Determinants of Courier Service Quality in e-Commerce from Customers’ Perspective

Abstract

<p><strong>Purpose:</strong> In recent years, the increasing popularity of e-commerce has become a driving force behind the development of courier service both in Poland and worldwide. In order to face growing competition on courier market and meet clients’ expectations, one of the crucial strategic goal of courier operators is to provide high quality service. The aim of the article is to identify and classify the key factors which determine the perception of courier service quality by customers shopping online.</p><p><strong>Methodology/Approach:</strong> The first part of paper is focused on the literature review concerning the determinants of courier service quality from customers’ perspective. Next, a survey method was used to collect data among customers using courier service while shopping online in Poland. Finally, the exploratory factor analysis was used to indicate the key dimensions and factors effecting the courier service quality perceived by customers.</p><p><strong>Findings:</strong> The article presents the complex review of literature concerning determinants of courier service and the original scale, which can be used to measure courier service quality. The results of author’s empirical research indicated that, the key dimensions effecting courier service quality from the customers point of view were: Reliability, Visual Identification, Service Complexity, Relational Capital, Social Responsibility, Responsiveness, Technical Quality.</p><p><strong>Research Limitation/implication:</strong> As the reseach aim was to develop the scale of courier service quality, in future research the CFA method (Confirmatory Factor Analysis) should be used to verify the scale. The main limitation of this research concerned a perspective of one stakeholder participating in the process of courier service – e-clients. The further research would be focused on identification of determinants of courier service quality in opinion of online shops and courier companies and development of models resenting the relations between them.</p><strong>Originality/Value of paper:</strong> This paper presents the original research that provides new knowledge about determinants of courier service quality in e-commerce. The literature analysis has shown that the previous research were often fragmentary and situational, but also did not take into account the specificity of e-commerce branch.

Trust in Courier Services and Its Antecedents as a Determinant of Perceived Service Quality and Future Intention to Use Courier Service

“…Even though the courier service is the last and crucial link in online shopping, studies concerning the relationship between trust and service quality are limited. Most research on the courier service was focused on measuring the service quality or customer satisfaction using the SERVQUAL method slightly modified according to the specificity of the express/courier branch [42]. However, only some of them indicated trust as the factor of service quality.…”

Multi-stakeholder perspective of courier service quality in B2C e-commerce

“…A part of the obtained results was consistent with conclusions reached by other authors. Most previous studies also indicated the timeliness of delivery (TIM) as a priority dimension for customers using courier services [ 32 , 34 , 38 – 41 ]. Liu and Liu included the compliance and completeness of the order (COMP) among the most important factors determining the courier service quality analysed in this study [ 32 ].…”

“…Moreover, the scientific research conducted so far was mainly concentrated on identifying criteria/ attributes/factors affecting the courier service quality and the methods of evaluating them, omitting the existing relationship between the factors. The research on the courier service quality considered only one perspective, usually clients of courier services (individuals or business customers) [31][32][33][34][35][39][40][41][42] omitting the perspective of the sender-an online shop and a courier company. Considering the conclusions of analysed research on service quality, the article aims to analyse courier service quality from a multi-shareholder perspective, as it allows to formulate comprehensive and novel conclusions towards future directions of service quality.…”

“…Further empirical research conducted by Gulc aimed to identify and classify the key factors which determined the courier service quality perceived by e-customers using the exploratory factor analysis. According to the results, the most important dimension affecting the courier service quality was the reliability manifesting as timeliness, a successful delivery attempt, the completeness of delivery and the lack of damage to the shipment, while visual identification and social responsibility were the least important [ 41 ]. The research by Ejdys and Gulc aimed to examine relationships between five constructs concerning courier service.…”

E-Auction for Courier Service

“…To conduct this research an online survey was conducted where there was a total of 120 participants the assessment was done based on respondents preferred courier services, frequency of delivery on different age group.it also evaluated the number of times users used the courier services before and during pandemic and preferred payment options. In [2] the author wants to identify and classify the key factors which determine the perception of courier service quality by customer shopping online, growing competition on courier market and meet client's expectations, one of the goals of courier services is to provide high quality service though there were some limitations to this research, the study was aiming to develop scale of courier service quality to verify the scale in future the author will use CFA In [3] the author wants to highlight and improve upon the existing courier system. This way they system provides the service which is less efficient in terms of comfort, cost estimation from consumers' point of view, tracking dispatch and cost estimation.…”