Value creation involves the creation of products and provision of services, which the customers found to be consistently beneficial.1 And almost all organizations nowadays recognize the importance of creating sustainable value for the customers in the success of the business. In the services industry, hotel services in particular, the critical function in creating value is that of the customer services. The quality of customer service is not only the most visible aspect of organization’s performance but also the customers’ basis whether to buy or not, and whether to remain a customer or not.2 This paper explores the importance of customer service function in a service organization, the Amara Sanctuary Resort Singapore. This specifically aims to: (1) explain how Amara Sanctuary Resort Singapore creates value for its customers; (2) determine the basic factors that shape the customer service function that can exist between a service organization and its customers; and (3) explain which customer service function is the most important for the selected service organization and its target customers (business travelers, family traveler and tourist couple).
Customer value is defined as the difference between the values the customer gains from owning and using a product and the costs of obtaining the product.3 In the case of the Amara Sanctuary Hotel Singapore, customer value is created by ensuring that the hotel guests have wonderful experiences during their stay. Amara Sanctuary Hotel Singapore is a luxury hotel comprising of 140 rooms, three outdoor swimming pools, two on-site restaurants serving Asian cuisines, a spa, as well as a glass pavilion and ballroom. Essentially, the core product of the Amara Sanctuary Hotel is the luxurious bed during the stay in an elegant private room with bathroom. The availability of supplementary services like reception, baggage service, room service, spa service, wake-up call, telephone, broadband internet service, restaurant, and recreation area/swimming pools complete the customer-value-creating bundle of the service organization. Hence, Amara Sanctuary Hotel Singapore creates customer value by providing additional services (of which some are offered free and others carry a charge) that enhance its guests’ visits.4 And apparently, these value-creating services form part of the customer service functions.
There are several factors that influence or shape customer service function. The factors include the role and presence of intermediaries, high and low contact service, capacity constrained services, level of complexity, frequency of use and repurchase, duration of service delivery process. In the lodging services industry, the first three are shapes customer service functions. The intermediaries are responsible for volume business for hotels. They specialize in certain functions in the service delivery process that likely result in efficient production as well as distribution of services. For instance, travel agents5 play a significant role as intermediary especially in booking/placing of leisure and corporate travelers (especially those who avail package tours) to hotels for their lodging accommodations. Another factor is the high and low contact service. Hotel service is a high contact service, that is, it involves significant interaction among customers, service personnel and equipment and facilities.6 Moreover, hotel service is characterized to have hard capacity constraint that is, the hotel as service provider’s ability is constrained or limited to serve its customers. As the hotel reaches its accommodation capacity for a given day/period, it can no longer serve/accept additional guests.
The researcher’s target customers for the chosen service organization (Amara Sanctuary Hotel Singapore) are the business travelers, family traveler and tourist couple. Given the needs and demands of these target customers, the most importance factor that affects customer service function would be the presence of intermediaries, particularly the travel agents. The travel agents’ access to valuable markets as well as their expertise in dealing with travelers ease up the load of work for hotel representatives. As a result, customer service functions are focused serving guests promptly and bringing and booking guests to the hotel becomes the concern of travel agents. Next to the most important customer service function is the restaurant service. The Amara Sanctuary Hotel Singapore operates two on-site restaurants that serve Asian cuisines. With this supplementary service, the hotel could attract more guests by providing additional restaurant services other than serving Asian dishes. The restaurant service could be made as one of the main attractions of the hotel that caters for business meetings, family gatherings, and small special occasions (anniversary).
Overall, customer service function is essential in the success of a service organization. Effective and efficient performing customer service is perceived as the key in creating value for customers that in turn result to customers purchase and re-purchase of the organization’s product and sustainable profit for the service organization in the long run.
Works Cited
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Bennett, Marion and Buhalis, Dimitrios. “Tourism and Travel Distribution: The Travel Agent’s Perspective. Insights.org.uk. January 2003. http://www.insights.org.uk/articleitem.aspx?title=Tourism+and+Travel+Distribution%3A+the+Travel+Agent%2527s+Perspective
“Customer Service.” Businessballs.com. Accessed November 2, 2012. http://www.businessballs.com/customer_service.htm.
Lovelock, Christopher and Wright, Lauren. Principles of Service Marketing and Management. (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 2002). http://wps.pearsoncustom.com/wps/media/objects/4172/4272985/Ch03.pdf.
O’Malley, Paul. “Value Creation and Business Success.” Pegasus Communications, Inc. Accessed November 2, 2012. http://www.pegasuscom.com/levpoints/valuecreate.html.
Naumann, E. “Creating Customer Value” (A White Paper). Accessed November 1, 2012. http://naumann.com/whitepaper.pdf.
