Source: Kanika Prasad, Shankar Chakraborty, 2012:526

The primary tool in QFD is the house of quality, which is also known as product planning matrix or matrix diagram (Prasad & Chakraborty, 2012:529). According to Hauser &Clausing on Prasad & Chakraborty (2012:528) the house of quality (HOQ) matrix is the fundamental structure of QFD. The HOQ matrix contains six major components (Prasad & Chakraborty, 2012:528), (Wu & Lin, 2012:1326).

(1) Customer requirements/ Voice of Customer (WHATs): A structured list of the customers’ requirements. It can be acquired directly through market survey in order to ensure the service provided meet the quality requirements.

(2) Technical requirements (HOWs): A set of relevant and measureable product or service characteristics or design specifications to satisfy customer requirements.

(3) Interrelationship matrix (HOW and WHAT) – It is used to determine the influence of relationship of both Technical requirement and customer requirement. Symbol or number is used to show the strength of the relationship.

(4) Technical correlation matrix – Technical correlation matrix is used to evaluate the relationship between each technical requirement whether it is positive or negative. It is known as a roof matrix.

(5) Planning matrix – This matrix is used to compare the firm with its major competitor. In this matrix, the customers’ requirements are quantified and ranked in order of their importance. The firm then can know its product or services weakness and strength in term of customer requirement.

(6) Prioritized technical requirements – In this matrix, technical requirements are quantified and ranked in order of their importance. The purpose of this matrix are the same with planning matrix which is to produce a product or service required by customer. The Absolute Weights and Relative weights will be used to help analyze specifically the importance of each quality and how much effort would take in order to improve upon it (Prasad & Chakraborty, 2012:529).