The role of health, safety and environmental perceptions on forming bus passengers’ loyalty – A case study of Vietnam

Introduction: Responsible businesses actively engage in climate action, health, and safety initiatives as part of their corporate strategy. The outcomes of such initiatives could play an essential role in forming customers' loyalty. However, very few studies have aimed at understanding the relationship among such factors in the public transport (PT) context. As such, this investigation explores the direct impact of perception of health benefits, environmental benefits and safety on passengers’ loyalty intentions towards a PT service. The mediating roles of image and perceived value on these links are also considered. Methods: Partial Least Square - Structural Equation Modeling (PLS-SEM) was utilised to assess the measurement and develop structural models. A multi-group analysis (MGA) was also deployed to test the significant group differences. For this investigation, a sample of 866 individuals was collected from two cities in Vietnam. Results: The results indicate that there were significant relationships between these constructs and the loyalty intention of passengers. The perception of health benefits and image were the main factors affecting passengers’ loyalty in both cities. In contrast, the perception of environmental benefits had the weakest effect on the loyalty intention towards bus services. Conclusions: The results from this study could support the development of interventions to increase PT ridership in low-income countries. Promotional efforts to boost PT ridership should focus on highlighting the health benefits of using PT for passengers and the community. PT operators were also recommended to convey societal and environmental contributions through logos, graphic design, mission statements, slogans, and media relations to improve the image of the bus services.