SATISFACCION DEL CLIENTE

Customer satisfaction has become a vital concern for companies and organizations in their efforts to improve product and service quality, and maintain customer loyalty within a highly competitive marketplace (O’Loughlin and Coenders, 2002). A key motivation for the growing emphasis on customer satisfaction is that higher customer satisfaction can lead to a stronger competitive position resulting in higher market share and profit (Fornell, 1992). Customer satisfaction is also generally assumed to be a significant determinant of repeat sales, positive word-of-mouth and customer loyalty. Satisfied customers return and buy more, and they tell other people about their experiences (Fornell et al., 1996). High consumer satisfaction has many benefits for the firm, such as increased consumer loyalty, enhanced firm reputation, reduced price elasticity,lowercostsoffuturetransactions,andhigheremployeeefficiency(Anderson et al., 1994; Fornell, 1992).

The Jordanian mobile phone sector

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Received 25 January 2011 Revised 23 September 2011 Accepted 5 October 2011

The TQM Journal Vol. 24 No. 6, 2012 pp. 529-541 rEmeraldGroupPublishingLimited 1754-2731 DOI 10.1108/17542731211270098

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TQM 24,6

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In the last decade, a number of national indicators reflecting consumer satisfaction across a wide range of organizations have been developed, one of the most widely used being the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) model developed by Fornell et al. (1996), which comprehensively identifies causal relationships among customer satisfaction and its antecedents and consequences. This study adopts the ACSI methodology for two reasons. First, it offers many key antecedents and consequences of customer satisfaction. It is vital for both researchers and practitioners to know what factors affect satisfaction, and what effect satisfaction has on other constructs that are directly linked to the overall organizational performance. Second, the ACSI methodology is robust, and it may be successfully adapted to various products and services, including information technologies and mobile services (Serenko et al., 2006).

No equivalent research has so far been conducted in Jordan. Therefore, the purposes of this study are to investigate the applicability of the ACSI model within the mobile telecommunication services’ context in Jordan, by examining the relationships among customer expectations, perceived quality, perceived value, customer satisfaction, customer loyalty, and customer complaints. Compute Jordanian customer satisfaction index (JCSI) with mobile services in Jordan, and how does it compare to other countries?

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