Conceptual Structure Rethinking of the Quality of Self-Service Electronic Banking by Observing Ethical Principles for Vulnerable Consumers

Banks provide various services to different kinds of customers in many ways and the existence of an electronic platform makes these services more effective. This study examines the category of electronic services to understand vulnerable people and identify factors affecting their understanding of the quality of electronic services and the consequences of those services through the lens of ethics.

This research uses an exploratory sequential mixed approach. In the qualitative section, hermeneutic phenomenology was used to explore the participants' lived experiences. Based on a snowball sampling procedure, we selected 25 old people for in-depth interviews. Data analysis was performed by coding and sequential mixed methods. The quantitative section used a descriptive correlations method based on structural equation. Vulnerable customers data has been collected using a questionnaire and structural equation modeling and AMOS software were used to analyze and explain the model.

Ethical Considerations: 

The study conformed to all moral principles, including honesty, satisfaction, trustworthiness and confidentiality.

At quality step, through the phenomenological method, the main influential themes were identified as follows: previous image, traditionalism and social responsibility. Regarding the dimensions of electronic self-services quality, two components of emotional action and application value were added to the previous themes. Study results indicate that e-service quality components include efficiency, responsiveness, attractiveness, usage value, information, ease of use and accessibility, security and privacy, as well as emotional actions. According to the results of the present research model, behavioral intentions are significantly affected by the five components of electronic services quality with path coefficients listed including ease of use and accessibility (0.172), responsiveness (0.150), attractiveness (0.110), usage value (0.540) and information (0.092). Antecedent components such as previous experience, verbal communication, customer participation, social responsibility, individual needs, traditionalism and organization image affect the primary banking service quality phenomenon.

Potentially vulnerable customers do not show a different behavior pattern than other customers of these services. However, potentially vulnerable customers have more influential variables in evaluating service quality than ordinary customers due to their age and personality characteristics.