TY - JOUR
T1 - Physical distribution service quality in Internet retailing
T2 - Service pricing, transaction attributes, and firm attributes
AU - Rabinovich, Elliot
AU - Bailey, Joseph P.
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was funded in part by a grant from the Supply Chain Management Department at the W.P. Carey School of Business, Arizona State University. The authors wish to thank Craig R. Carter, Thomas Choi, Martin E. Dresner, Curtis Grimm, Arnold Maltz, and Manus Rungtusanatham for their input to the theory and methodologies presented in this paper. The authors would also like to thank Vik Chaudhary (CEO, Bizmetric.com), Greg Howes (Director of Operations, Bizmetric.com), Dan Hess (Vice President, comScore Networks, Inc.), and Janet McCabe (Senior Manager, comScore Networks, Inc) for their generous support in this paper’s data collection process. Finally, the authors gratefully acknowledge the insightful comments made by three anonymous reviewers and the associate editor, as well as the copy-editing assistance provided by Naomi Jacobs on an earlier version of this paper.
PY - 2004/1
Y1 - 2004/1
N2 - This paper develops a theoretical framework and empirically investigates physical distribution service (PDS) quality by Internet retailers in their transactions with consumers. An analysis of data that measure hundreds of electronic commerce transactions along with data at the firm level shows that higher shipping and handling charges are good indicators of better PDS quality. Other transaction-level conditions and firm-level attributes also affect PDS quality, as measured by availability, timeliness, and reliability. Most notably, when the net price of products transacted increases, PDS reliability and availability decline. Furthermore, Internet-retailer size is found to favor PDS availability whereas, surprisingly, newer Internet retailers exhibit a higher level of PDS availability than many of their incumbent competitors.
AB - This paper develops a theoretical framework and empirically investigates physical distribution service (PDS) quality by Internet retailers in their transactions with consumers. An analysis of data that measure hundreds of electronic commerce transactions along with data at the firm level shows that higher shipping and handling charges are good indicators of better PDS quality. Other transaction-level conditions and firm-level attributes also affect PDS quality, as measured by availability, timeliness, and reliability. Most notably, when the net price of products transacted increases, PDS reliability and availability decline. Furthermore, Internet-retailer size is found to favor PDS availability whereas, surprisingly, newer Internet retailers exhibit a higher level of PDS availability than many of their incumbent competitors.
KW - Logistics/distribution
KW - MIS/operations interface
KW - Service operations
KW - e-Commerce
KW - e-Services
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=1642559618&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=1642559618&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.jom.2003.11.004
DO - 10.1016/j.jom.2003.11.004
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:1642559618
SN - 0272-6963
VL - 21
SP - 651
EP - 672
JO - Journal of Operations Management
JF - Journal of Operations Management
IS - 6
ER -