Interview: Qualitative Study of Customer Satisfaction and Service Quality in

Indian Domestic Airlines:

I’ve taken this interview of a young guy aged 28. His name is Vishal Raj. He is an IT
professional working with HCL as a project manager. His has done B-Tech in electronic and
communication and MBA in marketing and finance. His total experience of 5 years with HCL.
He mostly travels to Delhi, Chennai, Kolkata and Patna. On an average he takes
approximately 8 flights in a year. He mostly travels for either business purpose or family
visit.

His travel plan (family visit) is flexible with respect to ticket price. He does adjust travel
dates if he finds cheaper ticket on nearby dates.

But his business trips are insensitive with respect to ticket price. Because business trips are
critical and travel dates can’t be altered. He decides his airlines on the basis of best suited
availability with respect to departure and arrival time. Air fare doesn’t bother here.

Below airlines are his most preferred airlines for domestic trips.
 Jet Airways
 Vistara
 Air India
 Indigo
Although these are the most preferred airlines of the interviewee. But if he finds any other
airlines available at least a thousand rupee cheaper or more, he would prefer to travel with
the cheaper flight.

The most influencing factors in airlines services which decides the satisfaction of the
interviewee are-
 Free meal
 Inflight Services
 Air Fare
 Baggage Handling
Interviewee told some more factors which he experienced in his favorite airlines and if any
other airlines deliver the same would be counted in his favorite list.

 Inflight services- like free and tasty meals, caring and co-operative attendants
 Availability of flight attendants good and adequate.
 Courtesy and appearance of flight crews was so delightful.
 Air-fare is quite reasonable
 Ground services are better (ticketing, baggage handling, check-in etc.)
 The experience while boarding the aircraft
 Express baggage/ Seat check-in counter was really quick
 Pilot’s communication with passengers was really eloquent-
 He was talking about-
 His introduction and experience.
 The temperature inside and outside.
 At what height we were flying
 What the maximum speed of the flight was and what speed it was flying.
 Comfortable seats and most of the time got isle seat in the first row without any
charges.
 Cleanliness of aircraft
 Noise level of aircraft was low.
 No turbulence experienced ever.
 Hygiene toilets.
 Easy availability of tickets and booking.
 Refund at cancellation option was available.
The interviewee had some bad experience with other flights which are given as below-

 Bad inflight service- Availability of attendants were not good.

 Flight crew was not as polite as expected.
 Food was not good.
 The pilot was not communicating well with the passenger.
 Baggage handling was so pathetic and it caused damaged luggage.
 The wheel of the luggage was broken.
 Once the guitar was broken even though it was kept in the wooden case, due to mis-
handling. And there was no provision of claiming against any damage to your
luggage.