Module Title: Managing Quality in Hospitality, Tourism, and Events

Module Title: Managing Quality in Hospitality, Tourism, and Events

Introduction:

            Today’s economic environment is characterized by fierce competition, creation of wealth, which has resulted in poor customer service and ownership of services as well as quality goods. Successful companies embrace competitive advantage by ensuring excellent customer services and quality products; hence, being able to adapt to consumer preferences (Prakash, et al., 2019). The travel and tourism sector is one of the most competitive industries, and poor customer service can profoundly negatively affect an organization, such as continuous losses and complaints from the customer of the Travel firm TUI group. Being part of the hospitality sector, Travel firm TUI group needs to understand that customer service is the key to a successful business in this industry. The company lacks good customer service, and their products are relatively weak which is one of the main contributing factors to the company’s losses. Besides, the case study indicates that there is poor communication between the company and customers because, as one customer said in her feedback, it takes the company ages before they can respond to a customer’s email. As today’s global market continues to become fiercely competitive, it is imperative for any company that wishes to have a competitive advantage to have a way of responding to change. Failure to respond to change and poor service delivery is one of the leading causes of business failure and failure of a company like the Travel firm TUI group.

Q 1: Outline at least 1 of the underlying reasons for poor quality that may have impacted TUI Group being rated as one of the worst tour operators in the UK.

It does not need one to be a rocket science expert to realize that poor service delivery and communication is one of the underlying reasons for poor quality that may have impacted TUI Group is rated as one of the worst tour operators in the UK. What the management of this company fails to understand is that today’s customers are not interested in traditional holiday packages; instead, they prefer revolutionized, personalized, and customized holiday packages.  The company’s poor communication can be cited as the major contributing factor to poor quality service delivery (Prakash, et al., 2019)..

The hospitality industry requires adapting to changes. Today’s customers are looking for revolutionized services but not old-fashioned tourism services where one could not book their destination through online and therefore, failing to provide good communication services to your customers can contribute to the company being rated one of the worst operators in the UK. It is heartbreaking for a customer to complain about an issue, especially ones related to service dissatisfaction, and yet, the company takes weeks or months before they can respond to such queries. Therefore, it is clear that not only the company is not providing quality services to their customers but also, have poor communication channels or processes with their customers (Prakash, et.al, 2019).

Q2. Assess the extent TUI Group’s financial capabilities and staff competence to improve quality.

Total quality management include being responsive, adapting to changes as well as successful management of both internal and external factors that may affect a business. There are more than a few things that the staff members of TUI Group can do to improve quality. For example; looking at the company’s financial capabilities tells you that the company has a potential of implementing today’s technology machines in their strategic plans in order to ensure that customers can have ease and effective communication with the company. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is one of the driving forces of successful companies, and it is disturbing to find out this company has not integrated it into their operations. Gone are the days when people answered calls because in today’s competitive global market, you can call any company anytime, and you will have your queries or needs attended to. Based on this, one of the main things that the staff of this company can start with is by learning and implementing AI in the company’s operations (Lanka. 2019).

There is a strong correlation between the economic and financial sustainability of a company and environmental sustainability. Given the fact that tourism plays an integral role in both social as well as economic progress, an organization such as TUI Group must observe and embrace these traits to improve their performance (Harcourt, et al., 2019). Based on this; the staff of this company needs to gather data that will be used to improve services and increased good customer relationship which would go a long way towards improved quality services.

Q3. Make at least one recommendation to TUI Group on how to improve the quality of their service by reference to the total quality management concept.

Adapting excellent and efficient communication between the company and its customers is one of the critical ways towards improving the quality of TUI Group’s services. As clearly outlined in the case study, inadequate response or communication is one of the major causes of the company’s failure. Therefore, the company needs to improve in this area. For example, the company would enhance its service delivery if they could start collecting and responding to feedback. Also, the company needs to provide feedback forms to her customers, asking them what they need to do to improve their services as well as customer expectations.

References

Butler, R. W. (2019). Tourism carrying capacity research: a perspective article. Tourism Review.

Harcourt, R., de Bruin, W.B., Dessai, S. and Taylor, A., 2019. Investing in a good pair of wellies: how do non-experts interpret the expert terminology of climate change impacts and adaptation?. Climatic change, 155(2), pp.257-272.

Prakash, S.L., Perera, P., Newsome, D., Kusuminda, T. and Walker, O., 2019. Reasons for visitor dissatisfaction with wildlife tourism experiences at highly visited national parks in Sri Lanka. Journal of Outdoor Recreation and Tourism, 25, pp.102-112.