A Theoretical Overview of Public Transport Service Quality: A Focus on Bus and Mini-Bus Taxi Service in South Africa

With the introduction of the Bus Rapid Transport system in South Africa, existing public transport organisations, particularly buses and minibus taxis, will have to adapt to the changes or else they will inevitably fail. In general, public transport organisations are being forced to move from a traditionally operations-driven orientation to a more market-driven orientation, which means that they need to improve their service quality. In light of the aforementioned, this paper explores the theory of service quality with special emphasis on the dimensions of transport service quality, namely, reliability, assurance, tangibles, empathy, and responsiveness.