Multicriteria satisfaction analysis to analyse passenger perceptions of air travel service quality in Croatia

As people travel by air more often, they become more demanding in the services that they expect and the price that they are willing to pay, which can affect their loyalty to a given airline or airport. Air transport companies must gain and retain customers in order to remain competitive. Here we assessed passenger perceptions of air travel service quality using multicriteria satisfaction analysis (MUSA) that may provide deeper insights into consumer behaviour than previous studies. During a three-year period from 2016 to 2018, we assessed perceptions of air travellers using a survey that asked about air travel experiences within Croatia in the year prior to the year of the survey in order to avoid the influence of current feelings. Then we analysed survey responses using MUSA method and found that overall passenger satisfaction depended strongly on service at the departure airport, which many of our respondents judged to be inadequate. We have additionally fine-tuned the improvement priority list by incorporating passenger demand levels. Our results may help guide efforts at air transport companies to improve service quality and to better understand how passengers perceive their services.