Assessment of Tourist Perception on Service Quality in the Hospitality Industry in Cross River State

Abstract

Quality service has become a serious issue among scholars in the hotel industry. This arises due to the fact that operators of the industry still find it difficult to understand what a tourist needs “are” at a particular time. This paper critically examines tourist perception in the hotel industry, with specific reference to the joint contribution of the various service quality dimensions, variables to tourist satisfaction in the industry. This research adopted the Parasurama, Berry and Zeithan (1988) method in evaluating tourist perception of service quality in the hotel industry. Three hypotheses were test and the result shows that tourist were not satisfied with the service quality provided by the operators of the hotel industry in Calabar. According to Chu (2001) the success of the hotel industry depends on the quality of services provided by the operators of the industry. Therefore, it is very important for the operators of the industry to understand the expectation of the tourist if the industry must strive effectively. Key words: Service quality, tourist, perception, hotel industry, expectation.