Evaluating the service quality of drug distribution companies with a combined approach of Kano, SERVQUAL and artificial intelligence network

Today, many successful service organizations and institutions have realized that paying attention to the needs of customers means paying attention to the service quality and providing quality services to customers. The purpose of this study is to analyze the quality of services provided by drug distribution companies to customers in the area covered by the center of Yazd. In the first stage, the needs of customers were identified and categorized into 4 categories based on Kano model: mandatory, functional, exciting and indifferent needs. For this purpose, 184 questionnaires were collected from different customers of pharmaceutical distribution companies. By identifying indifferent needs and removing them from the list of qualitative components, a second survey was conducted to analyze the gap between customer expectations and perceptions. To do this, the Wilcoxon statistical test was used to examine the significance of the gap between customers' expectations and perceptions. In the final stage, by surveying customers' opinions on various areas of service delivery, including drug cartons, distribution services, Internet services, transportation and staff services, and services related to the duration of receiving money from pharmacies, the relationship between them and Qualitative gaps were modelled using an artificial neural network. The results indicate that there is a quality gap between all components of quality, quality dimensions and areas of customer service. This includes components such as the efficiency of the distributer website , the clarity of the customer instructions in the drug distribution companies, the consistency of the customer-requested facilities and the portfolio of facilities provided by the distributer , the fulfilment of the time promised by the distributer to deliver services as well as employee’s empathy in responding sympathetically to the needs of customers are more tangible than other areas.