Abstract:

The purpose of this research is to determine the perception of service quality of students who frequently use bus companies in road transportation. It is very important in terms of competitive advantage that bus companies, which have an important share in road transport companies, provide a quality service in an intense competitive environment. At this point, it is considered necessary to determine the perception of service quality in road transportation of students who occurred approximately 10% of Turkey's population, and to present suggestions accordingly; it is also aimed that the suggestions presented will contribute to the improvement and development policies of companies. For the purpose of the research, the data used in the research were collected by applying a survey technique on 723 students studying in different faculties at Afyon Kocatepe University. The questionnaires were applied to the students who were randomly at the bus station between the dates of 15th of November, and 29th of November 2019, which are the end dates of the midterm exams according to the academic calendar 2019/2020 academic year. In general, the service quality perceptions of the participants towards bus companies were slightly above the medium level. It was concluded that the factors with the highest scores in the perception of service quality of university students who use the services are "reservation and ticket purchase transactions" and "stopover", while the lowest factor is "city shuttle vehicles and staff". In addition, it was also tested whether the perceptions of service quality differed in terms of demographic characteristics of the participants and it was determined that there were significant differences in the reliability dimension only in terms of average monthly expenditure. 

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