Online services
Online service refers to any type of information or service provided on the internet. Online services may include shopping, lodging, FIR, email, forum, social networking, etc.
Online services may be free or paid an online service provider maybe be a local, international or global companies who specializes in online services or allow to connect all to online services through their network.
Online services may be free or paid an online service provider maybe be a local, international or global companies who specializes in online services or allow to connect all to online services through their network.
Different online services
- Communication- email, instant messaging, online conferencing social networking e.g. Facebook, Twitter etc.
- Real time information- train timetables, new services, traffic reports, weather
- Commerce- shopping, banking, auctions
- Government- online tax returns, applications for various governments services, revenue collection, health services
- Education- online learning, School/College websites, online counseling
- Business- video conferencing, online share trading
- Entertainment- multiuser games, radio players, sports, books
- Download services- software, upgrades, music, film
- Web storage- Google Docs, drop box etc.
- Online mapping and root planning- Google Maps, navigation
Advantages
- Convenience
- Save time
- Greater choice
- Better prices
- Reduced long-term costs
- Wider customer base
- Freedom of choice
- High satisfaction percentage
- Privacy
- Data storage saving
- Internet banking
Disadvantages
- Cost
- Staff with expertise
- Website downtime
- Online fraud
- Delay
- Inferior product
- Shipping charge
E-commerce/e-business/electronic commerce
E-Commerce refers to any form of transaction that uses an electronic medium to facilitate the transaction. E-Commerce refers to paperless exchange of business information using following ways:
- Electronic data exchange(EDI)
- Electronic mail(email)
- Electronic bulletin boards
- Electronic fund transfer(EFT)
- Other network based technologies
- Reduce the cost of production by reducing overheads
- Offer an opportunity to increase the sale
- Offer an opportunity to access New Market across the globe
- Provide more accurate information and improved customer service experience
- Improve employee motivation through a more flexible working method
- Allow 24x7 access to the firm’s products and services
- Improves speed of response
- Reduced inventory
Traditional commerce
- Heavy dependency on information exchange from person to person
- Manual intervention is required for each communication or transaction
- It is difficult to establish and maintain standard practices in traditional commerce
- Communication of business depends upon individual skills
- Unavailability of uniform platform as traditional commerce depends heavily on personal communication
E-Commerce
- Information sharing is made easy by electronic communication channels making little dependency on person to person information exchange
- Communication or transaction can be done in asynchronous way. Electronics system automatically handles when to pass communication to required person or do the transactions
- A uniform strategy can be easily established and maintained in E-commerce
- In e-commerce or electronic market there is no human intervention
- E-commerce website provides user a platform where all information is available at one place
Classification of of E-commerce by the nature of the transactions or interactions
E-commerce or electronic commerce business models can be generally categorised in following categories.
- Business to Business (B2B)
- Business to Consumer (B2C)
- Consumer to Consumer (C2C)
- Consumer to Business (C2B)
- Business to Government (B2G)
- Government to Business (G2B)
- Government to Citizen (G2C)
Business to Business (B2B)- websites following B2B business model sells its product to an intermediate by who then sells the product to the final customer. As an example a wholesaler places and order from a company's website and after receiving the consignment, sells the end product to final customer who comes to buy the product at wholesaler's retail outlet.
Business-to-Consumer (B2C)- website following B2C business model sells its products directly to a customer. A customer can view products shown on the website or business organization. The customer can choose a product and order the same. Website will send a notification to the business organization via email and organization will dispatch the product/goods to the customer
Consumer to Consumer (C2C)- website following C2C business model helps consumer to sell their assets like residential property, cars, motorcycle etc. or rent a room by publishing their information on the website. Website may or may not charge the consumer for its services and other consumer may opt to buy the product of the first consumer by viewing the post/advertisement on the website
Consumer to Business (C2B)- in this model a consumer approaches website showing multiple business organization for a particular service. Consumer places an estimate of amount he/she wants to spend for a particular service. For example, comparison of interest rates of personal loan/car loan provided by various banks via website. Business organization that fulfills the consumer's requirement within specified budget approaches the customer and provide its services
Business to Government (B2G)- B2G model is similar variant of B2B model. Such websites are used by government to trade and exchange information with various business organizations. Such websites are accredited by the government and provide a medium to businesses to submit application forms to the government.
Government to Business (G2B)- government uses G2B model website to approach business organizations. Such websites supports auctions, tenders and application submission functionalities
Government to Citizen (G2C)- government uses G2C model website to approach citizen in general. Such websites support auctions of vehicles, machineries or any other material. Such website also provides services like registration for birth, marriage or death certificates. Main objective of G2C websites are reduce average time for fulfilling people requests for various government services
Model of Electronic Payments
- Credit card
- Debit card
- Smart card
- E-money
- Electronic fund transfer (EFT)
Credit card- credit card is a small plastic card, with a unique number attached with an account. It has also a magnetic strip embedded in it which is used to read credit card via card readers.
When a customer purchase a product by credit card, credit card issuer bank pays on behalf of the customer and customer has a certain time period after which he/she can pay the credit card bill. It is usually credit card monthly payment cycle.
Debit card- debit card, like credit card is a small plastic card with a unique number mapped with the bank account number. It is required to have a bank account before getting a debit card from the bank.
Smart card- smart card is again similar to credit card and debit card in appearance but it has a small microprocessor chip embedded in it. It has the capacity to store customer work related/personal information.
E-money- e money transactions refers to situation where payments is done over the network and amount gets transferred from one financial body to another financial body without any involvement of a middleman.
Electronic fund transfer- it is the very popular electronic payment method to transfer money from one bank account to another bank account. Accounts can be in same bank or different Bank.
Net banking
Net banking, also known as online banking, is a service provided by banks that allows customers to perform various financial transactions and manage their bank accounts through the internet.
With net banking, customers can access their account information, view their transaction history, transfer funds between accounts, pay bills, and even apply for loans or credit cards online. This provides a convenient way for customers to manage their finances from the comfort of their own home or office, without the need to visit a bank branch.
To use net banking, customers typically need to register for the service with their bank, and create a unique username and password to access their account online. Some banks may also offer additional security measures such as two-factor authentication to further protect customers' account information.