Customer satisfaction in public bus transport :: A study of travellers perception in Indonesia

BUDIONO, Oktiani Astuti, Prof. Dr. Ir. Siti Malkhamah, M.Sc

2009 | Tesis | S2 Magister Sistem dan Teknik Transportasi

An increase in population generates increasing in travel demand. Indonesia as one of the most populated countries in the world after China, India, and USA that face a large number of travel demands. Nowadays, Indonesia deals with an explosive growth in vehicle ownership and utilization. An increased road length and new roads generate faster and longer trips, more trips by car and higher car ownership all of which adds up to more traffic congestion and pollution. Public transport is an important solution for this problem. Public transport operators are forced to place emphasis on the monitoring and improvements of the services provided in an attempt to address the increasing rate of car ownership. This study focuses on traveler’s satisfaction with service quality attributes. Using self rate questionnaire to investigate overall customer satisfaction and factor that influence public transport users’ satisfaction. Data were analyzed using descriptive, correlation, factor and regression analysis. One main finding reported that customer was not satisfied yet with public transport service (M=2.5, SD=0.9). The correlation analysis reported frequency (r=0.50, p=0.001), comfort travel by bus (r=.49,p=0.001), on board security (r=0.48,p=0.001),and travel time (r=0.48,p=0.001), were top four factors that positively correlated with overall satisfaction. Factor analysis grouped fourteen specific service quality attributes into two factors, functional and soft factor. Both functional quality factor and soft quality factor demonstrated significant effect on overall customer satisfaction with public transport in Indonesia. The standardized regression coefficient reported that functional quality factors (β=0.393, p=0.001) that consisted of frequency, price, punctuality and travel time, played stronger influence on overall customer satisfaction than soft factor (β=0.288, p=0.001). It is highly recommended to pay more attention on functional factor in order to improve and develop attractive and marketable public transport. From regression analysis suggested that two factor measured only have low influence on overall customer satisfaction, and it is interesting to investigate another original factor from Indonesia perspectives that also has influenced the overall satisfaction. To enrich and give the perspective in local level, data analysis also carried out for both cities; Jakarta and Yogyakarta. The results suggested similar result with the main finding. This means that so far, the condition is remain similar because customer in both cities evaluate that public bus transport were not satisfied.

Kata Kunci : Customer satisfaction,Attributes of service quality,Public transport