Abstract: Certification and award are an important tool for improving public service quality. Compared with the mature practice in foreign countries, certification and award of public sports service quality in China have not started yet. UK quality scheme for sport and leisure (QUEST), which has made great contribution to the continuous improvement of UK sports and leisure quality and been widely recognized as a professional quality certification and award scheme, is worth careful analysis. In response to the future trend of "quality first" in public sports service, this present paper made an overall analysis of the QUEST Quality System through the methods of literature review and case study: in terms of development process, it has gone through the stages of initiation, modification and strategic adjustment; in terms of status, QUEST model is mainly divided into QUEST for Facilities and QUEST for Active Communities; in terms of operational process, QUEST mainly involves the stages of self-assessment, external evaluation, report analysis, periodic review and sample extension. QUEST can provide a reference for the design of public sports service quality certification and award program in China, which includes: consolidating the basis of quality management theory to ensure the strategy of "quality first"; promoting the partnership of diverse subjects to improve the certificate level and professional authority; perfecting the public sports service quality certification and award procedure to give play to the comprehensive advantage of quality management tools.

Key words: public sports service, quality management, continuous improvement, quality certification, UK Quality Scheme for Sport and Leisure