Assessment of the taxi service in Doha

Abstract

This research focuses on passengers' satisfaction of the taxi service in Doha, Qatar. Qatar is a rich developing country where taxis are widely considered as a public transportation service due to the limited use of the existing bus service and the profoundly dominant use of private car by expats and Qatari locals. The main objective of this research is to identify the quality attributes of the current taxi service. A descriptive analysis relating the demographic, accessibility, and trip purposes to taxi users in general in Doha with overall service satisfaction was conducted. A Structural Equation Model was used to assess the taxi service attributes that influence the users' perceived satisfaction. Two models were developed: one was a relationship between the demographic and satisfaction of the users while the other was between the trip time and the satisfaction of the users. The first model supports the premise that income is the greatest attribute in the demographic followed by marital status, age, and occupation. On the other hand, the latter model demonstrated that waiting time is the most contributing variable among the times spent by taxi users followed by walking from work to a station, journey time, and walking from home to a station. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.