A new customer satisfaction index for evaluating transit service quality

Abstract

In this paper, an index based on customer perspective is proposed for evaluating transit service quality. The index, named Heterogeneous Customer Satisfaction Index, is inspired by the traditional Customer Satisfaction Index, but takes into account the heterogeneity among the user judgments about the different service aspects. The index allows service quality to be monitored, the causes generating customer satisfaction/ dissatisfaction to be identified, and the strategies for improving the service quality to be defined. The proposed methodologies show some advantages compared to the others adopted for measuring service quality, because it can be easily applied by the transit operators.