Service quality, Customer Satisfaction, Re-Purchase Behaviour: Empirical Evidence from the Mass Road Transport Sector in a Developing Economy

Abstract

This paper employs the SERVQUAL model as theoretical lens to explore the effect of service quality on consumer repurchase behaviour through customer satisfaction. The study develops a theoretical model to explore the dimensions of service quality through customer satisfaction indicators on consumer repurchase behaviour. A survey of a sample of 300 passengers of key private bus operators in Ghana, a developing nation in Africa was conducted to test the research model. Structural equation modelling (SEM) techniques were used to analyse the data and test the model. The results revealed that when the effects of price system and income level are controlled, the effect of service quality on re-purchase intent is mediated by passenger satisfaction and that an individual’s purchase decision to reuse the services of an operator in the industry is not only significantly determined by service quality but also the level of satisfaction derived from using the transport services. There was confirmation of extant literature that if passengers have a positive assessment of a transport operator’s operations in terms of service quality, they would be more likely to be satisfied with the services delivered.  The findings suggest that in developing economies, passenger’ decisions to repurchase a transport operator’s service might not necessarily be influenced by the satisfaction gained from the service quality measures but by other factors. To the best of the researchers’ knowledge, this study is the first to empirically test the effect of service quality on consumer repurchase behaviour in Sub-Saharan Africa using SEM techniques