Model Evaluation of Suppliers in Terms of Real Company for Selected Criteria

KLJUČNE RIJEČI procjena kriteriji ugovaratelj multikriterijska analiza Saaty matrica tvrtka za logistiku Ján Ližbetin Department of Transport and Logistics Institute of Technology and Business České Budějovice, Czech Republic e-mail: lizbetin@mail.vstecb.cz Lenka Černá Department of Railway Transport Faculty of Operation and Economics of Transport and Communications University of Žilina, Slovak Republic e-mail: lenka.cerna@fpedas.uniza.sk Martin Ľoch Department of Railway Transport Faculty of Operation and Economics of Transport and Communications University of Žilina, Slovak Republic e-mail: martin.loch@fpedas.uniza.sk


INTRODUCTION
The choice of supplier has long term impact on the company ability to respond effectively to customer needs. The wider possibility of the choice of consumers from foreign markets or the intention of foreign distribution, the more difficult the choice of suppliers is [1], [2].
The significance of the accurate supplier choice is based on the fact that the delays of the planned delivery from the supplier cause customer or final user needs dissatisfaction. The partner of choice (supplier) should be the one who fulfills the best the criteria in combination of quality and price [1], [2].
The essential role in the supply chain management is that the activity -contradiction elimination is integrated into the whole process, and respectively, into the process of gaining competitiveness. New complex process is established and it includes the terms supplier -manufacturer -customer, i.e. the definition of the supply chain. All the companies, which participate in development, production and delivery of the product to final user, belong to this chain. In general we may speak about controlled cooperation exceeding the company so the suppliers are on one side and the customers (by entering and leaving value-creating chain) on the other side and they are coordinated by business creation processes. This approach is called as supply chain management (SCM) [1, [2].

PROPOSED MODEL FOR THE AREA OF SUPPLIER EVALUATION IN THE LOGISTICS COMPANY
Presented model determines the approaches, instructions and principles for the area of supplier quality evaluation. The objective of the model is to increase supply chain management efficiency which will enable better reaction to newly created situations and it will satisfy the needs of the selected logistics company and all the subject concerned [3], [4].
Supplier evaluation according to the proposed model is based on milticriteria analysis, the criterion choice depends on personal and written practitioners questioning. Importance definition of the particular criteria is based on Saaty method. The Scoring model is used at multicriteria supplier evaluation analysis.
The multicriteria analysis was specified on suppliers in two areas which cause the most of the complaints in the logistics companies [5]: -Transport area (external transport -shifting towards the customer) -Handling and storage area (general handling, classification and storage) The multicriteria analysis with scoring model was used in suppliers' evaluation in the logistics company. Saaty method was used to define importance of the particular criteria [6].

PRACTITIONERS CHARACTERISTICS
The practitioners in the area of the logistics were contacted for the needs of supplier evaluation model creation. The specific characteristic of practitioners [5]: Practitioner 1 (Area Manager for Central Slovakia) Job description: to ensure management and development of business activities in the logistics company, coordination and control activities, complex setting of all logistic company processes [5]: Practitioner 2 (Logistics specialist) Job description: to ensure planning and organization of the logistics, preparation of the internal directives for employees, the responsibility for fulfillment of the terms agreed on with business partner, the quality improvement of the services provided by company, the responsibility for effective technology and staff utilization, the communication with business partner, in the case of problem situation the coordination of transport among the company departments, reporting [5].

THE CRITERION CHOICE FOR SUPPLIER EVALUATION
There are different criteria for suppliers evaluation in the actual market environment and used by companies. The method of questioning (non-standardized questioning) specifically form of in-depth interview with practitioners was used to define and choose the criteria for suppliers evaluation. It ensures the correctness of the criterion choice. It is the method of psychological quality research to acquire wide spectrum of detailed information about respondent´s attitudes and opinions [5], [6].
Compilation of criteria for supplier evaluation was based on personal interviews with the practitioners.
Selected criteria for supplier evaluation (HD) are indicated as [5]: K i HD i-th criterion for supplier evaluation, where i= 1,2, ..., k k -total number of criteria for supplier evaluation -PRICE (K 1 HD ) -price certainty, agreement -how much the buyer should pay and in what periods. The price represents service purchase price for a unit of delivered amount. -QUALITY (K 2 HD ) -provided quality of the realizable services. The suppliers may guarantee the quality of their provide services in different ways: quality certificate, the number of complaints to total amount of provided services, -RELIABILITY (K 3 HD ) -deadline (delivery time) compliance -DELIVERY TIME (K 4 HD ) -it represents the period from receiving the orders by supplier to execution of the particular service -FLEXIBILITY (K 5 HD ) -if there is a demand for change of amount of the provided services, this criteria represents supplier willingness to adapt to changes and percentage expression of the capability to fulfill received orders in time -RESPONSIBILITY (K 6 HD ) -it includes the supplier responsibility for the actions during the provision of ordered services/ products, responsibility realization for poor provision of services to company, responsibility for ordered amount, quality, time, -IDENTIFICATION / RISKS PREVENTION (K 7 HD ) -willingness to identify accrued risks and their prevention -SUPPLIER DEVELOPMENT (K 8 HD ) -supplier willingness to innovate and modernize the cooperation development with supplier, compatibility of informational company system among the subjects.

DEFINITION OF THE CRITERION IMPORTANCE
The Saaty method of multi criteria analysis is used to define the importance of the particular criteria. Saaty matrix for criterion importance definition of the particular criteria is provided in the table 1. (Supplier evaluation) [5], [7][8][9].

PROPOSAL OF THE SUPPLIER EVALUATION ACCORDING TO SCORING MODEL DEFINITION OF THE CRITERION IMPORTANCE
Scoring model is an instrument for quantitative evaluation of the particular suppliers according to given criteria for the purpose of effective and impartial decision making [5], [7].
The identical importance was set by all the practitioners with the method of equal importance within the proposed model The practitioners are equally reliable in the field of logistics [5], [7].

CRITERION IMPORTANCE CALCULATION
Criterion importance calculation -the importance of the particular criteria is calculated with the aid of Saaty matrix associated with i-th practitioner, it means that every matrix is amended by i-th practitioner. The calculation of the criterion importance by i-th practitioner is presented in matrix [5], [7], [8].

CRITERIA MATRIX COMPILATION MADE BY I-TH PRACTITIONER FROM SPECIFIC AREA OF EXPERTISE
To ensure importance transparency from the practitioners, the table was drafted -criteria importance matrix assigned by the practitioners.
The importance assignment of the selected criteria for supplier's evaluation -impartial importance assignment is stated in the Figure 2 [1], [10], [11].

THE SCORING GRID PROPOSAL FOR COMPARISON OF THE INDIVIDUAL CRITERIA BY THE PRACTITIONERS AND FOR IMPORTANCE ASSIGNMENT
Scoring grid for importance assignment of the individual criteria is stated in the following Table 3 [10].

THE CALCULATION OF THE FINAL CRITERIA IMPORTANCE ASSIGNED BY THE PRACTITIONERS
(1) Where: Final importance of i-th criterion for the evaluation Final importance of the first criterion for the evaluation i = 1,2, ..., k vj = importance of the j-th practitioner j = 1,2, ..., k wij = importance of the i-th criterion assigned by j-th practitioner

ENLISTING THE FINAL IMPORTANCE
Enlisting of the final importance -the final importance of the individual criteria for supplier evaluation may be enlisted as: (2)

ASSIGNMENT OF THE CRITERION MATRIX FOR SUPPLIER EVALUATION
For the right decision on choosing the supplier, it is necessary to establish the criterial matrix (see Table 4) [1], [10], [11].

SUPPLIER EVALUATION ACCORDING TO SCORING MODEL
It is important to assess numerical scale for scoring model. It is clear that the more points the supplier gains, the better position he gets. Every logistics company may define their own numerical scale -according to their needs. The proposed numerical scale was consulted with the practitioners by the method of questioning (personal interview) [1], [3], [11]. Source: authors

TABLE COMPOSITION WITH THE POSSIBLE LIMITS FOR SCORING OF THE INDIVIDUAL CRITERIA
A compilation of the possible boundaries for each scoring criteria is the next step in multicriteria decision table [5], [7].

PROPOSAL OF THE POSSIBLE LIMITS FOR SCORING OF THE INDIVIDUAL CRITERIA
Individual limits of scoring were designed with the aid of brainstorming method and personal interviews with practitioners. Figure 3 is focused on the field of transport and individual scoring limits have been proposed for handling and storage area (normal handling, sorting and storage).For this article, only limits as for transport are shown [5], [7], [10].
Criterion K 2 HD (Quality) in the area of transport may be defined as [12] - [15]:   Figure 5) -supplier evaluation proposal, where total number of gained score may be calculated as follows [13], [14]: The maximum of total score number of evaluation, which is possible to achieve with selected scale, is 500.

SUPPLIER CLASSIFICATION PROPOSAL
The supplier classification proposal is based on the total number of points which the supplier may achieve during the evaluation [5], [15], [16]. In the case that the supplier is classified as "excellent supplier", his position in the logistics company is not compromised. The supplier proved excellent results in every area and the cooperation and communication between the supplier and company is at the high level [5].
As long as the supplier is classified as "insufficient supplier", it is necessary so that the logistics company will ask a supplier written submission where the supplier will react to the insufficient evaluation and what are his remedial actions and schedule of their realization. The second option is that the company will look for alternative (new) supplier [5], [12][13][14].

CONCLUSION
The proposed model for the assessment of suppliers in the logistics enterprise was applied in a real-logistics company. Evaluation of supplier was made in two areas: transport, handling and storage.
The fundamental objective of every logistics company providing services is to achieve optimal level of provided services with minimal costs. Those two crucial factors affect each other in many cases. On the one side, there are constantly increasing demands of the customers on the speed, quality and flexibility of the consignments. On the other side, there is a problem of price competitiveness, so this means a tension on the constant search of potentials on decrease of the logistic costs [12], [16].
The application of the innovative approaches into the measuring and quality evaluation for the companies providing service is very important step. It leads to increasing company success on the transport market. Nowadays, the most of the measurement and quality evaluation systems is just partial in some of the logistics companies, because it is reduced on evaluation of the selected factors whilst many shortcomings in supply chain management stay hidden [14], [16].