A Model to Upgrade the Quality of Postal Services in the Islamic Republic of Iran

This dissertation investigates the quality of postal services and the relationship between postal services and customers satisfactions from the viewpoint of customers and postal employees. Quality of postal services is formal through the process of collection to delivery. With regard to expansion of operations geographical discrepancies and other restrictions quality of services in postal field is more complex and more comprehensive than in other manufacturing. The case study is Tehran province and a sample of 580 persons who were selected on the basis of stratified and random systematic sampling. The model used is SERVQUAL which is a tool for measuring the quality. The achievements of this research are as follows: 1- In the five -level dimensions of service quality such as Reliability, Responsiveness, Assurance, Empathy and Tangibility, there seems to be a gap in grades allocated to perception and expectations of the two groups. 2- The gap between perception and expectations of customers in the fields of Reliability, Responsiveness and Empathy is greater than the gap between the existing fact and knowledge of customers’' expectations by the employees: this gap has a negative correlation with customers’ satisfactions. Concept of customers in the field of Assurance and Tangibility is less than the gap between the existing fact and knowledge of the customer's expectations by the employees. This gap has also a negative correlation with customer's satisfaction. 3- The gap between concept of customers in the field of Assurance and Tangibility is less than the gap between the existing fact and knowledge of the customers’ expectations by the employees this gap has also a negative correlation with customers’ satisfaction. 4- From the viewpoint of both, the customers and the employees, Reliability dimension is the most important variance. 5- Customers’ satisfaction from postal services in five dimensions has a more positive relation with their perception from quality of postal services (received quality). Postal employees also put emphasis on the existing fact for the customer's perception and their judgment from the quality of postal services.