RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN SERVICE QUALITY, CUSTOMER SATISFACTION AND CUSTOMER LOYALTY TOWARDS THE INTRODUCTION OF COMMUTER WOMENS COACH (ktmb)AZLIN ZANARIAH BAHTAR (MILT)

ABSTRACTThis study focuses on the service of public transportation in KLThe main purpose of this study is to identify the level of customer satisfaction & loyalty of women towards the implementation of womens coach.277sets of questionnaires were fully answered obtained from 3 main stations; KL Sentral, Mid valley and Bandar Tasik Selatan.90% were satisfied and satisfied with the service but believe that improvements are needed.

INTRODUCTIONDefinition of transportation: ..Movement of people, goods, services and information.. Agunloye & Oduwaye (2011)Public Transportation (PT) is vital in developed and developing countries because it can transport a large number of people especially in the urban area during peak hour Agunloye & Oduwaye, (2011)The existence of PT can reduce the traffic congestion and makes travelling be more conveniet Rohana, Ismah & Che Anizaliana (2002), Yeung (2012), Barabino, Deiana, Tilocca & Barabino (2012) and Mazzulla & Eboli (2006).

ContThe number of passengers increased annually (refer table above) website of KTMB60% of the passengers are women Utusan Online (27 April 2010) & The Star Online (28 April 2010)

Table 1: Number of riders in 3 years

YEARRIDERSHIP201096, 022201197, 531201234, 847, 247

PROBLEM STATEMENTPT is beneficial as it can reduces cost, time and travelling to office is easier.However, as the number of passenger increased, many cases were reported; picked pocket and sexual harassment website of KTMB and The Star Online.Due to that issues, Pink Coach was introduced in 2010 where only women and boys under 12 of age can board it.The purpose is to ensure the safety and make the elderly and pregnant women feel more comfortable.

RESEARCH OBJECTIVESTo examine the relationships between service quality with customer satisfactionTo examine the relationship between service quality with customer loyaltyTo examine the relationship between customer satisfaction with customer loyalty

SCOPE OF STUDYTotal number of passengers of top 5 stations in 2012 were 12, 389, 953 people.300 set of questionnaires were distributed at the top three stations as highlighted in the table.Table 2: Number of riders in 5 main stations

No StationTotal1KL Sentral5, 765, 5572Bandar Tasik Selatan1, 730, 2013Mid Valley1, 706, 4814Serdang1, 666, 4855Kajang 1, 521, 229

FRAMEWORKH1H2H3H4H6H5Figure 1: Framework initiated by Yeung (2012) in her research titled; Relationships among Service Quality, Image, Customer Satisfaction and Loyalty in a Hong Kong Franchised Bus Company.

FRAMEWORKH1H2H3Figure 2: Relationships among Service Quality, Corporate Image of KTMB, Customer Satisfaction and Customer Loyalty towards the Introduction of Commuter Pink Coach (KTMB)

LITERATURE REVIEW SERVICE QUALITY

LITERATURE REVIEW CUSTOMER SATISFACTION

LITERATURE REVIEW CUSTOMER LOYALTY

HYPOTHESES STATEMENTSH1:Service quality has a significant and positive relationship with customer satisfactionH2: Customer satisfaction has a significant and positive relationship with customer loyaltyH3:Service quality has a significant and positive relationship with customer loyalty

RESEARCH METHODOLOGYIt employed a descriptive research where it seeks to describe and to determine the level of relationships between variables.Distributed 300 sets of questionnaires to women commuters but only 277 were fully answered.The sets were distributed at the top three stations; KL Sentral, Bandar Tasik Selatan and Mid ValleyAnalyses used were; Reliability Test, Frequency Distribution, and Correlation Analysis.

FINDINGS RELIABILITY TESTTable 3: Strength of Variables

VariablesCronbachs AlphaN. of ItemsService Quality0.91110Customer Satisfaction0.9818Customer Loyalty0.9727

FINDINGS FREQUENCY DISTRIBUTIONTable 4: Summary of the Women Commuters Demographic Data

ItemsElementsPercentageAge15 207.9%21 2526.7%26 3039.4%31 35 17.7%35 408.3%Marital StatusMarried59.2%Single40.8%OccupationGovernment 14.4%Private Sector53.1%Students23.8%Others8.6%Frequency Everyday17.3%Almost everyday57.4%Once a week5.1%Others 20.2%Years of ExperienceLess than a year10.8%More than a year39.7%More than five years38.3%Others11.2%Awareness of Pink CoachYes98.6%No1.4%What do the women thinkGreat 87.7%Fine12.3%Overall SatisfactionYes 92.1%No7.9%Overall LoyalYes94.4%No5.8%

FINDINGS CORRELATION ANALYSISTable 5: Relationships between Variables** Correlation is significant at the 0.01 level (2-tailed).

Service QualityCustomer SatisfactionCustomer LoyaltyService QualityPearson Correlations10.772**0.725**Sig. (2 Tailed)0.0000.000N277277277Customer SatisfactionPearson CorrelationsSig (2 Tailed)N0.772**0.00027712770.877**0.000277

CONCLUSIONThe purposes of the introduction of the Pink coach are to make women commuters feel safer and a lot more comfortable while they are on board as previously many cases were reported on sexual harassment, pick pocketing and pregnant women were not able to get seats. After four years of the introduction of Pink Coach Commuter, researcher can conclude that women today are satisfied with the service provided but the figures shown do not representing all women commuters.Base on table four, respondents overall satisfaction and loyalty are 92.1% and 94.4% respectively. This data can be supported by figures in table five as the findings showed that the relationships are significant and positive which this indicates that when the quality of service is good, commuters will be satisfied and the satisfaction will lead to loyalty.

RECOMMENDATIONThough that, base on the open ended question, 57.8% respondents said they are fully satisfied with the Pink Coach, 33.9% said they are satisfied but believe that the management can improve the service in future and only 8.3% said they are not satisfied and complaint that men were on the Pink Coach and require the people in charged should monitor this situation more seriously.Although the percentages of dissatisfaction commuters are relatively low, the management of KTMB should address the issues quickly as the figure of 8.3% may increase if there is no necessary actions taken place. The active actions from the management will decrease the level of dissatisfaction and able to stop the spreading of worth of mouth.

THANK YOU&SELAMAT MENYAMBUT RAMADHAN