Service classification
Taking nature of transport service into consideration of a service classification model, the Service Process Matrix model by Schmenner (1986) is considered to be the best in capturing service features and clearly describe a position of Inter-city train services in a service industry.
According to the model, train services operations are classified in a high degree of capital investment relative to personnel employment. It also demonstrates less customer interaction along with providing a service standardisation rather than customsation. For example, all inter-city train service providers, in accordance with airline services, offer customers similar services and basic infrastructures such as train capacity, facilities and security; they are described in the nature of Service factory. Whilst fast food services provide less customised services but there are more labour intensity in the service operation, which classified in Mass service position.
Strategic position tendency is moving towards Service factory in order to improve positive relation between labour and customisation as low-low relationship. Even the train services are standing in the position; train service providers keep improving their service system in a lower direct-interaction with customers. They tend to package automated service process with online system. Auto ticket machine, online booking, train timetable available on website are good examples to illustrate this idea. Airlines are also following this strategy by using online application to communicate with customers such as online check-in, which serves convenience for both the customers and the airlines themselves. Fast food industry seems to follow the direction as well by offering home delivery service and limited service time per customer; timers are used to count time in each service in order to enabling the highest service efficiency in term of customer contact time.
Addressing business position of each service operation is significantly linked to business strategy that will be discussed further.

Strategic Links in Service
The Service Profit Chain Model by Heskett, et al., (1994) is applied to illustrate analysis of the inter-city train service operation. The train service will be compared with other two service industries; airlines and fast food, to describe the chain function more clearly.

Profit and Growth are linked to Customer Loyalty
Southwest Airlines has never ranked higher than the top seven in its industry; its profit yet remains consistency. Heskett, et al., (1997) states that creating loyalty means to maintain relationship with customers through service provided which matches to the customers’ needs. This shows an important of customer to profitability rather than market share. Moreover, costs to serve existing customers are less than creating new customers. For fast food restaurants, marketing efforts are less important to motivate purchasing power. Repeat users in train service industry, which are daily passengers, have more patient for delays and require less information than first-time travellers. Recent railway statistics report that there are 1,350 million passenger journeys made in Britain by rail travel (Railway Technical Web Pages, 2011). These are evidences showing the important of customer loyalty retention and how the loyalty carries out profitability and growth of companies.
Customer Loyalty is linked to Customer Satisfaction

According to LaLonde and Cooper (1989 cited in Anderson et al., 2004), there are two main factors to evaluate customer satisfaction in transport services. First, reliability is defined as punctuality, secondly, reaction to customer inquiry such as the speed and accuracy of information responded to the inquiry. Recent news (BBC news, 2011) shows that a number of passengers in rural railway lines have increase due to incremental service reliability. Moreover, there is a piece of evidence that customer experiences have effect to customer loyalty. Complementary services and compensation, which offered from airlines services such as lounge, food and drink and free flight or free accommodation in case of delay in the service, have been providing to their customers. These extra services provide added-value to increase customer satisfaction and maintaining customer loyalty. However, customer loyalty does not always depend on level of customer satisfaction. There are a number of train service providers in which offer similar services such as Virgin Trains, Eastcoast and National Express. Customer decisions probably change due to discount or promotion offered from other companies. Another example is that consumers who select fast food as lunch or dinner mostly select McDonald’s because of three reasons; quick, low price and high street location. If a main competitor such as KFC advertises a price reduction, these consumers may be changeable regardless of the level of satisfaction they have with McDonald’s.

Customer Satisfaction is linked to Service Value

Degree of satisfaction derives from the degree of experiences which could fall below, meets or exceeds the customers’ prior expectations regarding performance (Anderson, et al., 2004). Customers today have value-oriented perception. They wish for the service quality that exceeds the price they pay and service value will result from when they obtain this form of satisfaction. Virgin trains, for example, has reached passenger numbers to 28 million in the mid of 2011 which results in passenger revenues up 11 percent to £753 million this year (Virgin Trains, 2011). Virgin trains management stated that this is a result of passengers who satisfied with the recent addition of a new Pendolino train which offers brand new train with boosted mobile signal, bike storage and so on. Southwest Airline also introduced a ticketless service during airline reservation system was ceased. Customers satisfied with the spontaneous resolution and the ticket’s sale volume was up 15 percent within days (Heskett, et al., 1997). In addition, ‘Happy meal’ set has increased McDonald’s product value and its brand for several years. This set includes collectible toy which can influence the children's perceptions and provide more value offering, resulted in increasing customer's satisfaction.

Service Value is linked to Employee Productivity

Take Southwest airlines to illustrate this point, employees are designed to be able to perform several tasks if necessary. Pilots can deal with baggage for late departures. This flexibility enables the airline to board more passengers per employee than other airlines and create customer impression in the service (Heskett, et al., 1997). Fast food industry uses special equipment in order to control and increase its productivity in the same time. For example, Pizzas Company obtains special oven provided a consistent temperature which can cook all pizzas at once. For train services, quality of employees is crucial in term of training which can reflect to their productivity. If well-trained drivers control any sudden incidents on rails efficiently; customer satisfaction will be higher. Employee performance in term of security trust has contributed to service value.

Employee Productivity is linked to Loyalty

According to Heskett, et al. (1997), cost of loss in performance in aspect of employee turnover is even greater when consider its effect of loss in productivity and decreased customer satisfaction. Low turnover rate directly relates to high employees competences. Profession that needs specific working skills such as rail traffic controllers can be performed more productively with expertise due to intensive work experience. Southwest employee turnover rate is only 5 percent per year in some operating locations; therefore, the employees are able to deal with customers and jobs efficiently. On the other hand, there is no specialised skill needed for one working in fast food restaurant. Most of employees in fast food operating are temporary and training cost is not as high as the other two services. It seems that employee productivity has trivial impact on fast food service.

Employee Loyalty is linked to Employee Satisfaction

Employee satisfaction in train service industry derives from factors. Network Rail (2011) offers a number of benefits in their employment; rewards for peer performance assessment, training and development program, train travel fee subsidiary, guarantee bonus and a good pension scheme. To create employee loyalty, these drivers seem interesting to arouse working motivation. Southwest Airlines carefully reviews employee satisfaction. They position themselves as big families, not employer-employee organisation. Even fast food industry mostly hires part-time workers. If they satisfy with their jobs, salary, work atmosphere, and benefits, they possibly continual work in that organisation. However, relation between employee satisfaction and loyalty remain a controversial issue. It is not yet obviously that loyalty leads to satisfaction. An unsatisfied train driver whose skills are not applicable for other prospective careers, continue working for the company is the only choice for him.

Employee Satisfaction is link to Internal Quality of Work Life

Interrelation between internal service quality and working environment such as workplaces, colleagues, job description and career movement are considerbly significant (Fitzsimmons and Fitzsimmons, 2005). A pleasant working environment primarily provokes the employee satisfaction. For example, flexible timetable policy for train drivers in case of neccessities would increases in the employee satisfaction. Employee empowerment also drives employee satisfaction. The empowerment, however, cannot be adapted in all the employments. Some employees such as person in the ticket stall work following to standard whereas train drivers recieve decision authorities whether to decide to stop the train if there is an incident that may affect the passenger’s risk. At Southwest Airlines, incentive offers such as free flights and healthcare benefits internally lead to employee satisfaction. However, human resource is not a significant issue in fast food industry as much as the other two. Due to the fact that most of employees are part-time workers and the service is mechanism dependent. Employees may receive only fundamental payback such as wage and salary.

Conclusion
The nature of businesses categorised by the Service Process Matrix model has divided inter-city train service and airlines into service factories and fast food industry in the area of mass service. The Matrix sounds plausible to be base on further discussion in term of business development. The service classification shows where each business is positioned in business system and the model enables us to consider the presence business strategy and further develop the future strategic planning in the right direction.

After the businesses see where they are standing, adaptation of the Service Profit Chain model would help the operators to greatly understand how they can manage their business processes from their position to reach profitability and growth in long run. The businesses may move forward or decide to stay in the same position by adopting the strategic links as a tool for consideration. For example, as trend of information technology is on board, train service providers aim to use automate system, to less interaction with customers, more than human resources; however, they do not ignore the link of employee satisfaction which can drive value to the organisation. They regularly improve beneficial and supportive policy so that employee satisfaction and loyalty are remaining.

References
Anderson R.D., et al., 2004. A Bayesian Network Estimation of the Service Profit Chain for Transport Service Satisfaction. Decision Sciences, 35(4), pp. 675-676.
BBC News, 2011. Rural railway passenger numbers on the increase, [online]. Available at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14586096 [Accessed: 14th December 2011].
Fitzsimmons J.A. & Fitzsimmons M.J. (2005), Service Management, operations, strategy and information technology. 5th ed. Singapore: McGraw-Hill Higher Education.
Heskett, J.L. Sasser W.E. and Hart C.W.L., 1990. Service Breakthroughs: Changing the rules of the game. New York: Free Press.
Heskett, J.L. Sasser W.E. and Schlesinger L.A., 1997. The Service Profit Chain: How leading companies link profit and growth to loyalty, satisfaction and, value. New York: Free Press.
Network Rail, 2011. Career: Benefits. [online] Available at http://www.networkrail.co.uk/aspx/10369.aspx [Accessed: 13th December 2011].
Railway Technical Web Pages, 2011. Railway Statistics for Britain, [online]. Available at http://www.railway-technical.com/statistics.shtml [Accessed: 14th December 2011].
Virgin Trains, 2011. Booming passenger numbers drive record revenues at Virgin Trains, [online]. Available at http://mediaroom.virgintrains.co.uk/2011/08/booming-passenger-numbers-drive-record.html [Accessed: 14th December 2011].