Assessment Of Service Quality And Consumer Satisfaction In A Hungarian Spa

The present analysis was carried out at one of the most important medical tourism service providers, the Hévíz Spa and St. Andrew Hospital for Rheumatic Diseases. The institution provides spa services in two locations: in the medicinal lake of Hévíz and in the 7 pools of the pool spa. The present research carried out a single cross-sectional survey of the service quality and consumer satisfaction both in the lake and in the pool bath. Altogether 300 consumers were surveyed between 27 February and 31 March 2017. The questionnaire included the double list of questions of the SERVQUAL method, about performance and importance of various factors. The customers of the two service locations significantly differ: while the customers of the medicinal lake are mainly guests paying for themselves, 70% of the customers in the pool bath are patients supported by the National Health Insurance Fund. The results of the survey (with 4.64 as the average grade of quality on a 5 – point scale) reflects the high service quality of the spa. Although the difference between the guests and the patients in the evaluation of the importance of various quality factors was not proven, there is a tendency of different ranking of the importance factors and the service quality factors (i.e. reliability, assurance, empathy, responsiveness, tangibles). The graphical representation of the values and importance made it possible to identify the quality factors that require urgent improvement, in order to provide better service quality for both the patients and the guests. Analysis of variance proved that the patients supported by the National Health Insurance Fund were more satisfied at both locations than guests paying for themselves. The high level of patient satisfaction is a very useful fact for the Hévíz Spa, because the level of satisfaction positively affects recommendations. This positive word of mouth promotion is highly valuable considering the fact, that the legislation in Hungary does not allow the promotion of health services.