The Perceptions of Restaurant Guests for Dinner Experience: A Study in Kiev, Ukraine

ABSTRACT: The purpose of this thesis is to investigate guests' dining perceptions of the service quality in the restaurants according to their demographic characteristics: gender, age, nationality and education. The aims are to: (1) examine any differences in the guests' service quality perceptions according to the demographic characteristics, (2) identify the most important service quality dimensions (reliability, assurance, empathy, responsiveness and tangibility) that affect on guests' dining perceptions. This study investigates restaurant guests’ dining perceptions by using data that were collected from a sample of guests in the fine-dining restaurants in Kiev, the most visited city in Ukraine. In the methodology part of the study, deductive approach was used. The questionnaire is based on Stevens, Knutson and Patton (1995)'s research. The results indicated that empathy service quality dimension was ranked first as the most important factor influencing guests' perceptions of the service quality in the fine-dining restaurants. Tangibility was ranked second followed by assurance, reliability, and responsiveness. The results show that young people dine out more frequently and pay significant attention to the offered service quality in the restaurants. Local people view all the five dimensions of service quality (tangibility, reliability, responsiveness, assurance, empathy) as important, much more than the international tourists. Local people are more demanding than foreigners. The findings did not reveal any significant differences in terms of the respondents' gender and their perceptions of service quality which is completely opposite to other studies. In addition, managerial implications are provided based on the results of the study, and information regarding the limitations of the study as well as implications for future research is presented in the thesis. Key Words: service quality, perceptions, tangibility, reliability, assurance, empathy, responsiveness. …………………………………………………………………………………………………………