Exploring the Drivers of Customer Satisfaction in Service Industry: The Case Study of Student Dormitories in the City of Zagreb

Customer orientation is a fundamental principle of modern companies, and is the backbone of the quality management system. Therefore, service companies must find ways to monitor changes in the user environment and predict demand and emerging needs of users. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the factors that influence customer satisfaction with the dormitory service in the city of Zagreb. An empirical study based on the Servqual method was conducted to determine the level of satisfaction, future intentions, and perceived quality of dormitory services. A total of 321 users from the six dormitories in the city of Zagreb participated in the survey. Principal component analysis was used to define the key dimensions of service quality and satisfaction, followed by independent samples t-test or one-way comparison between groups to analyze the influence of personal aspects on customer perception. The results did not support a unified structure of service quality with five dimensions, but service quality is divided into technical and functional quality. The results reported in the study draw attention to the importance of customer satisfaction and point to improvement measures that can be implemented to improve the quality of student dormitories in the Republic of Croatia and elsewhere.