An empirical study of service postponement: locating the push–pull boundary

Kathleen Iacocca and Matthew Liberatore

International Journal of Production Research, 2018, vol. 56, issue 12, 4100-4114

Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to determine if service firms can profitably perform postponement. We develop a general model to identify the optimal location of the push–pull boundary, or extent of postponement. While previous literature discusses the benefit of applying postponement to the service industry this is the first paper to-date that mathematically models the benefit of service postponement. This paper illustrates how service companies can balance the trade-off between increased responsiveness and increased costs. The single-stage newsvendor model is iteratively applied to each stage of the service process to determine the optimal level of postponement. Two examples demonstrate the value of postponement and the impact of changes in service characteristics are investigated. Finally, this paper provides guidance for service industry professionals on policy-level decisions and applications of postponement.

Date: 2018
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/00207543.2018.1436786 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:tprsxx:v:56:y:2018:i:12:p:4100-4114

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/TPRS20

DOI: 10.1080/00207543.2018.1436786

Access Statistics for this article

International Journal of Production Research is currently edited by Professor A. Dolgui

More articles in International Journal of Production Research from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().