Internal service quality in the Malaysian telecommunication industries

Abstract

Internal service quality reflects the service quality of an organization. The telecommunications industry, facing rapid technological changes and varied customer demands, nonetheless, would find this approach useful in attaining the service quality improvements. The Service Profit Chain concept was adapted to show the relationship between internal customer service quality and internal customer satisfaction (employee satisfaction). Thirty branches or service centres of telecommunications companies participated in the survey, of which 182 of 399 (45.61%) respondents returned the questionnaires. The survey questionnaire was constructed, based on the SERVPERF. The range of scale from one to eight was selected to give the respondents a greater differentiation in the responses, as well as to avoid potential problems in interpreting purely verbal answers. The resultant dimensions from this study were interpersonal relationship, internal customer orientation, internal support systems, work climate, adequate tools, and rewards and recognitions. The results of the study provided the basics of the internal service quality requirements for the telecommunications industry in Malaysia. Interpersonal relationship was found to be the most important dimension, proving that the Malaysian telecommunications companies need to look into this aspect for internal service quality improvements. The significance of using the mean was to show the degree of importance of the dimensions, as well as the level of internal customer satisfaction. The overall internal customer service quality and employee satisfaction for the industry were average. The study carried out could provide a benchmark for service quality improvements in the telecommunications companies, so that eventually customer satisfaction and the resultant profitability could be attained.