WAITING TO BE SERVED: INVESTIGATING THE CUSTOMER WAITING EXPERIENCE IN THE BANKING SECTOR IN AN EMERGING ECONOMY

Purpose: This paper seeks to explore how queuing and waiting in the banking hall affect customers’ service experience and to suggest avenues for future success in handling customer frustration in the banking sector in Ghana. This is important because delay in the queuing system results in frustration and customer dissatisfaction. Design/methodology/approach: Using a survey research design, data was collected from 306 bank account holders by the help of self-administered questionnaires and was analyzed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) approach. Findings: The study found that queue management (Seeking hedonic gratification) queue environment (Seeking social interaction) impact on customer experience while available services (Seeking economic performance); queuing time (Seeking convenience) did not impact on customer experience. The study also found that customer experience impacts positively service delivery. Originality/value: First, this study helps to improve our understanding of customer experience of waiting and queuing for services. Second, it examines the impact of waiting and queuing has on customer experience and quality service delivery. Third, the study then examines customer perceptions of waiting in line and focuses on methods for making waiting time more tolerable. Keywords: Queuing, Waiting, Customer experience, Service delivery.