.442 0.033
Within groups 622.091 264 2.356
Total 638.315 266
Assurance
Between groups 7.045 2 3.522 1.505 0.224
Within groups 620.184 265 2.340
Total 627.228 267
Sincerity
Between groups 3.472 2 1.736 0.601 0.549
Within groups 757.125 262 2.890
Total 760.597 264
Personalisation
Between groups 2.271 2 1.135 0.395 0.674
Within groups 753.291 262 2.875
Total 755.562 264
Formality
Between groups 0.772 2 0.386 0.135 0.874
Within groups 757.755 265 2.859
Total 758.527 267
PAKSERV
Between groups 3.614 2 1.807 1.126 0.326
Within groups 381.762 238 1.604
Total 385.376 240
Table IV.
One-way ANOVA
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managers need to measure the dynamic nature of relationships by using a relationship
quality measure.
The three high-ranked dimensions (tangibility, reliability and assurance) are generic
dimensions to both the SERVQUAL and PAKSERV instruments; while the three
low-ranked dimensions (personalisation, formality and sincerity) are the unique
PAKSERV dimensions that replaced the SERVQUAL dimensions of responsiveness
and empathy. As personalisation, formality and sincerity were included in
the PAKSERV instrument to specically measure service quality in a culturally
sensitive context, it seems that this is an area that the banking industries needs to
devote resource in order to improve the service encounter for Black South African
banking customers.
The results of the competitive analysis indicated that there was no signicant
difference in perceived service quality across the three most widely used banking
groups other than on the reliability dimension. First National Bank was perceived to be
signicantly worse on reliability than the other two banks. Issues such a keeping
promises, following through on customers instructions and reducing errors on banking
statements are areas that would need to be addressed by First National Bank to
improve the poor perception of reliability. According to Berry et al. (1989) reliability is
the core to service provision and that issues such keeping promises, following through
on customers instructions and reducing errors on banking statements are areas that
should be core prioritises of the service provider. Furthermore, Malhotra et al. (2005)
found that reliability of services could be better established by placing the emphasis on
personnel (high touch) rather than technology (high tech) in developing countries.
Conclusion and directions for future research
While it may not be possible to generalise the point estimates of the various PAKSERV
dimensions beyond the population under study, it is possible to conclude that
the PAKSERV scale is applicable in a variety of real-world situations and contexts.
As the main purpose of the study was to provide further validation of the PAKSERV
scale, this studies major contribution lies in its information about the adequacy of
PAKSERV to capture the cultural dimensions of service quality. Not only does this
study re-enforce the notion that cultural dimensions are important to measuring
service quality, but also maintains that service quality scales need to include cultural
dimensions. While Raajpoot (2004) argues that these dimensions need to be tailored to
specic cultures, this studies rather views these dimensions as generic. In other words,
PAKSERVs cultural dimensions are not necessarily unique to a specic cultural
grouping but may be generic across a variety of countries and cultural contexts.
As Calder et al. (1981) argues, only models or theories that repeatedly survive testing
are candidates for application. While this study has explored some applications of the
PAKSERV instrument, these applications would probably not be generalisable outside
of the banking sector as a major limitation of this study is that PAKSERV was only
validated for the banking sector. To ensure validity across a variety of industries in an
African cultural context, further replication would be needed. Only after a series of
replications across a variety of industries and new samples, could it be concluded that
PAKSERV is absolutely valid (Raajpoot, 2004).
Furthermore, Chowdhary and Prakash (2007) caution that generalisations of
importance of service quality dimensions is not possible among all types of services, as
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different services are structured and delivered in different contexts. Taking this into
consideration, generalisations could possibly only be made for services with similar
contexts. For example, this study was conned to the perceptions of service quality in a
physical banking environment. As banking services are increasingly moving to the
internet and other electronic devices in developed and developing countries, it would be
important to adapt and test the PAKSERV instrument in an e-retail environment.
If the PAKSERV service quality instrument is further validated it could potentially
be a more widely used generic tool for measuring service quality and provide the
impetus for further research into a cross-cultural service quality measure. Further
research could possibly then use the PAKSERV instrument as the basis for linking the
service quality construct to economic and socio-cultural dimensions that Malhotra et al.
(2005) found important to customers evaluation of services.
Managerial implications
Notwithstanding the limitations, the results of this study have been used to
demonstrate a number of practical managerial applications of PAKSERV. While
managers are cautioned not to generalise the results from the applications, they can
begin to measure service quality in a variety of contexts and industries by using a
more culturally sensitive measure. By evaluating service quality dimensions that are
culturally relevant to customers, international service managers could focus on the
dimensions of service quality that are not adequately captured in the generic
SERVQUAL instrument, and so develop service delivery strategies accordingly. Even
in many contexts where there are minority cultural groups, formally recognising and
addressing cultural dimensions could not only improve the service encounter for
culturally diverse customers but also improve the delivery of services to all customers.
As service contexts become more internationally and culturally diverse, a single
international service strategy will become less realistic. PAKSERV provides managers
with a usable tool that is exible enough to develop realistic strategies that are
sensitive to cultural diversity.
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About the author
Stephen Graham Saunders is a senior lecturer at the Department of Marketing, Monash
University, Australia. He previously lectured at the University of Cape Town, South Africa.
His postgraduate studies include a MCom and MBA from the University of the Witwatersrand,
and a DCom from the University of Johannesburg. His research interests include services
marketing, multivariate analysis, and marketing products and services to the urban poor.
Stephen Graham Saunders can be contacted at: stephen.saunders@buseco.monash.edu.au
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