Assessing mobile payment for hotel reservations in China

Abstract

The rapid development of mobile technology and a growing number of smartphone users have greatly changed the payment behavior of consumers for hotel reservations. Although website functionality and website usability have gained extensive attention from previous literature, limited studies have investigated functionality and usability toward mobile payment for hotel reservations through online travel agencies (OTAs). To fill this gap, the present study develops a research framework based on theory of planned behavior (TPB) advocated by Ajzen (1991) and the conceptual model of website evaluation developed by Bai, Law, and Wen (2008). Attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control are the three most important elements involved in TPB whereas functionality and usability are the two main components of the conceptual model of website evaluation developed by Bai et al. (2008). The first research question of the present study is how effective is smartphone in delivering hotel-booking information? The corresponding objective is to assess the quality of hotel-booking information delivered via smartphone. The second research question is what are the impacts of functionality and usability toward mobile payment on hotel repurchase intention? The detailed objectives are within the context of mobile payment for hotel reservations: i) to test the mediating effects of attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control on the relationship between mobile functionality and customer satisfaction; ii) to test the mediating effects of attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control on the relationship between mobile usability and customer satisfaction; and iii) to test the mediating effects of customer satisfaction on the relationships between attitude and repurchase intention, between subjective norms and repurchase intention, and between perceived behavioral control and repurchase intention. By mainly adopting a quantitative research method, the findings show that overall, smartphone is effective in delivering hotel-booking information. In addition, the findings reveal that hotel-booking information can be categorized into four factors: hotel information, communication and interaction, design and layout, and consumer requests based on principal component analysis. Moreover, through conducting principal component analysis, the proposed constructs and the related attributes of mobile payment for hotel reservations are identified. Exploratory factor analysis further confirms the proposed constructs. Finally, the overall structure of the proposed research framework is examined through structural equation modelling. In total, 15 hypotheses are advocated, with nine hypotheses are supported. Specially, results show that within the context of mobile payment for hotel reservations, the mediating effects of attitude, subjective norms, and perceived behavioral control exist between mobile usability and customer satisfaction, but do not exist between mobile functionality and customer satisfaction. In addition, the mediating roles of customer satisfaction exist between attitude and repurchase intention, between subjective norms and repurchase intention, and between perceived behavioral control and repurchase intention. In conclusion, theoretically, the present study proposed a research framework and proved the model's applicability within the context of mobile payment for hotel reservations. Practically, the findings can help hotels facilitate hotel reservations, satisfy the needs of customers, and enhance the repurchase intention of consumers. That is, hotel managers can communicate with OTAs to improve functionality of mobile payment through providing detailed mobile payment information for hotel reservations. Furthermore, hotel managers can communicate with OTAs to improve usability of mobile payment for hotel reservations through operation simplification, safety management, and experience management.