Port Service Quality and Customer Satisfaction
Summary
Global maritime trade relies heavily on efficient and reliable port operations. Port service quality encompasses the spectrum of logistical, technical and relational services provided at terminals, including crane operations, customs clearance, berth availability and cargo handling. Customer satisfaction reflects shippers’ and carriers’ perceptions of performance against expectations across dimensions such as responsiveness, reliability, assurance, empathy and tangible resources. High service quality fosters competitive advantage, reduces turnaround times and underpins supply chain resilience. Recent advances in evaluative methodologies have enabled ports to quantify service gaps, align strategic investments and tailor offerings to diverse stakeholder requirements. Emerging digital platforms, automation and integrated information systems are reshaping the customer experience, while sustainability pressures and regulatory changes demand adaptive quality-management frameworks. Ongoing research explores novel measurement models, the interplay between technical performance and relational factors, and the translation of quality metrics into operational improvements and customer loyalty.
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Port Service Quality and Customer Satisfaction publication trend
The graph below shows the total number of articles in port service quality and customer satisfaction across all publications each year (not limited to Nature Index journals).
Technical terms
SERVQUAL model: A multidimensional framework measuring service quality through five dimensions—tangibility, reliability, responsiveness, assurance and empathy—by identifying gaps between perceptions and expectations.
Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM): A statistical technique for modelling complex relationships among observed and latent variables, often used to assess the impact of service quality dimensions on customer satisfaction.
Consistent Fuzzy Preference Relation (CFPR): A decision-making method that integrates fuzzy logic and pairwise comparisons to derive consistent priority rankings in multi-criteria evaluations.
Importance-Performance Analysis: A diagnostic tool that plots attributes by their importance to stakeholders against their current performance to identify priorities for quality improvement.
References
- Evaluation of Transshipment Container Terminals’ Service Quality in Vietnam: From the Shipping Companies’ Perspective. Sustainability (2019).
- Evaluation of Seaport Service Quality in Tanzania: From the Dar es Salaam Seaport Perspective. Sustainability (2021).
- Importance-performance analysis of port’s services quality form perspective of containerized liner shipping. Management Science Letters (2013).
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