ANALYSIS OF SHIPMENT DELIVERY OPERATION OF E-COMMERCE FIRMS IN NIGERIA

Abstract

In the last decade, the use of e-Commerce has become popular due to advancement in technology and the widespread availability of internet technology (IT) systems and devices. As a result, shopping habits are dynamically evolving with the ability to buy and sell physical goods online. Thus necessitating each e-retailer to extend their supply chain to customer’s doorstep (that is home delivery). This is often difficult and costly to organize because of the fragmentation of shipments. Another problem facing last mile delivery operation is the deliveries that fail on the first attempt. Therefore, the study was embarked upon to assess e-Commerce delivery operation in Akure while a cluster of e-Commerce users located in the Federal University of Technology Akure was sampled. Purposive and simple random sampling techniques were employed in the research due to the finite population of the study, which is predominantly composed of those who would have the knowledge of e-Commerce for purchase or trading of physical commodities. Primary and secondary data were collected and analysed. The findings of the research revealed preference for home delivery as it accounts for 77.6% of the deliveries made in the study area, owing largely to the relative ease of receiving ordered goods, which ranked first on the Relative Importance Index (RII) of criteria for the choice of delivery service with RII = 0.780. The major challenge facing delivery in the last mile was Product quality differing from the ones advertised on e-Commerce website, which ranked first on the Relative Severity Index (RSI) with RSI = 0.698. The study also assessed the factors that affect decisions of respondents to shop online through Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Two components extracted relate to the logistics activities of shipping purchased product and technology adoption for trade (e-Commerce) respectively.