Service Level Performance Research Articles

Study of Port Tariff Structure and Port Pricing Approach

In order to support National Logistics System continuity there are at least three (3) main components that should synergize well, namely the sea side (sea transport), the land side (hinterland transport) and the part that connects between the two (port). Port performance will greatly affect the performance of the national logistics system as a whole. One of the indicator of a country's logistics performance evaluation is the ease of arranging shipments of goods at competitive prices (shipment). One of the components of logistics costs which become concern of many parties is the port costs, in order to support the national high logistics cost reduction, study related to the port tariff structure and its associated regulations is needed, especially a matter to formulate and determining policy related to pricing port services. The survey and analysis will be carried out in an attempt to identified the port tariff structure as basis to determining the port pricing model. Port tariff structure analysis include the Identification of port services and cost component (user and port operator point of view). Based on the analysis of transport logistics cost, the shipping cost contribute 48%, port cost 40% and hinterland cost 12%. The port cost on the container terminal, the stevedoring costs contribute 42%, followed by the cargodoring cost 58%. It takes further analysis for stevedoring tariff and tariff lift-on / lift-off container given a large contribution to the overall cost of loading and unloading at the port. Port pricing formulation problem associated with cost (competitiveness), performance (level of services) and value added (value added to the customer), so that the best approach for determinining port cost and tariff are: (1) the first best pricing approach is MC = MR = P, (2) the second best pricing approach is LRMC. We suggest that the pricing policy for ports where tariff formulation needs to consider the external factors (currency, rates, fuel price, minimum salary and etc) and differentiated based on the level of port service. Relevant quality level of port service factors are the time in port, and the punctuality of handling the vessel and its cargo. Port Tariff = f (Cost of Goods Manufactured (production unit cost), Margin, Level of Service (LS)) and Maximum Port Tariff = 1.25 % ofproduction unit cost .

Tools for measuring and improving external customer satisfaction in stores of Santo Domingo, Ecuador

This article is based on the development and application of a procedure to measure and improve external customer satisfaction, allowing a rational intervention in the variables related to the quality of service and leading to the progressive improvement of quality management in stores of Santo Domingo, Ecuador. It was possible to measure the levels of satisfaction experienced by customers based on perceptions about the service they receive. In addition, it allowed the modeling of indicators measuring the degree of customer satisfaction and loyalty, both globally and by processes, from a multi-attribute approach, which uses a linear additive model of attributes that characterize it and identifies those essential and critical of according to its importance and current valuation, in the framework of the specific procedure developed to evaluate the level of service performance, allowing to focus the management actions towards the solution of problems and the improvement of vital aspects of the execution of the service and in this way to maintain a continuous monitoring of the indicators of performance of the customer satisfaction in the selected organization.

Modeling Unreliable Operation of mmWave-Based Data Sessions in Mission-Critical PPDR Services

Public protection and disaster relief (PPDR) situations are becoming increasingly common due to the rapid urbanization of our society. Among these, harsh weather conditions and harmful human activity create challenges for reliable operation of mobile communication infrastructures, which calls for immediate action. The wireless networks of today may not be ready to accommodate emergency scenarios as they have not been optimized for PPDR contexts historically. In this paper, we first review the important use cases, challenges, and requirements in the context of next-generation mobile networking for PPDR applications. We argue that many emerging services may be supported by the novel communication technology operating in millimeter-wave spectrum. Against this background, we contribute a new analytical model to characterize session continuity and other service-level performance indicators in cases when the communication system is susceptible to sudden intermissions caused by emergency situations.

Workplace incivility and its effect upon restaurant frontline service employee emotions and service performance

PurposeThis study aims to acquire a better understanding about consequences of workplace incivility upon restaurant frontline service employees caused by customers, supervisors and coworkers. The moderating roles of perceived organizational support (POS) and emotion regulation ability (ERA) were also tested to determine the possibility for reducing the negative effect of workplace incivility upon the emotional exhaustion of restaurant frontline service employees.Design/methodology/approachUsing data obtained from 239 restaurant frontline service employees, a 35-item instrument was used to assess workplace incivility and its effects upon emotional exhaustion, perceived service performance, POS and ERA. A structural equation model was used to test hypotheses. The multi-group approach was used to investigate the moderating effects POS and ERA have upon the relationships between workplace incivility, emotional exhaustion and perceived service performance.FindingsResults documented that workplace incivility significantly increases emotional exhaustion and further leads to low levels of job service performance. Customer incivility was especially found to have the strongest power for increasing emotional exhaustion, followed by supervisor incivility. Also, results confirmed that POS and ERA play significant roles in moderating the relationships between workplace incivility, emotional exhaustion and perceived service performance. Based upon this study’s findings, theoretical and practical implications are offered for developing successful employee management strategies.Practical implicationsResults suggest specific practical management implications pertaining to restaurant frontline service employees. This study’s research findings recommend the development of more efficient support programs designed to diffuse potential situations involving workplace incivility. Findings further highlight the important role employee ERA has upon the effects of incivility and frontline service performance. Implications are provided with respect to specific strategic direction management should consider to recruit and select the most appropriate employees for restaurant frontline service positions.Originality/valueThe current study’s conceptual research was developed in an attempt to simultaneously address all three dimensions of workplace incivility to examine how they affect employee emotions and their job performance.

Employee display of burnout in the service encounter and its impact on customer satisfaction

This study examines if employee display of burnout symptoms in service encounters has an impact on customer satisfaction. An experimental approach was used in which the employee's display of burnout (absent vs. present) and the service performance level (low vs. high) were the manipulated factors. The results show that employee display of burnout had a negative impact on customer satisfaction, that this effect was mediated by customers’ appraisals of the employee's emotional state, and that the effect was stronger under the condition of low service performance.

Determining the best performing benchmarks for transit routes with a multi-objective model: the implementation and a critique of the two-model approach

In addition to their operational efficiency, the service level based performance dimensions of transit systems has begun to attract the attention of several researchers in recent years. The consideration of both operational efficiency and service level performance enables a more comprehensive performance evaluation for bus transit operators. This study aims to investigate the operational efficiency and service level performance of public transportation companies with data envelopment analysis (DEA). However, DEA might assign some highly efficiently operating routes as benchmarks to inefficient ones despite some unsatisfactory service level performance, and vice versa. This benchmarking might help to improve one performance dimension but can result in worsening the other. To overcome this problem, the two-model approach introduced by Shimshak and Lenard (INFOR 45(3):143–151, 2007) is utilized to determine the best performing routes. This approach removes the high operational efficient routes with low service level performance and high service level performers but operationally inefficient routes from the analysis and helps to define best performing benchmarks being able to enhance both operational efficiency and service level performance. At the end of the study, a critique of the two-model approach is presented. This paper makes three contributions to the practice of transit performance evaluation. First, it puts forward the necessity of multi-objectivity for the subunits of transit systems. Second, it demonstrates the applicability of the two-model approach in the transportation industry. And third, it points out that despite the usefulness of the two-model approach to determine the best benchmarks in a multi-objective model, the model suffers to assign input/output goals for inefficient decision making units where input/output variables of distinct objectives are the same or related to each other.

Service performance evaluation using data envelopment analysis and balance scorecard approach: an application to automotive industry

In today’s competitive business environment, service providers have a strong objective to satisfy the customers with low cost to ensure a patronage/loyalty. Performance measurement defines the information or feedback on actions to meeting strategic objectives and client satisfaction. Generally, performance evaluation of the service provider is a time consuming complicated process, depends customer satisfaction. Over the past two decades several researchers have proposed methods to measure service and quality performance in order to improve the performance efficiency of the organization, since there is a considerable room exists. Hence, in this paper, we analyse efficient and inefficient levels of service performance using data envelopment analysis (DEA) and balance scorecard (BSC) techniques, to bridge the exist gap. The DEA approach has been used to measure the performance of automobile dealers from different areas to know their service levels and also treats the quality of service by making use of different cross-efficiency data envelopment analysis models to discriminate the units. Then, a BSC approach analyzes which aspects of decision making units are inefficient, grounded on four perspectives like as; customers, financial, internal business process and learning and growth, based on the study carried out on ten automobile dealers from various areas. The results identify that dealers are inefficient in learning about customer’s growth, which help the dealers to transform from inefficient into efficient. In addition, this study also focused on various insights related to performance evaluation and provide some useful recommendations which can be practiced in future.

Market orientation and service innovation on customer perceived value

PurposeTo enhance their competitive advantage, firms are increasingly regarding customer-perceived value as a vital factor in advancing the level of service performance. This paper aims to explore how supermarket retailers select and implement market orientation (MO) and service innovation strategies to enhance customer-perceived value based on their investment.Design/methodology/approachA review of the related literature indicated that studies have rarely explored the meanings and outcomes of MO and service innovation. Therefore, this paper examined the roles of MO and service innovation, evaluating how these factors affected relationship quality and customer-perceived value in a supermarket context. Customer advocacy and customer participation were evaluated as the mediating variables, and six hypotheses were formulated. The data were collected by conducting a questionnaire survey of the customers from five of the largest Taiwanese supermarket retailers. A structural equation model was used to test the hypotheses based on the respondent sample data.FindingsThe results indicated that customer participation and relationship quality are positively related to customer-perceived value. Customer advocacy is positively related to customer participation and relationship quality. MO and service innovation are positively related to customer advocacy.Research Limitations/implicationsThe high explanatory power of the results of the deduced model in this research help explain the MO and service innovation of supermarket retailers toward customers. However, the collection of data related to other retailers requires consumers in other countries to test the robustness of this theoretical model. The results of analyses conducted on other industries and in other countries may differ.Practical ImplicationsThis paper investigated how the MO and service innovation capabilities of supermarket retailers contributed to their customer advocacy to achieve superior customer participation, customer relationship quality and customer-perceived value.Originality/valueThis paper investigates the effect of MO and service innovation on relationship quality and perceived value, and regards customer advocacy and customer participation as mediators.

Chance-constrained formulations in rolling horizon production planning: an experimental study

Rolling horizon procedures, where an infinite horizon problem is approximated by the solution to a sequence of finite horizon problems, are common in production planning practice and research. However, these procedures also lead to frequent changes in planned release and production quantities, a phenomenon referred to as nervousness. We examine the performance of two chance-constrained production planning models developed for systems with stochastic demand in a rolling horizon environment, and find that these formulations significantly reduce planned release changes (nervousness) while also improving cost and service-level performance.

Sustainable design of rural roads with 2+1 road design: Levels of service and traffic flow performance

This paper provides research results of a study to assess the driver performance levels of a 2+1 road, a special type of road involving intermediate cross section that is applied where a four-lane roadway construction is unjustifiable and the use of a two-lane road design may not provide the desired level of mobility. Despite increased driver safety, the use of the 2+1 road involves a problem that the South Korean government cannot assess the mobility effects of 2+1 roads, because the current Korean Highway Capacity Manual lacks the level of service procedure for 2+1 roads. Hence, research is required to provide potential measures of effectiveness for describing traffic flows in 2+1 roads and establish a reliable level of service analysis procedure. To address this issue, we applied the following approach: (1) existing research concerning 2+1 road design and flow performance was reviewed; (2) a field study was conducted in 2+1 roads with video cameras and traffic detectors to investigate traffic flow conditions; (3) candidate measures of effectiveness for describing traffic flow in 2+1 roads were identified based on field study results as well as TWOPAS simulation efforts; and (4) an analysis procedure applicable to determine levels of traffic flow service for 2+1 roads was proposed. We also examined how our proposed procedure would perform based on a case study. It was found that the percent time spent following would represent the most appropriate measures of effectiveness and that realistic output may be produced with our proposed procedure.

Measurement costs and control in outsourcing relationships

Past research suggests that when an organisation outsources an activity, its control over the execution of the service is reduced whilst service quality monitoring increases. Little accounting research has been documented on the links between measurement costs and control sharing in contracts entailing the provision of industrial services. We analyse 35 contracts involving 80 non-spot transactions and 749 contract terms at an iron and steel mill in Brazil. The study complements this data with information from 32 interviews. We find that the measurement costs of the contracted services are associated with the complexity of activities and the tightness of control maintenance by the contractor, where such costs are high, legal contract enforcement and use of extra-contractual coordination mechanisms is low. Additionally, variances between the conceptually expected enforcement mix and that operating in practice is associated with service performance level.

Measurement costs and control in outsourcing relationships

Past research suggests that when an organisation outsources an activity, its control over the execution of the service is reduced whilst service quality monitoring increases. Little accounting research has been documented on the links between measurement costs and control sharing in contracts entailing the provision of industrial services. We analyse 35 contracts involving 80 non-spot transactions and 749 contract terms at an iron and steel mill in Brazil. The study complements this data with information from 32 interviews. We find that the measurement costs of the contracted services are associated with the complexity of activities and the tightness of control maintenance by the contractor, where such costs are high, legal contract enforcement and use of extra-contractual coordination mechanisms is low. Additionally, variances between the conceptually expected enforcement mix and that operating in practice is associated with service performance level.

The New Procedures for Diverge, Merge, and Small Weaving Segments in the New Version of German Highway Capacity Manual (HBS 2015)

The first version of German Highway Capacity Manual was published in 2001. Now, a new version is published in 2015 (HBS 2015). For the new German Highway Capacity Manual, most major chapters are revised and some of them are totally rewritten. The chapter for merge, diverge, and small weaving segments is rewritten in accordance with forthcoming developments in the past 10 years. In this paper, an overview of the chapter in the new German Highway Capacity Manual is presented. Procedures dealing with performance analyses and level of service (LOS) of those segments are introduced both for freeways and rural highways. Differences between the former version and the new version of the chapter in the German Highway Capacity Manual are indicated and discussed. In most of the existing highway capacity manuals, LOS of merge, diverge, and small weaving segments is traditionally defined by speed, volume, or density in critical areas. In that traditional concept several capacity values of different critical areas (merge, diverge, and weaving) as well as upstream and downstream basic segments within the influence areas are evaluated separately. In the new HBS 2015, a new model which considers the total merge, diverge, and weaving segment as an entire object is incorporated. A combined volume-to-capacity ratio (freeways) or a combined density (rural highways) is used for defining the LOS of the total segment. The parameters of the new procedure are functions of the number of lanes of the major road, the number of lanes in the on-ramp or off-ramp, and the predefined geometric design of those segments. The coefficients are calibrated with field data or defined by experts’ experiences within a matrix of coefficients. With those procedures, the traffic quality (LOS) can be obtained directly as a function of the volumes or densities on the major road and on the on-ramp or off-ramp respectively. The new procedure has the following advantages: a) a uniform function for all types of merge, diverge, and small weaving segments, b) traffic quality assessment for all critical areas under investigation in one step, and c) the procedure can easily be calibrated. For applications in practice, a set of graphs is provided.

Research on Evaluating the Operation of Power Supply Companies

Power supply companies undertake the important duties of transmission, distribution, the sales of electricity and other social services in the power system, the quality of whose operating conditions directly affect the sustainable development of the corporations and the normal operation of the entire electricity market. The tailored and comprehensive evaluation system to operating conditions in power supply companies has a practical significance. Considering the important role of Power supply companies plays in the national econony, the paper is to develop a performance evaluation index system and comprehensive evaluation model, hoping to provide references for the future performance evaluation management in the power supply enterprises. Based on the concept of comprehensive value, this paper has constructed the four-dimensional comprehensive performance evaluation system combined with the operating characteristics, including the circumstances, the quality of assets, the service level and performance level. Meanwhile, a comprehensive evaluation model is built by the Structural Entropy Weight Method and TOPSIS Method and six power supply companies are taken as sample companies. Empirical analysis results verify the effectiveness of the method. The study proposes a new concept of comprehensive value, develops a new method for performance evaluation of power supply companies.

Simulation model for closed loop repairable parts inventory system with service level performance measures

In this paper, an attempt is made to understand verification and validation methodology in the contexts which are driven by discrete-event simulations. Specifically, a problem context of closed-loop repairable parts inventory system of three echelons is considered. Proposed model is based on real-life situation faced by a large public sector transportation company dealing with repairable parts like tyres. In the simulation related literature, a general mechanism is given to perform verification and validation. However, there is a visible lack of specific context-based verification and validation guidelines in a complex simulation scenario. This paper explores the difficulties and nuisances to achieve a well-designed verification and validation method. The paper focuses on the specific industry and through illustrative example shows how verification and validation is achieved in a real-life problem context.

An approach to risk Assessment for Outsourcing Logistics: Case of Pharmaceutical Industry

Outsourcing functions such as logistics has become an industry trend towards cost-effectiveness and high service level performance. Many firms have acknowledged the benefits of relying on external experts in a need to empower their abilities. The pharmaceutical industry in particular is challenged by constant evolution of their development and manufacturing processes. Outsourcing logistics becomes then an attractive option for firms to focus on their core competencies. However, alongside the numerous benefits of outsourcing, various risks arise with the implementation of this option. This paper contributes to the literature by presenting a decision model that takes into consideration risks of outsourcing logistics in the pharmaceutical supply chain. Risk identification and a multi-criteria risk assessment model using ELECTRE TRI are described.

Long-term evaluation of the operational performance of fixed time ramp metering control strategy: a freeway corridor study

Ramp metering is one of the successful active traffic control strategies to control traffic flow at entry points to freeways. This study evaluates the effectiveness of fixed-time ramp metering control strategy on the day-to-day operation of traffic over two segments (easternmost and westernmost) of the I-12 corridor in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Detector speeds and volumes were collected over 11 months and used to generate three performance measures, speed, travel time, and level of service to compare traffic conditions before and after the deployment of ramp meters. Comparative analysis, comprising statistical analysis, analysis of travel time savings, and level of service were then undertaken for traffic conditions before and after ramp meters installation. Overall, the results show some improvements in traffic conditions in the eastbound direction of the westernmost segment; however, the conditions slightly deteriorated on the westbound of the same segment. For the easternmost segment of I-12, no improvement was detected.

Measurement and validation of online financial service quality (OFSQ)

Purpose – The role of service quality in fostering the growth of online financial services has received much attention in the academic and practitioner communities. In this context the purpose of this paper is to explore the underlying dimensions of perceived service quality in the online financial services context and develop a scale for measuring online financial service quality (i.e. OFSQ). Design/methodology/approach – The present study anchors in Grönroos’s (1984) service quality model and DeLone and McLean’s (2003) information systems (IS) success model in developing a multidimensional multi-item scale for measuring OFSQ. Accepted scale development method was employed to identify the OFSQ dimensions. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis was employed to analyze the data. Findings – OFSQ consists of five dimensions which are convenience quality, functionality, interaction quality, information quality, and image quality. The OFSQ scale exhibits adequate degree of validity and reliability. Practical implications – OFSQ instrument developed in this study enable service managers to accurately measure service quality and benchmark it to competitors that could help the service provider to improve their service performance level. These findings will provide the managers with a bird’s eye view of the levers for improving and managing the perceived quality of the online financial services in customer’s minds. Originality/value – The contribution of this study lies in the identification of perceived service quality dimensions in the online financial services context by integrating two theoretical models, i.e. Grönroos’s (1984) service quality model and DeLone and McLean’s (2003) IS success model.

Accurate Analysis and Prediction of Enterprise Service-Level Performance

An enterprise service-level performance time series is a sequence of data points that quantify demand, throughput, average order-delivery time, quality of service, or end-to-end cost. Analytical and predictive models of such time series can be embedded into an enterprise information system (EIS) in order to provide meaningful insights into potential business problems and generate guidance for appropriate solutions. Time-series analysis includes periodicity detection, decomposition, and correlation analysis. Time-series prediction can be modeled as a regression problem to forecast a sequence of future time-series datapoints based on the given time series. The state-of-the-art (baseline) methods employed in time-series prediction generally apply advanced machine-learning algorithms. In this article, we propose a new univariate method for dealing with midterm time-series prediction. The proposed method first analyzes the hierarchical periodic structure in one time series and decomposes it into trend, season, and noise components. By discarding the noise component, the proposed method only focuses on predicting repetitive season and smoothed trend components. As a result, this method significantly improves upon the performance of baseline methods in midterm time-series prediction. Moreover, we propose a new multivariate method for dealing with short-term time-series prediction. The proposed method utilizes cross-correlation information derived from multiple time series. The amount of data taken from each time series for training the regression model is determined by results from hierarchical cross-correlation analysis. Such a data-filtering strategy leads to improved algorithm efficiency and prediction accuracy. By combining statistical methods with advanced machine-learning algorithms, we have achieved a significantly superior performance in both short-term and midterm time-series predictions compared to state-of-the-art (baseline) methods.

Comparison of integrated and local planning approaches for the supply network of a globally-dispersed enterprise

While there is large number of insightful works on supply chain integration, the integration and coordination of supply chain activities in manufacturing networks of global enterprises received little attention. This study aims to assess and quantify the impact of integrated planning and decision making for the geographically extended supply network of a global manufacturer in terms of cost and service performance under demand uncertainty. Mixed Integer Programming (MIP) is used to model the hierarchical structure of tactical and operational planning; simulation is used to model the supply chain operations under uncertainty; and a full factorial design is used to examine the relationships among experimental factors. The results indicate that integration leads to improved cost and customer service performance, simultaneously, and that the higher the level of demand uncertainty, the greater are the benefits to be gained from integration. Furthermore, integration of planning and decision making across the supply network reduces the need for safety stocks, i.e., the preferred overall level of customer service performance is maintained with less investment in inventory.