Determinants of Customer - Perceived Service Quality in the Albanian Banking Industry

The purpose of this paper is to identify the determinants of customer service quality perceptions and to develop an instrument to measure the level of service quality in Albanian banking industry. For this purpose we use the BSQ instrument and evaluate whether it can be applied in Albanian banks context. The BSQ items are evaluated and new item are added after an extensive and in depth analysis of the literature review published on bank service quality measurements. As a result of this analysis, a modified version of BSQ was created as a measurement scale of bank service quality in Albania. Data were collected through customer surveys conducted in two major cities in Albania, Tirana (the capital city) and Korca. A structured questionnaire was used in face to face interview with 352 retail bank customers. The questionnaire was formulated using BSQ items and items find from the literature review. The collected data were analyzed through tools such as factor analysis and one way ANOVA. This analysis helped to provide the validity and reliability of the modified instrument. The proposed scale comprises 28 items which spans four dimensions: responsiveness and informing, reliability and security, commodities, effective access. The research findings confirm that the BSQ instrument needs to be modified to the cultural context of Albania. Given the limited research done in measuring bank service quality in Albania this study is a significant contribution to the literature. The instrument developed in this study is important to bank managers for evaluating, controlling and improving service quality.