中介服务定价的理论基础以移动支付为例外文翻译.docx

中介服务定价的理论基础以移动支付为例外文翻译.docx

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中介服务定价的理论基础以移动支付为例外文翻译

外文翻译

Theoreticalfoundationsinthepricingofintermediatingservices:

Thecaseofpaymentsviamobilephones

MaterialSource:

UniversityofExeter,BusinessSchool,UK

Author:

IreneC.L.Ng,NickK.T.Yip

ABSTRACT:

Intermediatingservicesarerelativelynewinresearch.Thisstudyexploreshowconsumersmaydeterminethevalueofintermediatingservicesandtheextentonwillingnesstopay.Weinvestigateamobilepaymenttechnologythatintermediatespaymentsfacilitatedbyatelecommunicationcompanyandabank.Weshowthataderivedeffectmaypersuadeconsumerstopayhigherfortheintermediatingservicewhentheitemspurchasedhaveahighersurplustojustifytheconsumptionoftheservice.Ourstudyalsoshowsthatmoneyhaspolarity,inthatmoneythatis‘owned’bytheindividualisvieweddifferentlyfrommoney‘notowned’.

Keywords:

intermediatingservices;pricing;mobilepaymentsystems.

1INTRODUCTION

Thisarticleisastudyofacomplexintermediatingservice–amobilepaymenttechnologyandthefactorsthatcouldinfluencethepricingofsuchaservice.Thetechnologyintermediatesbetweenapayerandapayeewherebythepayments,whethercommercialorotherwise,arefacilitatedbyboththetelecommunicationcompany（byinitiatingpaymentthroughacellphone）andthebank（bytransferringthefundsbetweenthepayer’saccountandpayee’saccountaftertheinitiation）.Themobilepaymentserviceallowscustomerstopayfortheirpurchasesusingtheirmobilephones.Thephonesareregisteredwiththeirbanks,therebyenablinghighsecuritytransferoffundsfromthepayer’sbank（orcreditcardaccount）tothepayee’sbankaccountbywayofafewkeypressesonthephone.Thisformofpaymentdiffersfromdebitandcreditcardsinsofarasthecostofthetransactionisbornepartlybythecustomer.Moreover,insomepartsofSouthEastAsia,debitcardsarenotcommonpaymentinstrumentsandthisformofmobilepaymentcanfunctionasanalternative.

Thisstudyisimportantasitisunclearhowconsumersvalueintermediatingservicesandtothebestofourknowledge,thishasnotbeeninvestigatedbefore.Hence,thisstudyaimstobringsomeinsightsintothephenomenonbyconductinganexploratorystudyofacomplexintermediatingservice–amobilepaymenttechnologywiththeaimofdiscoveringitstheoreticaldomains.

Inourstudy,theresultssuggestthatvariables,includingbundlingconsumption,advancepurchaseandtheprimaryproductpurchased,mayhaveanimpactonhowcustomerswouldvaluesuchaservice.Forinstance,thedatashowthataderivedeffectmaypersuadeconsumerstopayhigherforthemobilepaymentservicewhentheitemspurchasedhaveahighersurplustojustifytheconsumptionoftheservice.Thedataalsoshowthatconsumersmaychooseto‘bundlelosses’bypayingonebillattheendofeachmonth,regardlessofthenumberoftransactions,althoughtheeconomicbenefitmaybelowerthantopayaccordingtotransactions.Conversely,thestudyalsofoundthatconsumerswhoperceivehighvaluationriskmayprefertopayper-transactionastheybundlelossesthroughthepurchaseofaprimaryproductatatimethatissuitabletothem.Furthermore,ourstudyshowedthatmoneyhaspolarity,inthatmoneythatis‘owned’bytheindividual（forexample,savings,currentaccount）isvieweddifferentlyfrommoney‘notowned’（creditcardaccount）.Finally,theinvestigationshowedthatbankswhooftenchargeconsumersthroughopportunitycosts（forexample,lossofinterestearned）insteadofservicefeeswouldfindithardertochargeformobilepaymentservicesasthiswouldcreateagreatersenseoflossthannormal,asconsumersarelossaverse（Thaler,1999;BarberisandHuang,2001）.

Inthenextsection,aliteraturereviewispresentedwithsometheoreticalbackgroundonthepricingofintermediatingservices.Thisisthenfollowedbythefindingsanddiscussionbeforetheconclusion.

2LITERATUREREVIEWANDTHEORETICALBACKGROUND

ScientificworkontheuseofITande-businessincompaniestogainacompetitiveadvantagestartedinthe1980s（Parsons,1983;RockartandScottMorton,1984）.Overthepasttwodecades,electronicserviceshaveproliferatedastechnologicaladvancementsallowformoreinnovations.Indeed,withmoreinformationbeingmadeavailableandbetterinfrastructureinplace,itisexpectedthatanewgenerationofelectronicintermediarieswillemerge（Sarkaretal,1995;JanssenandSol,2000）.Thisisbecauseelectronicintermediatingservicesareabletolowerthecostoftransactionsduetolowersearch（Bakos,1997）,coordination（Maloneetal,1987）andpaymentprocessingcosts（SirbuandTygar,1995）.

Previousstudiesofintermediatingservicesoftenexaminedcustomers’willingnessorintentiontoadoptnewtechnologies,eitherthroughthetechnologyacceptance,alsoknownas‘TAM’basedmodels（Davisetal,1989;Ledereretal,2000;Venkateshetal,2003）,orstudyingthediffusionofinnovationthroughPerceivedCharacteristicsofInnovating（PCI）models（Rogers,1995;CarterandBelanger,2004）.StudiesonTAMmodelspresentusageintentionsandbehaviorasafunctionofperceivedusefulnessandperceivedeaseandtheyincludestudiesontheroleofgenderandsocialinfluenceintechnologyacceptance（VenkateshandDavis,2000;Venkateshetal,2003）,theworldwideweb（Ledereretal,2000）andthedeterminantsofadoptionofmultimediamobileservices（Pagani,2004）.The‘PCI’model,ontheotherhand,explainsthediffusionofaninnovationthatis,theprocessbywhichaninnovationiscommunicatedthroughcertainchannelsovertimeamongthemembersofasocialsociety（Rogers,1995）.Studiesinthisareaincludetheinfluenceofperceivedcharacteristicsofinnovatingone-governmentadoption（CarterandBelanger,2004）andtheuseofsocialcognitivetheorytoevaluatetheimpactoftheindividual’saffectiveandbehavioralreactiontoinformationtechnology（Compeauetal,1999）.

2.1Bundling

Asmanyintermediatingservicesfacilitatethepurchaseofanotherserviceorproduct,thiswouldmeanthatthevalueoftheintermediatingserviceisalwaysembeddedwithinabundle.Bundlingisthetacticofmarketingtwoormoregoodsand/orservicesasa‘packageataspecialprice’（Guiltinan,1987）.Thispracticeisubiquitousinmarketing,fromthesellingofvacationpackagestocableTVoptions.Purebundlingistheofferoftwoormoreservicesatapackagepricebutdoesnotprovidetheoptionofpurchasingtheindividualservicesseparately,thatis,intheirunbundledform.Hence,customerswhowishtobuyaserviceindividuallymaynotbesoinclinedtopurchasethebundledservices.Furthermore,customerswhohavealreadyhadtheintentionofbuyingthebundledservicesasindividualserviceswillnowenjoyalowerprice,andtheservicefirmwilllosetheadditionalmarginitwouldhaveearnedotherwise（VenkateshandMahajan,1993;StremerschandTellis,2002）.However,employingmixedbundlingcancircumventsomeoftheselimitations.Mixedbundlingprovidesthecustomerwithtwooptions,thatisallowingthemtochoosewhethertopurchasetheservicesinabundleorindividually（Schmalensee,1984）.Pricesofservices（whethersoldindividuallyorasabundle）canbesimultaneouslyoptimizedthroughmixedbundlinginsuchawaythattheservicefirm’sprofitcanbeincreasedoverandabovetheexpectedprofitthaniftheservicesweresoldonapurecomponentbasis（Schmalensee,1984;YadavandMonroe,1993）.Academicliteratureproposesthatbundlingcanprovidebetterservicevalue,reducemarketingcosts（Ngetal,1999）,increasedemand,reduceafirm’ssellingriskandobscurediscounts（Guiltinan,1987）.

Yet,despiteextensiveliteratureonbundling,suchstudiesimplicitlyassumethattheconsumeriscertainofthevalueattachedtotheproductorthebundle.Withaservicethatis‘alwayson’,orinwhichthereisaseparationbetweenpurchaseandconsumption,suchthatconsumervaluationoftheserviceisuncertain,thepricingissuesinthebundlingofsuchaservicewithotherservicesorgoodspurchasedareunclear.Furthermore,anintermediatingservicewouldrequireconsumerstobuypartofthebundleinadvance,whichistheserviceitself,whileconsumingtheservicewhenpurchasingtheotherpartofthebundle,forexamplesubscribingtotheInternetadvancedpurchaseandbuyinggroceries,resultingintheneedtounderstandpricingwithinsuchascenario.

2.2Prospecttheory

Productsaresoldinabundle;theperceivedsavingsmaybevieweddifferentlyfromaprospecttheoryperspective（YadavandMonroe,1993）.Prospecttheory（KahnemanandTversky,1979）holdsthat‘therearerecurringbiasesdrivenbypsychologicalfactorsthatinfluencepeople’schoicesunderuncertainty.Inparticular,itassumesthatpeoplearemoremotivatedbylossesthanbygainsandasaresult,theywilldevotemoreenergytoavoidinglossthantoachievinggain（Thaler,1999）.Thaler（1999）alsoexaminedtheendowmenteffectwithinspecificcasestudies,throughwhichheobservesthat‘consumersoftenfailtobehaveinaccordancewiththenormativeprescriptionsofeconomictheory,insteadrespondingmoretoperceivedchangesthanabsolutelevels’.Thetwobehavioralprinciplesoflossaversionandmentalaccountingwereintroducedtoprospecttheory.Lossaversionimpliesthatwhenalossandagainhavethesamemonetaryvalue,themotivationtoavoidlossisstrongerthanthemotivationtoapproachthegain（Thaleretal,1997）,whilementalaccountingisthe‘setofcognitiveoperationsusedbyindividualsandhouseholdstoorganize,evaluate,andkeeptrackoffinancialactivities’.

Sofar,academicsdrawingonprospecttheoryhaveonlyinvestigatedcomparativelystraigh