EXPLORING THE DIMENSIONS OF SERVICE QUALITY IN CUSTOMER SATISFACTION TOWARDS MUSLIM FRIENDLY HOTELS IN MALAYSIA

Abstract

The rising demand for Muslim-friendly hospitality, mainly in hotel services has a substantial impact on our tourism industry. Most Muslim guests prefer to stay at Muslim-friendly hotels because they provide the services and facilities for Muslim guests to practice their religion as well as enjoy their stay. A highly satisfied customer with excellent service quality provided by the hotel will be influenced to choose the same hotel for their next visit. Given the limited studies of the service quality in Muslim-friendly hotels, the present study was carried out to explore the dimensions of service quality in customer satisfaction towards the hotels that provide Muslim-friendly services in Malaysia. A quantitative study in this research utilized a convenience sampling method. The respondents were among 461 Muslims in Klang Valley area that had stayed at hotels offering Muslim-friendly services in Malaysia. To address the research objective, the data was analyzed using exploratory factor analysis (EFA).  Based on the EFA, the finding revealed five dimensions of service quality, namely: tangibles reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy that have a positive influence on customer satisfaction.