1、外文翻译之一Service quality and e-commerce: an exploratory analysis（1）作者：J. Cox and B.G. Dale国籍：UK出处：Managing Service Quality Volume 11 . Number 2 . 2001 . pp. 121131原文正文：Abstract : Examines the applicability of determinants identified in a physical services environment to assess the services relating to
2、e-commerce. It is argued that the lack of human interaction during the Web site experience means that determinants such as competence, courtesy, cleanliness, comfort and friendliness, helpfulness, care, commitment, flexibility are not particularly relevant in e-commerce. On the other hand, determina
3、nts such as accessibility, communication, credibility, understanding, appearance, and availability are equally applicable to e-commerce as they are in physical services. The paper argues the need for further research to identify suitable determinants for the e-commerce operating environment.Introduc
4、tion: E-business or e-enterprise is the term used to define a business that has a virtual presence or Web site on the Internet either to promote brand awareness or enable e-commerce. E-commerce can be defined as the conduct of business among e-enterprises and consumers where e-business means a busin
5、ess enterprise with the capability to exchange value (money, goods, services and information) electronically (Anderson Consulting, 1999).If an online company is to be successful, all aspects of its service must be closely integrated in terms of systems, networks, procurement, shipping and customer s
6、upport. Many companies have found that setting up a Web site is relatively easy, however, it is the fulfillment of orders offline that is problematic, because systems are not sufficiently efficient to seamlessly pass on the order information and complete the order without error and/or delay. Compani
7、es must also prepare themselves for the volume of users accessing their Web site, as well as having the capacity to handle this all the way up the supply chain.The key element to business achievement is quality (Dale, 1999). Without a quality management approach that guarantees quality from its syst
8、ems, staff and suppliers, a business will not be able to deliver the appropriate level of service quality to satisfy its customers. Just as speed is one of the main attractions for customers using the Web, rather than making transactions in the physical world, negative word-of-mouth appears to trave
9、l much faster in cyberspace. Business conducted on the Internet can still influence customers expectations through advertising but the communication that takes place is via a computer interface on third generation devices such as the Wireless Application Protocol phone and household appliances. Serv
10、ice quality on the Web is especially important for the interface between customer and the Internet, namely the Web site. Even before a customer actually completes a subscription form or makes a purchase, he/she will have navigated a way through the Web site. If the Web site is not easy to navigate,
11、a customer will probably never return to use it again.The first critical issue is the access of the customer to an organizations Web site. Constant availability and up-to-date information 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year are crucial from Web site start up. IDC in Computing Magazine
12、 (Gann, 1999) suggested that by 2003, between a third and half of all e-commerce will be conducted outside normal business hours. Zona Research in the same article (Gann, 1999, pp. 38-9) reported that If page-response time is kept under seven seconds, fewer than 10 per cent of people leave the site.
13、 However, when it rises above eight seconds, 30 per cent of customers leave. When delays exceed 12 seconds, a staggering 70 per cent of people bail out. In the same report, it was said that 75 per cent of the Internet users surveyed, who had made purchases on the Web, cited downloading delays as the
14、 reason for not making a purchase. In any industry, customer loyalty is a key factor in gaining a competitive advantage over the competition. Parasuraman et al. (1991) found that customers place a great deal of importance on relationships in service experiences. Most customers want to be served by t
15、he same contact person each time they visit their bank, or be recognized by staff in a hotel if they use it regularly. Although this aspect is elusive from a human contact point of view, Web sites are now capturing customer information and can recognize returning customers by means of a simple regis
16、tration of an e-mail address and by offering different options in order to provide customer customization. By building up this kind of customer relationship, e-businesses are executing customer retention techniques which should result in increased customer loyalty and help develop a successful busin
17、ess, as typically described by Heskett et al. (1994).In the world of e-commerce, the interaction between a customer and a business will for the most part take place with a computer as the interface. There is no human element as such in a service delivered over the Internet, apart from through custom
18、er service reached by e-mail or telephone, if that option exists, so the quality of the Web site becomes the moment of truth. Another difference between the physical service environment and the Web site interface is that companies are able to customize their service to individuals, particularly when
19、 they interact directly with the customer. For the Web site interface, the opportunity to customize is not automatic because the Web site must first glean customer information and then process this information to provide customization. Therefore the Web site must be created to provide relevance for
20、any type of customer whether old or new. Customers who register with Web sites and get a customized Web site according to their needs are now experiencing the new concept of mass customization which is being achieved through technological developments specifically tailored for the e-business arena.T
21、he two differences described above are key factors in suggesting that service quality research may not be applicable to the e-business environment. With the advent of the Internet, quality is still of major importance but the question is whether the theories and concepts developed in service quality
22、 can be applied equally to this business medium, where the main difference is the lack of human interaction. This is the focus of the analysis on which the paper is based. The paper considers, within the context of e-business, the conceptual model of service quality, the dimensions and determinants
23、of service quality, and the measurement of service quality.The conceptual model of service qualityParasuraman et al. (1985) developed a conceptual model of service quality which they created from empirical research. The model highlights the following five servicequality gaps:(1) Gap 1. Consumer expe
24、ctations management perceptions of consumer expectations.(2) Gap 2. Management perceptions of consumer expectations service quality specifications actually set.(3) Gap 3. Service quality specifications actual service delivery.(4) Gap 4. Actual service delivery external communications about service.T
25、he final gap Gap 5 is the result of the four other gaps.This conceptual model of service quality (see Figure 1) and its gaps will be discussed in relation to the concept of e-commerce and its relevance will be examined.In e-commerce, the medium of the Internet means that the same information or serv
26、ice can be standardized each time there is anFigure 1 A conceptual model of service quality interaction between the customer and the interface. In this case, variability disappears as the customer makes several clicks depending on what is offered and each customer goes through the same experience. T
27、herefore it could be argued that Gap 3 does not exist because the service specifications are put onto one common interface (i.e. the Web site), and do not differ for each customer. However, if the customer then contacts the company directly by e-mail and gets a personal reply, or telephones their cu
28、stomer service operations or experiences an after-sales service offline, then Gap 3 could exist.In relation to Gap 1, there could be a gap between what the customer expects and what management perceives that expectation to be. This kind of gap is relevant for any organization whether bricks and mort
29、ar (BAM) or just a pure play on the Internet. If management misinterprets what the customer needs then this will affect the customers evaluation of service quality. In e-commerce, the difference between what the customer needs and what management perceives these needs to be can become blurred. One o
30、utcome of the Internet phenomenon is that new business models are being created and innovation has increased enormously. Businesses are now creating and designing new products and services that customers would not otherwise have experienced. For example, L offers the service of negotiating with a su
31、pplier for a discount depending on how many customers want to buy a certain product. In the physical world, customers would seek out the lowest price and/or negotiate the price down but very rarely would a customer be concerned to identify five other or so people interested inorder to gain a substan
32、tial discount on, for example, a CD-ROM player, due to the time and effort involved. Therefore the quality issue in this gap does not relate so much to meeting the needs of the customer, because their expectations are much lower to begin with, but more to the backend processes when the product is de
33、livered. Horovitz (1990) supports this theory by saying that . . . the quality of service will be perceived differently according to whether the service is new or well established. The customer who has just discovered a service tends to be less critical in his judgment than the experienced user. Whi
34、le it can be argued that Gaps 1 and 3 may not be so relevant to service quality in the e-commerce environment, Gap 5 is still an important issue and is affected directly or not by the other four gaps. Perhaps in the case of e-commerce, different weightings are needed to determine which gap is more c
35、ritical than others in affecting quality. Parasuraman et al. (1985) suggest this in their areas for future research. In order to judge Gap 5, the customers perception of service quality during and after service delivery must be measured which depends on certain criteria; this is discussed in the nex
36、t section of the paper.Dimensions and determinants of service qualityGronroos (1984), Lehtinen and Lehtinen (1982) and Czepiel et al. (1985) have considered the service quality of the service encounter as two different dimensions, one being technical or output quality and the other functional or pro
37、cess quality. These dimensions were assessed according to attitudes and behaviour, appearance and personality, service mindedness, accessibility and approachability of customer contact personnel. By means of the computer interface, these assessments are mostly invalid due to the absence of customer
38、contact personnel, however, accessibility and approachability are relevant when referring to a Web site. Being able to access a companys Web site is crucial for a business transaction to take place, and the page layout must be suitably user friendly or approachable to encourage a customer to continu
39、e on to making a purchase. As for the corporate image, this can be said to be as relevant in a BAM environment as on the Internet.Czepiel et al. (1985) not only pinpointed the process and outcome quality dimensions but also identified three different dimensions of the service encounter, distinguishi
40、ng between customer perceptions, provider characteristics and production realities. They suggested that these covered common crucial characteristics in service delivery and that the determinants of satisfaction were therefore similar in each case. For the customer perceptions and production realitie
41、s, they listed elements which were then judged along a continuum. The customer perceptionsincluded purpose, motivation, result, salience, cost, reversibility, and risk. The production realities related more to elements such as technology, location, content, complexity and duration. These two dimensi
42、ons can be compared to the customers perception of a Web site and the complexity or speed of the technology involved. The third dimension of provider characteristics relates to the expertise, attitude and demographic attributes of the staff which, in this case, would be inconsequential.Edwardsson et
43、 al. (1989) expanded further these two types of service quality, and summarized four aspects of quality which affect customers perceptions:(1) technical quality;(2) integrative quality;(3) functional quality; and(4) outcome quality.Technical quality refers to the skills of the personnel and design o
44、f the service system. In e-commerce, these two aspects are hidden from view and are not experienced directly and therefore cannot be judged by the customer. Integrative quality is concerned with how the different parts of the service delivery system work together. This is crucial in e-commerce becau
45、se the customer must have a positive experience online and if relevant a positive experience offline. For example, if a customer buys a product through a companys Web site, then a smooth running system will correctly translate that order and payment, and deliver the product as promised. The third as
46、pect is functional quality which means the manner in which the service is delivered. As for Gronroos (1984) and Lehtinen and Lehtinens (1982) definition of functional quality, the meaning is the same and is relevant to e-commerce in so far as the layout and accessibility of a Web site is concerned,
47、without the direct human contact or physical environment. Outcome quality is when the actual service meets the promised service and the customers needs and expectations. This is true in the case of e-commerce just as much as for businesses in the physical world. If a customer is dissatisfied, he or
48、she is unlikely to visit that shop or buy from the Web site again. The likelihood of non purchase is greater on the Internet due to the ease with which customers can click to a competitors Web site. Even though this type of research had considered the matter of customers perception of quality, it wa
49、s Parasuraman et al. (1985; 1988a) who addressed the issue as to how the customer makes an assessment of service quality. They came up with ten determinants that can be used to measure service:(1) Access (approachability and ease of contact);(2) Communication (informing and listening to customers);(3) Competence (possession of required skills and knowledge to perform the service);(4) Courtesy (demeanour and attitude of contact personnel);(5)
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