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CHAPTER 2 DEFINITIONS OF SERVICE QUALITY
Summary
Perceptions of, and judgements about, the quality of public service providers are influenced by a range of sources. The most powerful influence appears to be personal experience. The experiences of friends, family and acquaintances are also significant when judging the quality of a service provider. To a lesser extent, participants also identified the media as an influence. The role of scrutiny reports was somewhat limited. This was partly due to a lack of awareness, but also due to a preference for relying on information from personal contacts.
Sources of information about service quality
2.1 As part of the introduction to the main issues discussed in the groups, participants were asked how and where they acquired knowledge and information about the quality of public service providers. There were three reasons for this; to 'ease' the participants into the discussions, to understand what considerations are key in forming opinions about the quality of public service providers, and to determine what factors most influence levels of trust in public service providers.
2.2 Perceptions of the quality of services were influenced by a range of factors. Participants had sought out and utilised a range of sources (to varying degrees) to obtain information about the quality of service providers. These included, in order of preference, personal experience, word of mouth, the media, and to a much lesser extent, official scrutiny reports.
Personal experience
2.3 Where possible, participants had made judgements about service quality based on first-hand experience; the nature of direct personal contact with service providers. Where people had a choice of service providers, the following quote, demonstrating the power of personal experience, was typical:
[The school] said come and have a chat and look round and that is how we, as well as talking to other people about what they were doing, then that's what helped us to decide - actually going to have a look. (Parent of secondary school pupil)
2.4 Information about, and trust in, service providers was acquired through observing the service and its staff, particularly the frontline staff, at first-hand. Parents mentioned staff who appeared to be inviting, approachable, friendly, helpful, attentive, and committed to their jobs. By visiting the service, people were able to assess aspects such as the concern, consideration, sympathy and patience shown to service users, the time staff members have available to spend with each service user, and the staff/user ratio. Factors such as the appearance and presentation of staff were also important in shaping perceptions of quality.
2.5 Furthermore, the appearance of various aspects of the service, including the accommodation, and the equipment that was available, were important determinants of perceptions of the quality of service, as were other, less tangible, aspects of the service such as the environment and atmosphere. As one participant noted:
… the look of the place, the appearance that is, 'That's it!' If we walked into a place and it smelt good, it immediately got the first tick. (Relative of care home resident)
2.6 Personal experience was the most powerful influence on attitudes to service quality as it was seen to provide a direct insight into the reality of the service delivery.
Word of mouth
2.7 Word of mouth was viewed as an important source of information about the quality of services, with participants indicating that they had made decisions and judgements about quality of service provision as a result of feedback from friends, family, and past or present service users.
2.8 In particular, people who had no direct contact with service providers were inclined to form opinions of service providers through reputation based on word of mouth. However, this was often utilised alongside other sources:
I looked at the evidence and made enquiries and spoke to people who had been in it before or who had relatives who had been in it before and made a decision on that basis. (Relative of care home resident)
You really have to balance it with having some other information available about what other people think rather than just the [exam] results. (Parent of secondary school pupil)
2.9 Participants commonly described situations where they were more inclined to rely on information from people personally known to them than from other information sources such as official reports. Aside from the relative ease of accessibility of personal acquaintances, participants favoured information from people they knew because of the perceived reliability and impartiality of the information: they were often more willing to accept information from sources known to them than from the government or 'experts'.
Media
2.10 The media clearly play a role in transferring messages about the quality of service provision to the general public, and can play a role in determining levels of trust in services.
2.11 Some participants were aware that information about the quality of public services was available on the internet - both official and unofficial information. On occasion, information gathered there had helped form judgements of the quality of service.
2.12 Television programmes and newspaper reports were cited as potential sources of information on the quality of services. However, it was noted that the services discussed often only make news stories as a result of negative occurrences. There was recognition therefore that, as a source, the media are not impartial, and was viewed with a degree of scepticism amid accusations of being negative and scathing in what is reported.
Scrutiny reports
2.13 In general, participants were not aware of scrutiny reports until their involvement in this study. It follows that they were not commonly used to judge service quality. Furthermore, the value placed on scrutiny reports was often considered second-best, or at least did not appear to be as influential in shaping perceptions of service quality or in building trust as first-hand experience or feedback from personal acquaintances. Scrutiny reports were viewed as being of value alongside other sources or when other information was not available:
I would go to the relatives first. The particular one mum is in was recommended by two different people we knew quite well, but we read the report in conjunction with the personal recommendation of a relative whose parents was in there. (Relative of care home resident)
[If] You have nothing else, no other knowledge of any of the nurseries or have any word of mouth, then I think you would have to go on the report. (Parent of child in a nursery)
2.14 In general, participants tended to bring together different types of evidence in order to form judgements about the quality of services. First-hand experiences were commonly the preferred source of 'accurate' information about public services. The experiences of other trusted acquaintances such as friends and family were significant. The media were also influential, although there was widespread recognition that the media had a bias towards, and tended to exaggerate, negative stories. It was less common for scrutiny reports to play a significant role in judgements about the quality of service provision. This appears to be partly as a result of the lack of awareness of their existence, and partly a result of a preference for obtaining feedback and judgements from friends and family.
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