By Joyce Remi-Babayeju
Experts from the Institute FCT Chapter of the Institute for Tourism Professionals of Nigeria, ITPN, has said that that effective service delivery is key to tourism and hospitality industry.
The practitioners made this known at a One-Day Interactive Workshop on Effective Customer Service Delivery for Tourism and Hospitality Professionals organized by the FCT Chapter of ITPN.
One of the resource persons, Alhaji Abdulmalik Hassan in a paper presentation titled “Effective Customer Delivery for Tourism and Hospitality Professionals”, stated stated that excellent customer service delivered in the appropriate way, is a prerequisite for effective and efficient business management that guarantees customer satisfaction, patronage and retention.
He explained that for retention of customers service delivery in the tourism and hospitality industry deserves is a serious business which deserves much more, adding that the lackadaisical attitude of personals and staff in the private sector of the industry makes them run down their businesses and lose customers.
“We take for granted the way the gateman and receptionist welcome guests, and that once the guest does not receive an amiable reception from the on-set at the entry point, the organization losses the ability to command customer satisfaction let alone retain customer patronage.”
Hassan called for more attention on training and equipping lower cadre staff with the necessary skills to deliver better customer service than the current trends in which most organizations spend huge resources training their top executives.
A facilitator, Capt. Emmanuel Lords Great in a paper ‘Re-Inventing Customer Experience for Tourism and Hospitality Industry’ posited that businesses have changed from manufacturing dependence to providing timely and quality service, adding that due to increase in technology and globalization, there has been a dramatic change in customer behaviour which service providers must understand and come to terms with.
Capt. Lords Great stressed that Customers are increasingly becoming aware of the need to get value for their money and will frown at poor quality service delivery from mediocre organizations.
This therefore means that hospitality and tourism organizations must work on customer satisfaction and retention efforts which are key to keeping them from running away.
What drive customers away is rude and discourteous behaviour, inept, and incompetence dispositions of staff during service delivery.
Chairman of the FCT Chapter of ITPN, and convener of the workshop Dr. Mrs. Ebikaboere Seimodei said that when service delivery is poor, the result will be dwindling fortunes in the industry and low economic value to the national economy.
According to her a flourishing tourism industry can only be achieved via quality service delivery which the country stands to benefit from its economic values such as generating income, providing job opportunities, ensuring foreign exchange earnings amongst others.
Director General of the National Institute for Hospitality and Tourism, NIHOTOUR, Alhaji Nura Dani Kangiwa represented by Dr. Taiwo Famogbiyele, Director, General Studies, Research and Development, in a keynote address said that the success of the country’s tourism lies in effective service delivery dependent on the quality of professionals and practitioners in the sector.
Kangiwa noted that there is urgent need for adequate sensitization through education and relevant training and skills acquisition for personnel and drivers of the industry such as the one organized by the FCT Chapter, ITPN.
