Influence of personal attributes on perception of residential facilities management services

Abstract

Purpose-The aim of this study is to explore the influence of personal attributes, namely, gender, age, education and income, on the perception of facilities management (FM) services for residential buildings. Design/methodology/approach-Collected through an interview survey, the personal particulars of the users of a typical residential estate in Hong Kong and their perceived importance and performance levels of five main aspects of FM services were analyzed using the analytic hierarchy process and statistical analyses. Findings-The weighted performance ratings of the services, which are products of interaction between perceived importance and perceived performance, showed perfect rank correlations across user groups with different personal attributes. As for the shares contributed to the services’ overall weighted performance, the largest differences were associated with the security and leisure and landscape aspects rated between the users with tertiary education and those without. Research limitations/implications-The findings that male adults, users with tertiary education and those with earning capacity tended to give more consistent responses can serve as a reference for determining the target amount of samples in similar surveys in future. Further work is needed to research into how the method of this study may be adapted for use in investigating FM services for other types of buildings or the same type of buildings in other places. Practical implications-The approach taken in scrutinizing the performance contributions of the services, which helps to identify any improvements needed, can be used to evaluate FM services for similar residential buildings. Originality/value-The study results provide an understanding of the influence of personal attributes on perception of FM services.