Transparency and trust in cargo claims: microenterprises selling internationally on a peer-to-peer platform
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to determine the factors that impact the trust of microenterprises in online selling platforms and cargo carriers and examine the consequences of a lack of trust.
Design/methodology/approach
This study adopts a qualitative exploratory approach and uses grounded theory to generate insights based on interviews with 27 microenterprise owners selling internationally on an online selling platform.
Findings
The results show that a lack of competence, an absence of an integrated claim system and a lack of transparency are the main factors affecting sellers’ trust in online selling platforms. The relationship between the sellers’ intention to continue to use the online selling platform and their trust in the platform was found to be moderated by switching costs.
Research limitations/implications
This study is limited in that the results were mainly based on the sellers’ perspectives although the phenomenon of interest involves various actors. To mitigate this limitation and cross-check the data, the customer reviews and some of the sellers’ account statistics were also analyzed.
Practical implications
This study introduces the sellers’ perspectives on the dynamics of supply chain management in international micro trade. These dynamics provide a guideline for how to build and manage an online selling platform targeting microenterprises.
Originality/value
Unlike previous studies, this study examines online transaction behaviors from the standpoint of sellers, not buyers. Moreover, it is the first study examining the damaged or lost shipments within the context of online transactions in international micro trade.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
Funding: This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.
Declaration of competing interest: The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
Since submission of this article, the following author has updated their affiliation: David M. Gligor is at the Department of Information Systems, Analytics, and Supply Chain, Florida Gulf Coast University, Fort Myers, Florida, USA.
Citation
Caliskan, F., Idug, Y., Gligor, D.M., Uvet, H., Adana, S., Celik, H. and Cevikparmak, S. (2024), "Transparency and trust in cargo claims: microenterprises selling internationally on a peer-to-peer platform", Journal of Business & Industrial Marketing, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/JBIM-03-2023-0170
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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