A quality function deployment strategy for improving mobile-government service quality in the Gulf cooperation council countries

An application of quality function deployment and SERVQUAL approaches to enhance the service quality in radiology centres

Purpose

Meeting the patients' requirements as customers of the health care sector is crucially important as a social responsibility. According to the resource constraints, only an efficient utilisation of health services can provide that purpose. This study aims to develop a quantitative assessment framework for radiology centres as a vital section in healthcare to translate the patients' requirements into service quality specifications. This would help to achieve quality improvement by emphasising the voice of customers.

Design/methodology/approach

A literature review is conducted to specify the service quality criteria and the patients' requirements related to healthcare and hospitals. Based on the experts' opinions, these criteria and requirements are later customised for the radiology centres. Moreover, the requirements are categorised into five dimensions of SERVQUAL. The interrelations between service elements are also determined through expert group consensus using Pearson correlation. Afterwards, by applying the QFD method, the relations between the requirements and criteria are explored. Additionally, a customer satisfaction survey is executed in Tehran public hospitals to prioritise these requirements and provide an importance-satisfaction analysis.

Findings

Based on the result of the case study, service elements are prioritised for improvement, and practical suggestions are provided using the Delphi technique for quality improvement. In addition, a cause-and-effect diagram is presented to highlight the improvement area and provide enhancement suggestions.

Originality/value

This study is the first empirical attempt to benefit from the VOC in evaluating and enhancing the quality of service delivered to radiology patients. In doing so, the study applies a hybrid approach of QFD and SERVQUAL as well as other tools to highlight the improvement area and provide enhancement suggestions. The findings can be readily used by the practitioners.

Website analytics for government user behavior during COVID-19 pandemic

Purpose

The present study aims to clarify the following two research objectives: (1) the user behavior of government websites during the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) period and (2) how the government improved government's website design during the COVID-19 period.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors used website analytics to examine usage patterns and behaviors of the government website via personal computer (PC) and mobile devices during the COVID-19 pandemic. In-depth interviews were conducted to understand the user experience of government website users and to gather users' opinions about how government websites should be redesigned.

Findings

With the rising of the COIVID-19 pandemic, most studies expect that the use of government websites through a mobile device will grow astonishingly. The authors uncovered that the COVID-19 pandemic did not increase the use of government websites. Instead, severe declines in website usage were observed for all device users with the declines being more pronounced in mobile device users than in PC users. This is an admonitory caveat that reveals public health and pandemic prevention information announced on government websites cannot be effectively transmitted to the general public through official online platforms.

Originality/value

The study highlights the gap in information behavior and usage patterns between PC and mobile device users when visiting government websites. Although mobile devices brought many new visitors, mobile devices are ineffective in retaining visitors and continuous long-term use. The results of localize experience is helpful in the improvement of government website evaluation worldwide.

Mapping the customer centric weather index insurance service design using quality function deployment

Purpose

The present paper aims to propose a framework on weather index insurance (WII) service design by using quality function deployment (QFD).

Design/methodology/approach

This study utilizes QFD technique to propose a customer oriented framework on WII service design. In initial phase, customer and design requirements were gathered to derive the relationship between customers' and managers' voice for construct the house of quality (HOQ). Later on, prioritized customer and design requirements as QFD outcome were utilized to develop the action plan matrix in order to suggest the future action plans.

Findings

This study proposed a customer centric framework on WII service design to address the customer requirements. Findings show that adequate claim payments, hassle free prompt claim payment and transparency in losses computation are prioritized customer requirements with highest importance rating, whereas, accurate claim estimation, claim management system and advancement of technology are prioritized service design necessities with highest importance rating.

Research limitations/implications

The proposed WII service design can enhance the quality of WII service by attain the higher standards of WII service in order to completely satisfy the customers.

Practical implications

The proposed WII service design can provide a solution to the problems faced by WII industry by improve the customer's service experience and satisfaction.

Originality/value

Based on best of author's knowledge, this paper first proposed a framework on WII service design by integrating customer and design requirements by using QFD.

Prioritization of public services for digitalization using fuzzy Z-AHP and fuzzy Z-WASPAS

In this paper, public services are analyzed for implementations of Industry 4.0 tools to satisfy citizen expectations. To be able to prioritize public services for digitalization, fuzzy Z-AHP and fuzzy Z-WASPAS are used in the analysis. The decision criteria are determined as reduced cost, fast response, ease of accessibility, reduced service times, increase in the available information and increased quality. After obtaining criteria weights using fuzzy Z-AHP, health care services, waste disposal department, public transportation, information services, social care services, and citizen complaints resolution centers are compared using fuzzy Z-WASPAS that is proposed for the first time in this paper. Results show that health care services have dominant importance for the digitalization among public services.