ABSTRACT

The study examined the effect of customer service quality on marketing performance of United Bank for Africa Plc and Zenith Bank Plc in Aba, Abia State. The service quality dimensions such as (tangibility, reliability, empathy, communication, assurance and responsiveness) were used for the study. Marketing performance were measured by customer patronage, customer loyalty, brand preference, satisfaction, repeat business and customer turnover.  The researcher adopted survey research design. The population of the study comprised bank customer above 18years of age (224,820) residing in Aba, Abia State. Taro Yamane formula was adopted to select sample size of 399. Proportionate, Judgmental and convenience sampling techniques were adopted to select customers in Aba who are banking with United Bank for Africa Plc and Zenith bank Plc. Questionnaire was the major instrument for relevant primary data collection. Cronbach Alpha value of 0.79 was realized which showed that the instrument was highly reliable. The data was analyzed with descriptive statistics such as frequency, percentage and mean. The hypotheses were tested with simple linear regression analysis model. The descriptive results, showed that 46.6% of the respondents strongly agreed that, availability of service facilities such as ATM, Cheque leaflets inspired them to the bank. 56.1% of the respondents strongly agreed that, confidentiality of information always induces them to remain loyal to the bank services. The empirical result showed that, tangibility of bank services have significant effect on customer patronage. Service reliability has significant effect on customer loyalty. Empathy during service delivery has significant effect on bank brand preference. Service communication has significant effect on customer satisfaction. Assurance of bank services has significant effect on repeat business with the bank. Service responsiveness has significant effect on customer turnover with the bank. In conclusion, customer service provision in United Bank for Africa and Zenith Bank Plc in Abia State and Nigeria at large should go beyond service delivery and satisfaction. Strategies that exceed customer expectations should be put in place to delight the customers. The researcher recommended that, for United Bank for Africa and Zenith Bank Plc to always stay ahead of the other banks there is the need to constantly carry out research on service dimensions and customer’s taste in order to develop corresponding products to suit these tastes.