Abstract:
There has been a significant growth in the residential apartment market in Sri Lanka during the last
decade. The main reasons behind this upsurge include the population growth, changes in living patterns
and the soaring prices of property particularly in urban areas of the country. The sustainability of this
segment of construction depends, to a greater extent, on the ability of developers to satisfy customer
requirements in the long run. Satisfied customers are believed to be the backbone of the residential
housing industry, and the developers have now come to realise that the ability to correctly assess
customer requirements and the quality of services are crucial to their financial viability. At present, most
of the residential apartments are designed without the involvement of potential users or customers. When
there is a communication gap among the parties, particularly with respect to user requirements, the goal
of customer satisfaction and high quality services cannot be achieved. To overcome this problem, the
concept of 'quality gap' could be used. It is an indicator, based on the difference between 'expected
quality' and 'perceived quality', often used for identifying areas for improvement in residential housing.
