The Delivery of Goods or Services - Research Paper

Introduction

This study was intended to explore the current state of on-time delivery systems for logistics firms in Singapore as well as the various factors influencing the current state of on-time deliveries (OTD). While at it, the study would analyze the effect of OTD on the supply chain performance as well as review some strategies that have been employed by different multinational firms all over the globe to improve their on-time delivery.

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Background Information

The delivery of goods or services is one of the crucial elements of a company's wishes to succeed in its business ventures regardless of the quality of their goods or services they offer entirely. It serves a great role in accruing customers' trust in the business firm, which is, in turn, directly proportional to the sum of accrued profit margins. Many firms have yet to discover how much their businesses can achieve with their delivery performances if it's optimized, and that is partly because they have no feasible way of measuring on-time delivery and partly because they lack the mechanisms of how to optimize the on-time delivery.

Forslund argued that OTP is a series of processes from ordering by the customer, delivery by the supplier from their warehouse or manufacturing industry/site, later to transit by the logistics service provider, and ultimately customer receipt and invoice process. OTD is an exceptionally important process in the supplier-customer supply chain. A couple of studies have been carried out to investigate the impacts of on-time deliveries, both beneficial and adverse effects. In his investigation, (Krause, 2014) found that factors such as reduced quality deviations as well as reduced cycle times diminished considerably while supplier's performance increased gradually with improved on-time deliveries. Lead time is the time taken between the start of the process and its termination, generally speaking. Lead times affect the on-time delivery of a commodity or a service depending on the amount of production and material lead times. Lead times can be reduced by typically holding the right stock as well as keeping cycle times as minimal as possible to reduce the production lead times. Suppliers can also internally source, manufacture, and assemble goods to reduce raw material lead times. Acquisition of Vendor Owned Inventories (VOI) or vendor managed inventory instead of the conventional inventory systems may help reduce lead times.

Objectives

• To identify the factors influencing the current state of on-time deliveries for logistic firms in Singapore.
• To analyze the impact of on-time deliveries on supply chain performance.
• To assess the methods used by some multinational logistics firms to achieve on-time delivery

Purpose of the study

The primary goal of this study was to review And assess the lead times of different processes, procedures, and parameters and improve them if and where possible which will consequently improve on-time delivery for logistical operations in the supply chain which will, in turn, initiate a positive chain changes all leading to satisfactory customer services, improved supplier productivity and above all, high profits for all involved parties.

Research Questions

My core research question was, "what are the main factors influencing the current state of on-time deliveries of logistic firms?" These factors could comprise processes of production and supplier delivery, people involved in the production, supply, and logistical operations, as well as various aspects of the infrastructure that would influence logistics.

Definition of Terms

Lead time in the field of procurement and logistics refers to the time taken between the initiation of purchase of goods or services and the actual physical delivery or otherwise depending on the agreed terms and conditions. Lead times can be classified into different classes depending on where, in the supply chain, they occur. Procurement lead time involves pointing out a need or a want, choosing the most appropriate good or service to satisfy that need/want, tendering for suitable vendors, ordering, and paying for the good or service. Purchasing lead time would include the time between ordering and delivery (inclusive of processes of availability confirmation, ordering, acknowledgment of order, shipping notice, receipt of goods or services, and invoice recording). Customer lead time entails the duration of time taken between the confirmation of receipt of an order to delivery to a certain geographical location or picks up from the manufacturing site or the supplier's storage warehouse, depending on the agreed terms. Production lead time is how long it takes to fabricate and ship a commodity without the constraint of unavailability of materials.

On-time delivery (OTD) was defined by (Kamali, 2018) as 'ready to dispatch items from the warehouse to the customers as per the agreed delivery schedule.' It's a mechanism of measuring the efficiency of the supply chain by determining the quantity of goods and services that have been delivered to the intended customers in full and on time.

Research Design

There are five qualitative research designs commonly in use by researchers. The ethnographic study design is a sociological design that utilizes the literal understanding of the implications of the lives of cultural groups. The narrative design relies on life stories of past events related to a certain experience. Phenomenological design, on the other hand, focuses on conditions to predict possible future behaviors rather than life stories.

Assumptions and Limitations

According to previous research studies, there are numerous issues related to the delivery performance of logistic firms, especially if there is a triadic relationship with the stakeholders within the supply chain. Most companies suffer from such issues in their duty of fulfilling their delivery commitment to their clients. The current chapter reviews the past related literature on lead time assessments to optimize on-time delivery and presents critiques research methods used by the researchers, their findings, and gaps that still exist.

Methods of Searching

The researcher utilized various methods of searching for the literature review, including the university library and online databases such as Google Scholar, ResearchGate, Science Direct, SAGE Journals, among others. The keywords used for searching the databases included on-time deliveries, lead time assessments, supply chain management, logistics, and delivery. The articles used for the study included scholarly articles, peer-reviewed articles, books, and current articles published within the past ten years.

Review of Related Literature

Role of Transportation

Transportation, inventory management and order processing are some of the key elements in the Supply Chain Management (Ghiani, Gilbert, & Roberto, 2014). Frazelle (2002) defined transportation as the "flow of material, information, and money between consumers and suppliers." Within the logistics field, transportation is defined as the stockpiles of materials or commodities that are awaiting manufacture, processing, transportation, and selling. The definitions of transportation encompass all the activities from the beginning to the end of the supply chain. The transportation activities take place through hauling or raw materials or finished goods from their sources to meet demand by final consumers elsewhere. According to Bowersox, David, & Bixby (2012), transportation activities are associated with huge costs, which can either be classified as variable, fixed, or joint costs. Bowersox (2012) defines variables costs as costs related to the levels of movement such that the costs become higher if the movements or activities are high and vice versa. On the other hand, fixed costs are usually the operating costs that remain relatively fixed regardless of the movements. Joints costs are generated based on specific services that the company provides. Chopra & Peter (2007) suggest that geographical location's network is the key element that determine...