Comparing perceived and expected service using an AHP model: an application to measure service quality of a company engaged in pharmaceutical distribution

Abstract

Service quality has gained significant attention in the last two decades. Various tools have been developed to measure service quality, the most prominent being the SERVQUAL survey instrument. It has been generally agreed that SERVQUAL and other instruments for measuring service quality are not entirely satisfactory. Recently, the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) has also been applied for measuring service quality. Unfortuantely, applications of SERVQUAL and applications of AHP have not been compatible with each other since the former has traditionally been applied for measuring service quality of a single firm while the latter has usually been applied to compare service quality of more than one firm. In this paper, we have proposed a novel application of AHP so that it can be used to measure service quality of a single firm. The results and feedback received from the respondents indicate that AHP can be advantageously applied to measure service quality of an organization.