How service quality, guest trust and guest satisfaction affect a five-star hotel's reputation in Thailand

Abstract

Thailand has climbed in the global tourism ranking to the 10th spot, and is now expected to greet up to 40 million foreign guests in 2019. Given this significance, the authors undertook a study to investigate the opinions of 542 five-star rated hotel guests across six provinces and metropolitan areas of Thailand. The LISREL 9.1 software program was used to analyse the guest's opinions on how a Thai five-star hotel's reputation (RP) was affected by service quality (SQ), guest trust (TR), and guest satisfaction (ST). Results from the study's six SEM hypotheses determined that the factors most important were SQ, TR, and ST, with total effect (TE) values of 0.89, 0.71, and 0.60, respectively. Finally, from the study's questionnaire, 15.87% of the guests viewed their relationship status as 'other', suggesting that five-star hotels need to pay close attention to non-traditional travellers and guests. Also, a significant percentage of Chinese and Indian travellers have been reported as booking a Thai four or five-star hotel, so hotel management must be culturally aware of these guest's needs and wants so as to drive sustainable operations.