SERVICE MARKETING OF INDIAN RAILWAYS GAP MODEL

1. SUBMITTED TO SUBMITTED BY
Prof BASAVARAJ S M DILIP GOULI

3.  First in India in 1853 from Bombay to Thana.
 In 1853, first railway train journeyed distance of 22 miles
between Bombay to Thane.
 Originally operated by private companies Englishmen.
 1925-1950 GOI took over all the private railway
companies.

4.  Indian Railways is more than 150 years old.
 It is largest railway in the world under one management.
 It is the lifeline of our country.
 It is the biggest employer in the world (around
14,06,430).
 No strikes in last 30 years inspite of 14 lakh workers.

5.  The total route length of Indian railway is approximately
63,000 kms.
 -The first electric train was opened in February 1925 on
Mumbai suburban railway on Mumbai Victoria Terminus (VT) –
Kurla branch line.
 -As on 31st march, 2004 the electrified route was 17,503 kms.
 -The Indian railway largest in the Asia and second largest in
the world after the USSR.
 -The total number of railway station in India is more then
7,000.
 -The Indian railway operates approximately 7,525 trains' daily
covering 7,031 railway stations.

6.  Service marketing environment of Indian railways can be scanned
by considering six major environmental forces, like demographic,
economic, socio- cultural, natural, technological and political
legal. As demographic environment consists of the age mix of
population, literacy and education level. Economic environment
consists of income distribution of different people. Socio-
cultural environment consists of influence of religion, languages
and customes that shapes the values and attitudes of customer
preferences, habits and behavior.

7.  Place (distribution) –
-service delivery point
-Stations, city booking agencies, out agencies
-places should be customer friendly.
-places should be well maintained.

8.  Products-
-Rajdhani, Shatabdi trains
-Janshatabdi trains
-Long distance mail and express trains
-Unreserved passenger trains
-Commuter suburban Trains
-Millennium Parcel trains

9.  Promotion -
-Each Product features to be communicated to customer in
that segment using suitable media.
-advertising
-personal selling
-publicity
-sales promotion

10.  Physical evidences –
-A Reserved Ticket
-Cheque Book

11.  Process -
-Process Exist are complex on railways like some
processes are:
-Reservation process/ refund process / claim process.
-Communication process.

12.  People –
-Service personal
-Customers
-Careful selection and training

13.  - Booking from abroad is a bit difficult affair if you are
totally new to the whole scheme of things. Through
Internet you can directly book most of the trains
 -All ‘A' and ‘B' category stations to be made model
stations.
 - Modern facility such as ATM, cyber cafes etc. to be
provided at all major stations.

14.  Delayed trains

15.  Lack of safety

16.  Improving the after sales services.
 Admit and apologies.
 Rectification of any error
 Compensate
 Minor performance lapse need monitoring

17.  Quality means watching the services from customer
prospective.
 The main quality concern of Indian railways are
 To provide hygienic condition inside the trains.
 Avoiding as much as possible the delay in the trains
schedule.
 Safely is also one of the concern for Indian railways.
 Improving the infrastructure to world class level of
standards.

18. The central focus of gap model is the
customer gap, the difference between
customer expectations and perceptions

19. Not knowing what customer expect .ie what are
the expectation of customer of Indian railways.
which can be due to inadequate marketing
research.

20. Not selecting the right service design and
standards. Indian railways have a good service
design but not reached to that level of standards
to meet all customer expectations.

21. Not delivering to service designs and standards.
This can be due to deficiency of human resource
policy of Indian railways.
And may be due to failure in meeting supply and
demand. Because of the huge population of India.

22. Not matching performance to promises. This can
be due to lack of integrating services marketing
communication and ineffective management of
customer expectation by Indian railways.

23.  Fares on Indian railways across categories are among the
cheapest in the world. In the past few years, despite a
recessionary environment, the Indian railways has not raised
fares on any class of service. On contrary there is a minor dip in
fares in some categories. Ticketing services is available at all
major and minor railway stations across India.
 In this way, Indian railway has set the prices according to
different facilities given in different compartments.