CHALLENGES TO PROVISION OF QUALITY CUSTOMER SERVICE IN RECORDS MANAGEMENT
Ayu
Ashrida Dorahim
Faculty
of Information Management
Universiti
Teknologi MARA
Puncak
Perdana Campus
ayuashhh@gmail.com
ABSTRACT
This paper
proposes the challenges faced in records management organization in order to
provision of quality customer service. The concept of service quality influence
customer satisfaction is the crucial for the success of records management
organization. This paper presents the challenges for such behavior involving
lack of awareness, risk and security, organizational and personnel problem and
growth in technology. It is hoped that the study will inform development in the
area of records management to serves customers satisfaction and the quality
itself.
Keywords:
quality
services, customer services, challenges of customer services, provision of
quality service, records management
INTRODUCTION
Andreassen T. W. (2001) mentions that customer
satisfaction can be viewed as an evaluation where expectations and actual
experience is compared. A service failure is when the service delivery does not
manage to meet customer expectations. Often service recovery begins with a
customer complaint. The aim with service delivery is to move customers from a
state of dissatisfaction to a state of satisfaction. When a consumer or customer
is contented with either the product or services it is termed satisfaction.
Satisfaction can also be a person’s feelings of pleasure or disappointment that
results from comparing a product’s perceived performance or outcome with their
expectations (Kotler & Keller, 2009).
According to Schiffman & Karun (2004) customer
satisfaction is defined as “the individual’s perception of the performance of
the products or services in relation to his or her expectations” (Schiffman
& Karun 2004). In a nutshell, customer satisfaction could be the pleasure
obtained from consuming an offer. Measuring customer satisfaction could be very
difficult at times because it is an attempt to measure human feelings. It was
for this reason that some existing researcher presented that “the simplest way
to know how customers feel, and what they want is to ask them” this applied to
the informal measures (Levy, 2009; NBRI, 2009). Gibson (2005) found in his
studies that satisfied customers become repeat purchasers of a product or
service and provide positive word of mouth. That means that it is important to
understand what factors that influences customer satisfaction in order to
create good products or services. Zeithmal and Bitner (2003) expands this
discussion and describes that there is an overwhelming interest in service
quality and the reason for that is that both practitioners and researchers
believe that quality is crucial for the success of any business organization.
Ekinci (2002) argues that the term expectation
in service quality literature has different meanings for different authors.
According to Tam (2005), it is important for success in influencing customer
satisfaction to understand how customer expectations develops and update even
if the term expectation is vague and difficult to interpret in surveys. Kandampully
(2000) argues that the management of these customer expectations is also an
imperative concept in tourism companies for further products and services
designed to match and exceed those expectations. Butcher and Heffernan (2006)
discuss the relationship between customer and employees and that social regard
plays an important role in service delivery, for example in a situation where a
customer has to wait. A number of studies have shown the importance of friendly
behaviour from the staff in order to improve service delivery and create long
term relationships.
Chang (2008) describes that the concept of
service quality should be generally approached from the customer’s point of
view because they may have different values, different ground of assessment,
and different circumstances. According to the work of Kumra (2008), service
quality is not only involved in the final product and service, but also
involved in the production and delivery process, thus employee involvement in
process redesign and commitment is important to produce final tourism products
or services.
Another research study on service quality is
presented by Grönroos (2007) who focuses on a model that is a comparison
between customer expectations of the service and their experience of the
service they have received before. An author defines service as “any intangible
act or performance that one party offers to another that does not result in the
ownership of anything” (Kotler & Keller, 2009). In all, service can also be
defined as an intangible offer by one party to another in exchange of money for
pleasure. Quality is one of the things that consumers look for in an offer,
which service happens to be one (Solomon 2009). Quality can also be defined as
the totality of features and characteristics of a product or services that bear
on its ability to satisfy stated or implied needs (Kotler et al., 2002). It is
evident that quality is also related to the value of an offer, which could
evoke satisfaction or dissatisfaction on the part of the user.
In relating customer satisfaction and service
quality, researchers have been more precise about the meaning and measurements
of satisfaction and service quality. Satisfaction and service quality have
certain things in common, but satisfaction generally is a broader concept,
whereas service quality focuses specifically on dimensions of service. (Wilson
et al., 2008). Although it is stated that other factors such as price and
product quality can affect customer satisfaction, perceived service quality is
a component of customer satisfaction (Zeithaml et al. 2006). This theory
complies with the idea of Wilson et al. (2008) and has been confirmed by the
definition of customer satisfaction presented by other researchers.
CHALLENGES
IN RECORDS MANAGEMENT
Lack of
Awareness
There is a need of
providing education to all employees on the importance of records and its
resulting cost so that each one may take part in efforts towards improvement of
records management in the public sector. Wamukoya (2000: 30) argues that “It is
the duty of records managers and archivists to make public servants and the
general public aware of the importance of information in general and records in
particular in supporting decision making, accountability and good governance”.
It is of the opinion that such awareness raising programs be provided to
employees frequently for on-job employees in the form of seminars and as
orientation course for newly employed individuals. The study of Lyaruu, T.
(2007) revealed that there was general lack of awareness of the importance of
records among employees and this contributed towards restraining efforts of
improving management of records in ministries and departments. The study noted
that, such situation is contributed by the fact that ministries and department
lacked awareness raising to their employees not only on the sensitivity of
records, but also on the duty and responsibility of each employee to contribute
in giving accurate and complete records as well as managing their own records.
Risk and
Security
By records management nature, vital documents contain
important and often confidential information. Securing that information can be
a challenge. Chris Mackechnie (n.d.) explained that, some companies keep vital documents in locked storage,
accessible only to authorized personnel. Policing access, maintaining access
logs and assigning authority levels only add to the cost of storing the
documents. Once the document is signed out, there is little the organization
can do to ensure the file remains confidential and is not shared on purpose or
accidentally with anyone else in the company or outside of it. Martin C.
Kimario (2014) stated that in developing the records disaster recovery plan,
record center should assess the varying intensity of each risk to which their
records may be subject. Risks may range from minor flooding affecting perhaps
only one or two offices in a facility to a major fire that may cause
significant damage to the entire facility and its contents. In addition, Ohio
State University (2015) mentioned that there is a greater risk for potential
security breaches and damage via virus attacks and also significant risks of
records loss or damage due to instability of storage media
Technology
The system also faces
major technological hurdles. Today some of the most important decision-support
documents are in the form of multimedia computer slide presentations and
spreadsheets, which have assumptions embedded within the electronic version
that are not easily amenable for printing out. The problems related to saving
such important types of records are typically not addressed, and so the records
are lost (Martin C. Kimario, 2014). New technology trends have made the
challenge of modernization more complex as well. According to Lauren Horwitz
(2014) the proliferation of information, with an array of new formats for unstructured data such as video, audio and social
media conversations also the wide dispersal of data on mobile devices and in
the cloud have also pushed records management out of the physical realm, but
without a larger mandate for a well-managed digital future. Ohio State
University (2015) stated that the documents and records created are dependent
upon technology to interpret them and more often than not, they are dependent
upon specific hardware and software system combinations, some which are
proprietary and unique.
Organizational and
personnel problems
Personnel records management is important in all
organizations. Often an employee has left the organization, in order to protect
ongoing rights and interests of the employee and the organization. According to
Sanderson & Ward (2003) the importance of records management is increasingly
being recognized in organizations. It is therefore the responsibility of
records managers to ensure that they gain the attention of decision-makers in
their organizations. Gaining recognition is all about convincing management of
the role of records management as enabling unit in an organization. Employees
require information in order to carry out their official duties and
responsibilities efficiently and effectively in a transparent manner. Records
represent major sources of information and are almost the only reliable and
legally verifiable source of data that can serve as evidence of decisions,
actions and transactions in an organization (Wamukoya, 2000). According to
Northwest Territories (2002) the role of records management is to ensure that
members of staff involved in different operations have the information they
need, when necessary.
The record center must
ensure their staff should have adequate experience levels and combined of
skills not only in its new information technology positions, but also in the
computer science, information and content management, business systems
analysis, large-scale procurement, communications and organization-change
management, training and project management staffs because it relate to
technical issues (Martin C. Kimario, 2014). According to the State of Montana,
Montana Historical Society (2002) and Hounsome (2001), lack of qualified staff
such as a records manager and archivist. Also the experience and qualification
of the existing staff is suitable for manaing a records management programme
will cause organizational problems.
Growing size of the
archival collection
The machinery of government embracing both bureaucratic
and political institutions in a climate of democratic government is creating
huge volumes of records for reasons of administrative necessity, efficiency and
accountability. There are lacks of affordable tools to appropriately and
effectively manage electronic records. Without effective tools and/or
institutional polices and guidelines for filing and managing records, the
usability, locatability and accessibility to the records may be compromised
(Ohio State University, 2015). This problem makes the record center to provide
more storage area. It’s including in term of cost. Otherwise, the causes of
unmanaged problem are because the record center operation do not followed the
right procedures and ignore the values of records. Martin C. Kimario (2014)
stated that, the task of scheduling, transferring, arranging and describing on
a government-wide basis presents definite difficulties. The general situation
in the judicial system, for example, is the large accumulation of inactive
records and an increasing output of new active records which combine to create
a serious storage problem in court registries.
CONCLUSION
AND RECOMMENDATIONS
From the study concluded that organization must enhance
employees’ capacity in order to improve provision of service quality. The
challenge for records managers then is not only how to set up a records system
that works and that ensures that content needed as records can be protected, organized
and subject to retention rules. The challenge is also the records system in
such a way that as the business wishes to adopt applications or technologies it
can and these application or technologies can become part of the records system
rather than sitting apart from it. Therefore, to exceed customer expectations,
it is necessary for records management organization to continually improve the
quality of service provided to its customers.
In order to bridge the gap between customers’ perceptions
of service delivery in records management organizations, records management
department needs to provide more training to the records manager to enhance
their customer service skills. The training should focus on records manager
ability to help customers resolve their queries and problems quickly. In the
process of resolving such problems, they should show a caring, courteous
attitude and a sincere interest in helping customers. Furthermore, records manager
should improve their knowledge and skills so that they can provide a fast and
reliable service to their customers.
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