ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Apart from the efforts of myself, the success of any dissertation relies mostly on the encouragement and guidelines of many others I take this opportunity to express my gratitude to t[.]
iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Apart from the efforts of myself, the success of any dissertation relies mostly on the encouragement and guidelines of many others I take this opportunity to express my gratitude to the people who in one way or another way contribute to the successful completion of this dissertation My first sincere thanks go to Dr Dominic Mwenja for his efforts in co-organizing the doctoral program and supporting me in the process of learning and doing my dissertation The program equipped me with the knowledge to help me be more successful in my life and my career Second, I am truly indebted for Dr Pham Thi Nhuan for her valuable advices and encouragement during my learning and doing dissertation My dissertation would not have been possible without her assistance Third, I would like to show my gratitude to Dr Pham Hung – The president of Center for System Development, Vietnam National University and all of the center’s staffs for their supports at the time that I learned Last but not least, I wish to avail myself of this opportunity, express a sense of gratitude and love to my friends and my beloved parents for their manual support, strength, help and everything Table of Contents v Page Dedication iv Acknowledgements .v Table of Contents vi List of Tables ix Abstract xii Chapter I: Introduction .1 Rationale Research issues Purposes of the research .7 Definitions of key terms .8 Scope of the research 10 Conclusion 11 Chapter II: Review Of Literature 12 Concept of Web in banking sector .12 Web’s benefits 14 Benefits of information 15 Benefits of Transaction 18 Barriers to Web service acceptance 21 Organization’s ability to optimize the technological capability 21 Reliability .22 Lack of legal support .25 Customer relationship 26 Customer relationship marketing 26 Web benefits and customer relationships 27 Web barriers and customer relationships .29 The previous relationships of customer 31 The service switching cost 32 Web benefits and service switching cost .35 The power of customer relationship and service switching cost 36 Customer loyalty 38 vi Customer loyalty 38 Service switching cost and customer loyalty 39 The power of customer relationship and customer loyalty 40 Conclusion .41 Chapter III: Methodology 43 Survey Design 43 In-depth interview 46 Result of in-depth interview .47 Overview of Internet banking service applied in Vietnam 47 Benefits of Web 48 Benefits of information 53 Benefits of transaction 53 Barriers of Website Technology 54 Impacts of Internet banking services on customer relationship 60 Impacts of Web benefits and the power of customer relationship on switching cost 61 Impacts of customer relationship’s power and switching cost on customer loyalty 62 Development of survey tools .63 Data collection 64 Characteristics of sample 65 Conclusion 68 Chapter IV: Discussion Of Research Findings .70 Effects of Internet Banking on users 70 Duration of use and frequency of use 70 Types of services 72 Use of Internet banking in the future .74 Overview of the findings of the contents described in the model 75 Information quality 75 Access to information 75 Information sharing 76 Transaction benefits .76 Organization-related barriers 80 vii Reliability-related barriers .80 Lack of legal support .83 Power of customer relationships 83 Switching cost 85 Loyalty of customers 86 Previous relationships 87 Reliability and validity .88 Re-testing the contents of the web use benefits .88 Re-testing the contents of Web barriers 92 Test of power of customer relationship 95 Testing of costs related to banking service switching 97 Testing of the concept of customers’ loyalty 99 Testing of hypotheses 100 Impacts of customer relationship power 101 Impacts of service-switching costs 110 Impacts on customer loyalty 115 Conclusion .116 Chapter V: Conclusions and Recommendations 117 Summary 117 Problems for managers 121 Conclusion .124 References 126 Appendices .132 Appendix I .132 Appendix II 134 LIST OF TABLES viii Appendices Table 3.1: Stages of qualitative study Table 3.2: Benefit of Internet banking service Table 3.3: Summary on barriers to corporate customers’ adoption of Internet banking Table 3.4: Summary on customer relationship’s study results Table 3.5: Contents used to evaluate each factor Table 3.6: Characteristics of questionnaire respondents Table 3.7: Sample description Table 4.1: Duration and frequency of use of Internet Banking among users Table 4.2: Types of Internet Banking services used by customers Table 4.3: Use plan of Internet banking in the future Table 4.4: Mean Table 4.5: Mean of the groups of barriers Table 4.6: Mean of the contents of customer relationship Table 4.7: Mean of the assessment contents of switching cost Table 4.8: Mean of the assessment factors of loyalty Table 4.9: Mean of the assessment contents of previous relationships Table 4.10: Factors in the group of Web benefits Table 4.11: Comparison of reliability of Web benefits ix Table 4.12: Barriers related to Web Table 4.13: Comparison of reliability of contents related to Web’s Barriers Table 4.14: Criteria for power of customer relationship Table 4.15: Comparison of reliability of the concept of customer relationship power Table 4.16: Criteria of service-switching costs Table 4.17: Comparison of reliability of the concept of serviceswitching costs Table 4.18: Criteria of customers’ loyalty Table 4.19: Comparison of reliability of the customers’ loyalty concept Table 4.20: Initial regression analysis for impacts on customer relationship Power Table 4.21: Last regression analysis for the influence on power of customer relationship Table 4.22: ANCOVA for impacts of types of users on power of customer relationship Table 4.23: First regression analysis for impacts on service-switching costs Table 4.24: Last regression analysis for impacts on service-switching costs Table 4.25: ANCOVA for impacts of types of users on service- x switching costs Table 4.26: Regression analysis for impacts on customer loyal xi Abstract In the world today, Information Technology increasingly plays an important role in all aspects of society, culture and economy The development of Information Technology results to the popularity of Web using in most of enterprises all over the world to offer their services to customers With the advantage of the unlimitedness in time and geographic location, Web is an effective way to build up the relationship with customers for enterprises generally and banks in the banking sector particularly This is the reason why the author conducted the dissertation with the theme of “Banks apply Web technology to improve customer relationships” The dissertation is carried out to study the perceptions of customers on services provided by banks via Web sites To address the research issues, the subjects of the research are identified as the corporate customers who have the strongly financial potentials The research methods of the study are applied based on the three main stages, they are: The in-depth qualitative interview for the stage one, the development of research tools for the stage two and the last one is data collection and the description of research sample characteristics By sparing no effort, the author proved the effectiveness of Web technology in the communication between banks and customers in order to help banks establish a strong customer relationship The dissertation contributed an important part to help banks improve their services and develop more and more CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION Rationale The Internet has given customers more information about products in diverse industries such as travel, health, automobiles, computers, home entertainment, and financial services For example, the percentage of people using the Internet for information and advice is high in travel (70%), health (56%), and automobiles (62%) (Glen & John, 2004) With today's technological advances, there are many different ways for firms to interact with customers (i.e Internet or automated communication) (Tammy & Bruce, 2010) The challenge posed by the evolution of supplier–customer interaction towards electronic company–customer interaction or customer self-service technology has become an essential feature of service marketing (Meuter, et al., 2000; Trocchia & Janda, 2003; Maria, et al., 2010) According to Rowley (2006), e-service is defined as ‘deeds, efforts or performance whose delivery is mediated by information technology’, which includes ‘the service product, service environment, and service delivery that comprises any business model’ Recently, Web has been becoming a popular kind of technology applied by most of worldwide enterprises to provide customers with services Some people argued that because Web technology is not limited in time and geographic location, it is totally more effective than other traditional business methods (Au & Enderwick, 2000; Cheung 1998; Walter & Lancaster, 1999; Singh, 2006) A large number of enterprises have been investing in the development of their own web site in order to give the introduction of their enterprises and provide Internet services On the other hand, online market is becoming an interactive option for buyers and sellers The banking sector which is one of the sectors using information most is becoming an attractive one to use Web for commercial purposes Many banks gradually start to use Web services – Internet banking – to offer better services for customers and reduce operating cost (Danie, 1999; Polatoglu & Ekin, 2001) With the commercial purpose, Web brings about many important benefits to both providers and customers The benefits which the enterprises have are mainly created because Web is used as a channel of information distribution and marketing communication means (Hoffman & et al., 1995; Glen & John, 2004) Many organizations applying Web technology try to introduce their services via Web, accordingly, they wish to reduce operating costs and increase competitive capacity in B2B activities (Clemons & Wang, 2000; Day & Wensley, 1988; Doherty & et al 1999, Singh, 2006) According to many customers, Web provides the easy ways to access to necessary information (Evan & Wurster, 1997) E-commerce is a channel used to support customers, conduct online transactions (Greaves & et al., 1999; Ng and et al., 1998) Moreover, customers can control better through the transaction channel With the channel, customers can also easily see the content of Web and compare information with other service providers As a result, they can easily make buying decisions (Klein & Quelch, 1997; Novak & et al., 1999) Furthermore, the interaction, feedbacks on services and supports of enterprises through Web applications are regarded as an important tool in establishing customer relationships (Damanpour, 2001; McGowan & et al., 2001; Jaymeen & Mirza, 2005) Noh and Fitzsimons (1999) indicated that Internet is an important communication tool in ... theme of ? ?Banks apply Web technology to improve customer relationships? ?? The dissertation is carried out to study the perceptions of customers on services provided by banks via Web sites To address... breaking customer website provider relationships (Yanamandram & White, 2006; Yang & Peterson, 2004) The companies decide to apply Web technology to attract customers'' interest or build customer relationships. .. Businesses need to understand the customers'' perspective The businesses need to understand what customers want if they really want to customer management, establish, maintain and expand customer relationships