Complaint Resolution and Grievance Redressal in Hotels

Abstract

The hotel sector is expected to generate 2.3 million jobs in the coming year. The country has moved up 13 positions to 52nd rank from 65th in tourism and travel competitive index. The domestic tourism visits grew by 15.5 per cent during 2016, and foreign tourist arrivals on e-visa has more than doubled to over 10 lakhs. International hotel chains are expanding their investments in India and are likely to account for about 50 per cent of hotel rooms by 2022, from the current 44 per cent. Since 1960, some 15,000 papers were presented across the world discussing guest satisfaction (Ekici et al. 2004, p. 189), but very little attention has been paid to the value perception and expectations guests have towards product delivery and satisfaction. Considering that guest expectations have gone up in the past 30 years and continue to do so, it is not an easy task for hotels to stay competitive and profitable unless they take guest complaints seriously and resolve the issues. Guests are likely to search for evidence of value and satisfaction from three distinct sources: 1. People, 2. Process, and 3. Physical environment. (Petrick, 2004, p.398). Though there are a number of variable paradigms, this paper aims to explore a. The reasons for guest complaints, and 2. The processes hotels apply to resolve the guest complaints. In this background, it is essential to explore and understand the issues concerning guest complaints. This paper primarily aims at understanding (a) what prompts a guest to raise a complaint, (b) what are the various processes open to hotels to resolve them, and (c) how does a fully resolved complaint effect a guest. This will be a qualitative research paper and will involve a survey through a structured questionnaire with random sampling, along with existing literature review.

Keywords: Guest Satisfaction, Complaints, Redressal

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