University of Northampton: STRM059 Research Project on Vehicle Delays

This research project report examines the issue of vehicle maintenance delays within the Serco MELABS contract in the Middle East. The study identifies the problem of increasing customer complaints due to delays in asset hire and transport services. The research outlines the rationale, objectives, and methodology used to investigate the issue, including a review of literature on scheduled and unscheduled vehicle maintenance and the impact of backlogs. The findings are presented with data analysis and are followed by a discussion of the key issues and evaluation of potential solutions. The report concludes with recommendations for improving the operational processes to reduce delays, enhance customer satisfaction, and improve Serco's market reputation. The report also includes an abstract, acknowledgements, table of contents, references, and appendices, providing a comprehensive analysis of the challenges and potential improvements within Serco's transport services.

THE UNIVERSITY OF NORTHAMPTON
NORTHAMPTON BUSINESS SCHOOL
MODULE: STRM059: Business Research in Practice 2018-19
Module Code Level Credit Value Module Leader
STRM059 7 30 Dr Chinny Nzekwe-Excel
Assignment Brief
Assignment title: Research Project Report (7500 words)
Weighting: 100%
Deadline 12th February 2020
Feedback and Grades
due: Four weeks after the deadline for the module (but NOT inclusive of
holidays)
Resit Dates PLEASE SEE NILE

Acknowledgements
Examining the full course of the current research, I will need enough measurement of thankful to my academic
director Subhani from HRMI. In addition to this, I am grateful to my instructor Kushul Suman who helped me right
through the research and dissertation. I want to express gratitude to my teachers, my friends, and lecturers. I also
need to show appreciation to the managers and employees of my place of work Serco Middle East – MELABS
Contract those have a vital and encouraging role for the data collection methods. I would like to bestow an honest
appreciation to my supervisors Manone Perera for successful submission of my research thesis at The University
of Northampton for allowing me to conduct the research and prepare this thesis under their administration. All of
them have provided me valuable guidance, encouragement, critics to accomplish the project and without their
humble support, this project would not have been as same as the current presentation. A humble thanks also go to
those who provided direct or indirect support in plentiful situations of this complex project. Finally, but not least, my
greeting also encompasses my family for continuous supporting and encouragement.
Thank You,
Yours Sincerely,
Rukshan Seneviratne

Table of Contents
Introduction 4
Rationale 4
Research Problem 4
Research objective 5
Literature Review 6
Methodology 8
Results/Findings 11
Interviews 11
Data Analysis 12
Primary Data Analysis 13
Secondary data Analysis 13
Discussion and Evaluation 13
Conclusion and Recommendations 15
Conclusion 15
Recommendation 16
References 17
Appendices 18

Introduction
Logistics is a trending business line in this current era. Helping other business with transportation is a market-
friendly business process. There are challenges and scopes in this business. This study is based on an operational
issue of a transport service with vehicle maintenance delays in Serco MELABS Contract in middle east. Secro is a
renowned organization providing public services since 1927. There are several services under the Organization.
MELABS is one of the contracts providing services such as Asset Hire and Transport Management, Pool Fleet
Management, Road Movement Services, Warehouse Management, Procurement Services, Waste Management,
Grounds Refuel Service and Telecommunications Services (Serco, 2019). Secro group of industries is doing their
businesses internationally and having projects of big names in the world. All the businesses are well structured.
Quality is the most influential factor to have an impact on customer satisfaction. A company always should keep
monitoring the processes running in the business. Secro has some customer negative feedback with the Asset
Hire and Transport Services, the most prominent segment of its business (Serco, 2019). The study focuses on
identifying the issues and providing a possible solution by this project. In this introductory part, the rationale of the
research, problems and objectives of the project is discussed.
Rationale
This study is done to have the solution for the current issues of Asset Hire and Transport Services, a part of Secro
Group MELABS Contract (Serco, 2019). This study will help to understand the operational issues of the business.
It is beneficial for fixing the problem of the business. To increase customer satisfaction and make a better
reputation in the market, Secro needs to have a change project in the business operation process of Asset Hire
and Transport Services. To make a big deal in future projects, the company needs to improve its service quality.
This research is useful to have better efficiency and to reach the desired success to the company.
Research Problem
The research problem is a vital point in the introductory part of any research. The research problem leads the
project to the ultimate completion of the same. In this part of the study, the primary problem of the research is
discussed. In this case, Secro MELABS Contract is facing increase number of complaints from its customer for
delays in its services (Serco, 2019). There are a lot of open requests for vehicle maintenance and servicing, both
scheduled and unscheduled requested are there in the queue. Serco is receiving request for services faster than
they can complete existing service requests and the managing department of the business is falling behind.
Therefore, number of offline vehicles are increasing. It is increasing the dissatisfaction of the client due to
operational impacts, which is having a negative impact on the current MELABS contract and could impact to future
business of the company.
Month Number of Open Service
Request
Number of Service
Requests closed
Number of Service
Requests carry forward
Dec-18 45 32 13
Jan-19 63 46 17
Feb-19 85 40 45
Mar-19 88 47 41
Apr-19 54 38 16
May-19 82 40 42
Jun-19 54 38 16
Jul-19 80 45 35
Aug-19 46 35 11
Table 1: Table of service request numbers (till solution implementation)

Service Request vs Completed
(Source: Serco, 2019).
The primary problem of the study is to have a new business process to reduce the number of pending services of
vehicles. This can be considered as the research question in this study.
Research objective
Research objectives are the processes which defines the success or the failure of the project. It is important to
note that the objective of a research would allow to overcome the research problem. In this case of study, the
objectives are stated below.
● To identify the key issues of the business process of Asset Hire and Transport Services.
● To conduct a proper and detailed study for analysing the customer satisfaction level related to the stated
research and be able to solve the corresponding problems as related to the business.
● To be able to promptly deal with the current limitations to the entire research prospect and identify the root
cause of the possible issues corresponding to the search matter.
These are the objectives of this study. Systematically fulfilling these objectives will lead the research towards
successful completion. All the objectives are based on the research problem an addressing the issues. Following
these with proper methodology is useful for the researcher for the desired research outcome.
Proper consultation will be done with the Service Provider and Serco Management to have proper planning of the
project.

Literature Review
Schedule and Unscheduled vehicle maintenance
According to Dede and Joshi, had identified the vehicle maintenance is the crucial factor to increase the availability
of vehicles. Scheduled maintenance helped to enhance within the predetermined timing (Dede and Joshi, 2019). It
also helps to recurring vehicle maintenance with time intervals. Unscheduled vehicle maintenance referred to the
maintenance applicable often. Vehicle ageing and degradation lead to cause the vehicle failed to work. The
increasing value of schedule maintenance helps in maintaining the value of a vehicle (Cebe et al. 2018). It had
been observed, and the scheduled maintenance had several benefits. It leads to prevail the apprehensive vehicle
maintenance and also helps to reduce the costing process of the maintenance. Hence it had identified the vehicle
maintenance often regulated at a certain time. With the exaggeration of the vehicle, vehicle maintenance also had
to opt. The inauguration of the schedule maintenance evolves the execution of the vehicle. On another hand, the
unscheduled maintenance had the negotiating attribute in vehicle maintenance. The enrollment of scheduled
maintenance had been optimized as the prominent factor to evolve the maintenance service of the vehicles.
Maintenance planners developed the plan of scheduled maintenance to operate effective maintenance. The
schedule line integrated die to effective maintenance task. The servicing operation opted to schedule the plan to
mesmerize the maintenance value of the vehicle. Subsequently, the scheduled maintenance helps to maintain
vehicle capability. Schedule maintenance had the predetermined actions to integrate the value of maintenance of
the vehicles.
On the other hand, the scheduled maintenance had the evolving value as they aid to demolish the maintenance of
the vehicle. The research study depicted the evolution of schedule maintenance leads to influence the value of
servicing of vehicles. Scheduled maintenance had been inaugurated as the component replacement. The
procurement of this maintenance process helps to provide preventive maintenance. Some of the scheduled
maintenance include grease, oil changes, and inspection during the trip. The research study also focused on
unscheduled maintenance. The unscheduled maintenance occurred due to unexpected failures, breakdowns. The
inauguration of the schedule and unscheduled maintenance helped to achieve the intensified vehicle life. The
profound schedule maintenance leads to promote the capability of the vehicle and lead to enhance the lifecycle of
the vehicle. Proactive maintenance had been preferred as it pledges reactive maintenance. The practice of
scheduled maintenance required the appropriate planning and knowledge to execute apprehensively. Proactive
maintenance mostly enhanced with the embracing of preventive maintenance. The inspection of preventive
maintenance included the facilitated services, oil changes. These had been enrolled as the scheduled
maintenance, which helps to prevail the potential components of the vehicles. Rather than that, the unprecedented
enhancement of schedule maintenance affiliated to locate the appropriate vehicle parts effectively. In the modern
world, the schedule and unscheduled maintenance both had the prioritizing role in influencing the maintenance
process. Moreover, it also facilitates the lifecycle of the vehicle and helps to integrate the prominent maintenance.
Impact of backlogging of the vehicles
The increased number of ad-hock reactive vehicle maintenance requests in addition to the scheduled maintenance
plan has appeared to be a problematic issue for Serco MELABS contract over the recent past. From the previous
pieces of literature, it has been prominent that the business organizations never become able to gain customer
satisfaction when they happen to be unable to fulfil the need of their customers. According to the article, an
effective reactive routing protocol is to be maintained for the dense vehicular ad hoc networks (Sivakumar, and
Manoharan, 2017). When a vehicle is left backlogged, it will become of no use to its owner, and it requires to be
repaired accordingly. The vehicle needs proper maintenance when it is getting used; otherwise, it may appear to
be backlogged one day and will become useless. This will create several problematic consequences for the
customer of a company that prepares the vehicles for their business. Therefore, the company requires to look into
these issues so that the customers will not face any problems in future while using those vehicles. While the
company who maintained the vehicles is seen to delay in the process of backlogging of the vehicles, the
customers may face several problems in the time of using those vehicles. Thus, the company requires to be aware
of the problematic consequences its customers may face and take necessary steps to further investigate the
matter (Hu et al., 2017). According to the authors, the operational commitments will be another significant problem
for the customers when they will not be able to make use of their vehicles (Ricci and Newman, 2018).
Furthermore, the transport fleet will be affected as the customer will not reach their destination in time when
vehicles happen to be offline (Amadeo, Campolo, and Molinaro, 2016). Thus, it may appear to be quite problematic
on the part of the customers for they will ultimately face all these consequences of vehicles being off line and
backlogged which need to be serviced but are left unrepaired. While the authors have focused on the problems of
the customers, it has not been overlooked by them that the customers need to be provided with the proper service-
related facilities by the vehicle selling the company for the responsibility to provide their customers with these
advantages lies on the company (Hu et al., 2017). The backlogged cars will appear to be more as a liability to
customers than as an asset. The customers will not become capable enough to acquire the facilities which were
intended behind their buying of those vehicles if those vehicles turn out to be backlogged for a long time period.
Most significantly, the customers will never be able to trust the company further for their poor experience in

acquiring service-related facilities. Therefore, the company requires to try to resolve all these problematic issues
faced by the customers; otherwise they will never be able to gain customer satisfaction, and the scope of their
business will be affected out of this in the future.
Mobile Service Unit
The mobile service provided to the customers is service that helps the company to service cars on the spot and in
bulk. The mobile service uses the concept of on-wheel service. The routine service for servicing vehicles ensures
that the customers do not need to take the number of cars to the service centre (Izogo and Ogba 2015). The
service centre sends van having all the equipment necessary for servicing a car and take minimum time to service
a vehicle. The companies working in the automobile industry have started using the concept of mobile service. The
utilization of mobile service builds a trust and brand name within the customer. The use of towing truck is quite old
and some customers find it uncomfortable to tow or drive their car to the servicing centre. The mobile service
ensures that the customer does not need to visit a servicing centre. The service centre is situated at a distance
that develops trouble for towing the malfunctioning car to the service centre, getting it repaired and return it to the
owner. The use of mobile service for car servicing helps the car servicing company to retain their customers (Izogo
and Ogba 2015). It is human nature to use the facility that does not require a person to visit a place where they can
call up and get the service done (Izogo and Ogba 2015). The use of internet and mobile has increased to a great
extent, and all people tend to use their smart phones for all-purpose, getting supplies from the market to getting the
car serviced.
The use of mobile service profoundly influences customer behavior as the brand name is highlighted. Most people
consider that a service providing company has the facility for mobile services means that the business organization
is technologically advanced and know about the latest trends (Al-Azzam 2015). The use of such a people-oriented
service indicates that the business organization uses the strategy of retaining customers by satisfying their
demands. A yard having un-serviced cars looks unpleasing along with blocking up the yard. It is crucial for a
company functioning in the automobile industry to establish a mobile service facility for its customers. The
customers and clients demand that their vehicles are upgraded and serviced from time to time. There exists a
strong relationship between the service provided after selling cars, quality of the service and customer loyalty. It is
possible to maintain customer loyalty by maintaining customer satisfaction and providing services based on
customer demand (Al-Azzam 2015). It is slowly becoming a trend that people prefer to get their car serviced at the
place opted by them instead of taking the car to the service centre themselves (Al-Azzam 2015). The quality of
services determines customer satisfaction as it expresses the true nature of the company along showing the
responsibility of the company towards its customers. The clients of the company find it easy to communicate to the
serviceman who has been appointed rather than to the head who sits in the room and order his subordinates to
check the fault in the car.
With the evolution of technology in the modern world, the servicing unit of vehicles also generated its value. The
collaboration of mobile service and routine service make the service more prominent. Hence it had been
accumulated an apprehensive servicing to inaugurate the exaggerating value (Bohnsack and Pinkse, 2017). The
routine service had availed the servicing process of the vehicle servicing organization. On another hand, it also
fulfils the adequate needs of the consumers. The consumer does not need to take the vehicle to the service centre.
The integration of routine servicing helped the organization to pledge the enhanced servicing of the vehicles. The
routine servicing ensures the servicing process by sending the servicing van which has the equipment that
required for servicing (Beckman and Bjone, Amazon Technologies Inc, 2017). The intervention of routine
maintenance also leads to maintaining vehicle maintenance within minimum time. The inauguration of the routine
service leads to increase their competency of the service centre. It had been observed, the mobile service and
routine service had perpetuated the value of the vehicles. The utilization of mobile service and renowned routine
service helped to intensify the value of branding of the service centre (Penilla, and Penilla, 2016). The organization
that is mostly involved in vehicle maintenance had concentrated on the mobile service to create mesmerizing
communication with the consumers. In addition, the inauguration of the mobile service leads to evolving the
trusting value of the consumer. Subsequently the research study also identified the routine service had opted to
intensify the value of schedule and unscheduled vehicle maintenance. The inclusion of routine service had
promoted the competency of the organization related to the servicing vehicles. Subsequently, the inauguration of
the mobile service had prevailed the magnificent customer behavior as it to highlight the brand of the organization.
Previously, the mobile service and timely routine service are not availed in automobile servicing organization. The
devolving efficacy of mobile service and routine service devolved consumer interest. Nowadays, the evolution of
mobile service also helped the consumers to solve the various query about vehicle maintenance.
Furthermore, the involvement of mobile service had enhanced the servicing capability of the service centre and
also helped the customer as it reduce the vehicle down time and the customer away time from operational
commitments. In another hand, the optimization of routine service has reduced the unscheduled maintenance
requests, the towing of the unrepaired vehicles such as trucks, cars are very complex to take in the service centre.

Methodology
Research Design
The term ‘research design’ refers to a significant framework that is made by the involvement of several methods
along with some innovative techniques for having a better conclusion of the proposed project and its objectives
(Colorafi and Evans, 2016). It has been seen that the research design of any project usually being determined by
the researcher who is responsible for the conduction of the project. A ‘logical manner’ is maintained in this process
for having a satisfactory result with the alignment of the information. ‘Research design’ defines how the raised
problem in the research would be solved with efficiency. According to the study (Woiceshyn and Daellenbach,
2018), four types of research designs have been identified that are suitable for researching with professionalism.
The recognized research designs are ‘descriptive, correlational, quasi-experimental and experimental’. The
following research has been conducted for an operational issue of a vehicle maintenance and transport service
provided in MELABS Contract in Secro.
Figure: Research Onion
(Source: 15 Writers, 2019)
Justification:
For this study, ‘descriptive’ research design has been chosen to research the vehicle maintenance and transport
service in Serco. The company is trying to engage the customers by providing a better vehicle maintenance
service and maintain the rate of customer satisfaction. The research design of the conducted research would help
to conclude the purpose of the study with information alignment. The following descriptive research design
approach and the collection of data would be determined in the below section.
Research Approach
Data collection is required for research to be conducted with the fulfilment of all the essential criteria of the crucial
aspects. The approach of the research is responsible for determining the process of data collection. The following
assignment is based on an operational issue of vehicle maintenance. The identified problem for the conduction of
the research used to be addressed by the research approach. There are three types of research approaches such
as ‘inductive, deductive and adductive (Woiceshyn and Daellenbach, 2018).
Justification:
The present study has been conducted using the deductive approach. The following research aims to engage
more customer satisfaction in the company by providing the customers with a good and improved vehicle
maintenance services. ‘Deductive’ approach would help the researcher to determine the processes of authentic
and relevant data collection, so that the study can be conducted successfully.
Research Philosophy
‘Research philosophy’ plays an immersive role in determining the way of gathering the data and the way to utilize
them in the conduction of the research (Fletcher, 2017). The philosophy of the research indicates the appropriate
approach for the research that would be adopted. The following study is based on an operational issue of the
vehicle maintenance service. ‘Realism research philosophy’ would be adopted for the successful completion of the

study. The philosophy of the research would help to gather confidential data that is helpful for the proposed
research.
Data Collection
Data collection is the most integral part of a research or project. It deals with the information required for analyzing
and concluding for a significant research problem. It is significant that when a research follows systematic data
collection process, the solution will be more satisfactory. This study is based on collecting data primarily from the
'Secro' itself in the form of information and statistics of the maintenance schedule of the vehicle maintenance work
requests since December 2018 till June 2019, customer complaints and interviewing the managing department of
the organization. Though information can be obtained from various sources like surveys, interviews,
questionnaires, journals, case studies, and reports, this study is focused on some particular systematic sources.
As this is a sort of secondary data thus a mixed method analysis is justified with collection of data. The secondary
data can be of various services provided by Secro to the defence, Navy or other sectors. This will provide the
graphics to the researcher to draw an explicit understanding on the cause behind the delay of the service units.
Sampling
Sampling is the process of selecting a group of people, subjects or objects from a large population or datasets. A
researcher uses sampling technique to determine the liable people and sources for the research for further
experiments. Thus, selecting an appropriate sample measurement tool for finding out the contextual participants is
very important for generating exclusive data. This research will account the Serco MELABS Head of Support
Services and Service Provider for an interview. This is followed by selection of appropriate literature and cases.
Data Analysis
The data analysis is an important section which provides the practical outline on the research area. This section of
the research will look to detail the process of executing the information collected previously. The data collection
mentioned a primary approach conducting an interview with the Head of Support Services and the Service
Provider of the maintenance of the backlogged vehicles. The interview results will be accounted based on the
transcript deduced from the two face to face interviews. The section will cover possible answer required to draw an
effective solution to the problem of the service. This is where the study will look for a compare and contrast on the
collected data. In order to understand the basic of the problem for the maintenance failure and customer
dissatisfaction, several literature reviews are included. The concepts generated from the literature in terms of the
mobile service unit as a solution, figuring out the client POC and the requirements to deal with research area.
Ethical consideration
Following are some of the major ethical consideration for the research:
1. Beneficence of the research anatomies
2. Confidentiality of the participants
3. Relevancy of the data collected
Limitations
The identified limitations for this research are as follows:
● The company, ‘Secro’ has to invest a significant amount of resources and time for improving the present
condition of the company
● Service Provider corporations for change in current practices , amount of resources and time commitment
Step-by-step process of Identification:
The following tables would be showing the systematic process of identification of the issues as related to that of
the business establishment and following would be the methodology accountable.
Objective 1 To identify the key issues of the business process of Asset Hire and Transport Services.
Research
Design
The research design followed for the described objective would be descriptive in nature.
Therefore, maintaining integrity of the specified objective.
Research
Approach
The specific objective would be met with the help of the inductive approach.
Data
Collection
Secondary data would be collected with the assistance of specific open source data basses
and peer reviewed articles as well as journals

Sampling No sampling would be necessary
Data Analysis Collected data would be analysed for the analysis and would be considered with reaching a
general conclusion.
Ethical
Consideration
Relevancy of the data collected would be justifiable with the research anomalies and the
reliance of the data sources
Limitations Reliability of the open source data thus questioning the integrity of the entire data collected
Objective 2 To conduct a proper and detailed study for analysing the customer satisfaction level related to
the stated research and be able to solve the corresponding problems as related to the
business.
Research
Design
The research design followed for the described objective would be correlational in nature.
Therefore, maintaining integrity of the specified objective.
Research
Approach
The specific objective would be met with the help of the adductive approach.
Data
Collection
Primary data would be obtained with the help of interview s and thus introducing the aspect of
sampling
Sampling A large population would be introduced as the primary dataset.
Data Analysis The collected data would be analysed fro reaching to a best possible prediction and secondary
data would be taken into account
Ethical
Consideration
Confidentiality would be maintained for the participants
Limitations Reliability of the collected data from feasible or human sources
Objective 3 To be able to promptly deal with the current limitations to the entire research prospect and
identify the root cause of the possible issues corresponding to the search matter.
Research
Design
The research design followed for the described objective would be experimental in nature.
Therefore, including quasi-experimental and true-experimental.
Research
Approach
The specific objective would be met with the help of the deductive approach.
Data
Collection
Secondary data would be collected with the assistance of specific peer reviewed journals
Sampling No sampling would be necessary
Data Analysis Collected data would be analysed for the analysis and would be considered with reaching a
specific conclusion. Thus, refereeing to a true event.
Ethical
Consideration
Relevancy of the data collected would be justifiable with the research anomalies and the
reliance of the data sources

Limitations Service provider in the current section being invested into R&D it is important to note that
reliability of data is quite difficult
Results/Findings
The scholarly articles offer certain valuable insight for the concerned matter. It is being found that requests
consuming ad-hoc reactive vehicle maintenance system are the main issue for Serco. Due to the stated issue, the
organization suffers from client complaints and dissatisfaction. Defective vehicles are the burden for the users
where they want the easy and best solution for it. However, the scenario becomes just the opposite of it as the
organization fail to offer timely service for the clients. Further, maintenance is even an important part of a vehicle
where the organization lacks severely. The organization carries much backlog for the defective vehicle and thus
cannot manage to offer their service for maintenance. The situation makes the scenario more vulnerable for the
customers and the company. The discussion stresses more on time as it is being found that time is the most
important factor in this regard as the clients become irritated due to the late service of the company.
The referring can be clarified more with the data of the last six months, the company managed to service less and
less vehicles on time and many vehicles were carried over to the next month for servicing where they fail to
provide their service on time. The graph shows the number of open requests is often more than the completed
services in a month thus making maintenance to be carried over to the following month resulting the vehicle is
offline for extended period.
Service Request Completed
(Source: Serco, 2019).
Interviews
The research is based on some sources of information and data. There are two types of information sources.
There are some established theories of management and findings regarding the current issues of the company.
These are considered as secondary data sources. A literature review is a secondary source of data. There is a part
of primary data collection in this research. The interview is the tool of primary data collection. The thoughts and
knowledge of related persons regarding the considered topic are taken as the primary source of data. In this case,
two interviews are taken to collect important information for the research. One is the Head of Support Services of
Asset Hire and Transport Services in Serco MELABS Contract, and the other is the Service Provider, who is a
partner of this project. Details of the two interviews are stated below.
Interview 1: Head of Support Services
Interviewer: How is the business going?
HSS: It's going satisfactory. Serco group is doing very well in the world market. Middle East Logistics and Base
Support Services (MELABS) is the re-bid won by Serco. However, there are some issues and customer complaints
which are harming this sector of their business.
Interviewer: What is the main issue for this current situation?
HSS: The maintenance and service of the vehicle are not going well. The asset has many backlog requests of
vehicle maintenance which are increasing the customer dissatisfaction. Supplier is losing time spent on vehicle
collection and return from service resulting in only limited vehicle collected for service in a month.
Interviewer: As per you, how it can be managed?

HSS: A proper system of monitoring and vehicle maintenance have to be implemented to reduce this problem.
Interview 2: Service Provider
Interviewer: What is the primary issue of the company?
Service Provider: increase number of vehicle maintenance requests, time taken for secluded maintenance, lack of
number and skills of employees are the main issue of the company.
Interviewer: What can be done to overcome the issues?
Service Provider: Minor services can be completed by use of mobile service system, which can provide service
within 3 hours. Major services and repairs can still go to the workshop for maintenance. With a mobile service, we
are able to service up to 5 vehicles in a day at the customer location. This will reduce the time taken for secluded
maintenance and reduce the vehicle backlog.
The scheduled maintenance service had been optimized as the predetermined service to avail the maintenance
service of the vehicles. Scheduled maintenance helped to enhance within the predetermined timing. It also helps to
recurring vehicle maintenance with time intervals. Unscheduled vehicle maintenance referred to the maintenance
applicable often. Vehicle ageing and degradation lead to cause the vehicle failed to work (Litichever et al. 2018).
The increasing value of schedule maintenance helps in maintaining the value of the vehicle. It had been observed,
and the scheduled maintenance had several benefits. The research study also integrated the evolution of routine
service and mobile service. The involvement of routine service and mobile service had led to intensify the value of
vehicle maintenance. The inauguration of routine service leads to promote technological factors in the automobile
organization. It availed the servicing strategy of the service centre. The evolution of mobile service helped the
customer to solve the various query about vehicle maintenance. They also need not to visit the service centre for
vehicle maintenance. The routine service had availed the servicing process of the vehicle servicing organization.
On another hand, it also fulfils the adequate needs of the consumers. The integration of routine servicing helped
the organization to pledge the enhanced servicing of the vehicles.
Furthermore, the involvement of mobile service and routine service had enhanced the servicing capability of the
service centre. On another hand, it also helped the customers to make the work more ease. It also had been
evaluated the customer behavior reflected with the optimization of mobile service. On the other hand, the
integration of routine service had magnified the servicing value of the vehicle. The randomization of technological
factors such as routine service had made the activity ease for mechanics. It also helped the customers to get the
service within a reduce time frame. The optimization of mobile service leads to enhance the competency of the
organization. Mobile service facilitates the communication process with the consumers.
The inclusion of mobile service had revealed to intensify customer attractiveness. Hence it also leads to enhance
the baring awareness of the organization and the inauguration of the mobile service leads to evolving the trusting
value of the customer. Subsequently, the research study also identified the routine service had opted to intensify
the value of schedule and unscheduled vehicle maintenance. The inclusion of timely routine service had promoted
the competency of the organization related to the servicing vehicles. The profound schedule maintenance leads to
promote the capability of the vehicle and lead to enhance the lifecycle of the vehicle. Proactive maintenance had
been preferred as it lessen reactive maintenance requirements. The practice of scheduled maintenance required
the appropriate planning and knowledge to execute apprehensively. Proactive maintenance mostly enhanced with
the embracing of preventive maintenance. The inspection of preventive maintenance included the facilitated
services, oil changes and power checks. Hence the synthesizing of the schedule maintenance created the
predominant action on the vehicle maintenance. It also increased the value of vehicle maintenance and helped to
fulfill the demand of the customers. The facilitation of mobile service and timely routine service had regained the
customers loyalty. The inauguration of mobile service leads the automobile organization to technologically
influence and also helped to provide the mesmerizing service within appropriate timing.
The betterment they obtained through the specified systems while mobile service is an important factor as it helps
to save time for the consumers initiating better customer satisfaction. Through the mobile service, the organization
can get in touch with its consumers at any time. The initiative further helps the organization to offer customized
service, which helps them to regain the reputation of the organization. In this regard, they obtain the service
through which the customers can access mobile service where they do not need to go to the service centre for
servicing. It is a common factor that, going to the service centre takes much time as it goes through different
regulations and procedures whereas mobile service is a better option in this regard which saves time for both the
parties and it helps the organization to retain its customers. Better relationship with the stakeholder like Service
Providers help the organization to have a better insight into the process of delay if any issues predominate the
procedure. The service consists of the engagement of different stakeholders like Service Providers as they make
the process successful for the organization and thus, the organization serves the people. The insight in advance
helps the organization to convey the delay to the customers previously to avoid the issues in future. The clients
can be prepared with the issue of the delay through advance information, which helps the organization to maintain
a better customer relationship retaining a better reputation for the part of the company.
Data Analysis
Primary Data Analysis

The specific section would be diving closer into the fundamental aspects related to the failure of the organization in
regards to the collected primary data. With the data analysis, tools such as root cause analysis the resultant would
be a specific and a dependable forecasting of the entire research as it follows an addictive approach for the
research to be commenced. However, it is important to note that the reliability of the prim art data would be solely
dependent on the assertibility and the credibility of the research to get along with the interviewee. The Serco
Company functions in multiple fields, which has areas that can be considered as the remote areas and need
mobile service. As being the worker that has been interviewed, they will deal with any issue regarding a car, it is
understandable that the provide data would be correspondingly in favours of the assorted organization. However, it
has been observed that the company lacks a strong connection with all the Service Providers to offer the business
for a smooth flow. Thus, giving rise to the main or rather the fundamental issues of the entire organization.
It can also be observed from the recorded table that the primary issue lies at the basic operation where the inter-
hierarchy of the organization poses as the basic problem. It can be observed that the service requests are
successfully gained or processed; however, the number of fulfilled requests are much lower than the original
request. Thus, implicating a possibility at the service providers’ end or at the department who is not able to process
the request from an end-to-end terminal thus causing a huge problem at the entire establishments a scheme.
Secondary data Analysis
Secondary data in this research are collected from the pieces of literature which holds some ideas of related facts.
Data has been collected from previous related works by different authors and hence is considered to be secondary
data. There are three themes on which the secondary data discussion has been done previously. A brief but
detailed idea on scheduled and unscheduled maintenance of vehicle has been provided in the first theme. From
the first theme, it can be concluded that scheduled maintenance is very much required to increase the lifetime of
the vehicle and keep the vehicle in running condition. Unscheduled maintenance occurs in case of unexpected
breakdowns. Efficient unscheduled maintenance is also necessary for the maintenance company.
Unstructured flow of works leads a company to lose its reliability. Secro has been facing issues regarding the
maintenance service since past few years. The balance between the ad hoc maintenance and unscheduled
maintenance is not being maintained. This is leading the customers to lose the faith on the company which is
making the vehicle. People are getting unsatisfied about the services.
Mobile maintenance service is a new age service. In the third and last theme of the discussion, the usefulness of
mobile maintenance service has been stated. From the discussion it can easily be framed that this type of
innovative idea can solve many issues regarding unscheduled maintenance. People can easily get the service
from anywhere within the decided service area of the company. This will help to increase customer satisfaction
also.
Discussion and Evaluation
The discussion on the schedule and unscheduled vehicle maintenance of the vehicle will be effective enough to
study the case of Serco, where it has failed to gain its expected revenue for the dissatisfaction of the customers.
The responsibility to provide any product-related service to the consumers lies on the company, and therefore the
company requires to follow the essential procedural measurement to resolve the problematic issues faced by the
customers (Rampelmann, and Köhler, 2018). Quite importantly, the maintenance of the vehicle is it scheduled or
unscheduled, needs to be the responsibility of the company who has not performed its duty carefully. As a result, it
has not been able to satisfy its customers to that level expected by it while selling the vehicles. Thus, the company
has failed to generate customer loyalty which will appear to be the most effective for the reputation of the
company. The company will have to look into the problems faced by its customers so that the customers will not
lodge further complaints against the company. When the vehicles are not provided with scheduled or unscheduled
maintenance, those will automatically be left backlogged and offline. This is adept enough to create problems for
both the company and its customers. The company Serco is left with many pending requests for servicing the
vehicles from different customers. It has not been able to provide all service-related facilities to all its customers,
and their problems have does not appeared to be solved. As a consequence, the company has gained
dissatisfaction from the part of its customers which is never expected by any organization. This severe problem will
somehow be solved if the company becomes able to arrange some mobile service centre in different places. It will
enable the company to provide service-related advantages to its customers who have previously not provided with
their desired service.
The failure of the company to generate customer satisfaction and thus gain customer loyalty has finally made it
unable to achieve its goals and objectives. Therefore, the company requires to be more cautious in this particular
matter of providing the necessary facilities as demanded by its customers. As a result, the customers will not
receive the service they need at the time of emergency. Furthermore, the customers become unable to make use
of their vehicles in the time of their need. The company requires to resolve the problematic issues faced by their

customers in order to gain customer satisfaction so that they will be able to run their business successfully. The
company further needs to look into the problems caused by the increasing (Cui et al., 2015). Thus, the company,
like any other business organization requires to solve the customers’ problems besides meeting their demands. It
can be emphatically mentioned that the company requires to maintain strategic measures to resolve the problems
faced by their customers. Therefore, all the problematic issues of the customers need to be solved by the company
so that the customers will no longer face any serious issue regarding the use of the vehicles made by the
company. The satisfaction of the customers and providing authentic service to their customers will bring success to
the company. Quite significantly, to run the business successfully, the company needs to make their customers
satisfied, which will lead to the way of customer loyalty to the company. As a result, the customers will lead the
company towards the way of achieving all its goals and objectives. Thus, the company will be able to perform its
corporate social responsibility more efficiently. The company, therefore, needs to primly focus on resolving the
issues related to the problems faced by the customers so that its ultimate objective can be gained. Thus, the
company will somewhat be able to recover all the problems it the faced in the recent past due to their failure in
providing adequate service to their customers whose satisfaction appears to be the basic goal of any business
organization. The company, first of all, needs to try to solve the pending cases and provide its customers with the
service as required by them. This will ultimately lead to the company towards the way of gaining success which is
considered to be another significant objective of the company. Therefore, from the above discussion, it appears to
be quite clear that the company needs to focus its duty on the way to gain customer satisfaction by solving all the
problems faced by them.
The company ATS ELGI is a manufacturing company that produces garage equipment along with servicing cars
from time to time. The company mobile service unit that follows the principle of “workshop on wheels” (ATS Elgi.
2014). The service unit has several pieces of equipment essential for a workshop, making the vehicle as a
platform. The unit provides service to mainly the mining industry, cement industry, iron and steel plants, automobile
industry, construction industry, defense and tyre service industry. The main aim of the mobile service unit is to
provide service in remote areas where the service along with equipment is required. The company reputed itself in
the service industry by establishing the mobile service concept by the year 1976 (ATS Elgi. 2014). The company
slowly gained a reputation in the automobile equipment industry by improving the quality of the vehicles used for
sending service to remote areas. The company presents a research and development team that looks after the
cars assigned as a mobile service unit. The vehicles have an ergonomic design, maintain safety along with having
ruggedness and aesthetics. The mobile unit has several pieces of equipment that are generally required for
servicing a vehicle or providing service to any pieces of machinery. The equipment includes oil pump, air
compressor, hose reels, grease pumps, diesel generator set, arc welder, vehicle washer, control panel, bench
welder, tools box, storage tank for storing diesel and water. The first aid box, accessories kit and fire extinguishers
are an integral part of the mobile vehicle unit. In other words, the vehicle is equipment all necessary tools that
might be required in extreme conditions (ATS Elgi. 2014). The business organization ensured that the mobile
vehicle unit is built as per customer demand along with the requirement of the industry distinctly. The structure and
features of the vehicles used as mobile service unit are developed in a way to survive extreme conditions along
with maintaining the name of the company. The customers of the company are highly satisfied, and the company
has been able to keep their brand name along with maintaining customer satisfaction.
The Serco Company functions in multiple fields, which has areas that can be considered as the remote areas and
need mobile service (Serco.com. 2019). The company faced customer dissatisfaction as they are unable to close
the registered queries for the car service. The Serco Company signed a rebid with the Australian Defence Force
for the Middle East. The company will provide nearly 21 lines of service that will include catering, ground
maintenance and facilities related, welfare services along with waste disposal. The defence force of Australia
situated in the United Arab Emirates will receive the service. The company will need to ensure that the customers
are satisfied by meeting the request raised by the defence people (Serco.com. 2019). The mobile service will
contribute to the working of the Serco Company providing the necessary help to the ADF working in UAE
(Serco.com. 2019). The mobile service unit will ensure that the 21 services lines are provided as per their
requirements along with maintaining customer satisfaction.
In the automotive industry, the importance of Service Providers is much important. As per the Vogel case study
subcontracting is the most important trend. Car manufacturers maintain strong cooperation among each other to
direct a proper way towards the business. Previously, OEM shares direct contacts with the suppliers with a greater
extent. First-tier suppliers are responsible for increased quality and co-ordination for an organization. At the
present context, different companies are involved with car production. Thereby, there is a noticeable competition
among the suppliers and Service Providers. In order to retain their respective existence in the competitive market,
they need to address USP and RDI (Nwokocha et al., 2019). The primary reason for the development can be
better understood with the help of OEM as it focuses on certain core areas like branding, chassis, design and
service. Further, the subcontracting era has developed its genre to third along with fourth-tier suppliers. The
related factors in this regard are transforming consumer demand and technological advances. The cars are turned
into high-tech products which need proper maintenance after a précised interval. In this context, servicing and
involvement of the Service Providers are much important. As basically being the worker of the company, they will
deal with any issue regarding a car. Thereby, the company needs to maintain a strong connection with all the
Service Providers to offer the business a smooth flow. The Service Providers even can be engaged with many
companies. Thereby, irregular or bitter relation with Service Providers makes the work of that company can be
secondary where the company needs to face the consequences. Further, Service Providers are the main persons

to offer technological advances to a car which makes the more preferred for the customer. In order to exercise the
advancement, the organization need to maintain a good relationship. Considering these offering, certain things can
be noticed for the case of Serco as it goes through a downfall for the recent years along with finally it overcomes
the problem. Certain reasons can be found behind the downfall and up-gradation. It is being noticed that previously
Serco does not exercise good communication with the Service Providers much, thereby the different face issues in
their business-like delayed service, bad quality etc. In this regard, it can be said that irregular communication with
Service Providers does not initiate the technological advances for the cars which stimulate the repeated servicing
process. However, considering them as an important part of the organization resolves different issues as
technological advances start to provide better quality and the organization can offer information regarding delayed
service to the customers as per the offering of the Service Providers to avoid any issue with the consumers. The
advantage helps the company to reduce customer complaints, enhancing the reputation for the company in the
market.
Month Number of Open Service
Request
Number of Service
Requests closed
Number of Service
Requests carry forward
Dec-18 45 32 13
Jan-19 63 46 17
Feb-19 85 40 45
Mar-19 88 47 41
Apr-19 54 38 16
May-19 82 40 42
Jun-19 54 38 16
Jul-19 80 45 35
Aug-19 46 35 11
Sep-19 58 85 0
Oct-19 35 94 0
Nov-19 31 60 0
Table 2: Table of service request number (post solution implementations)
Conclusion and Recommendations
Conclusion
It can be said that logistics, as a trending business of the current era, is indeed a market-friendly business. The
company has specific issues which make it challenging to regulate the entire business process. The improvement
of the business changes over time. The long-standing service provided by Serco with its large number of branches
since 1927 is praiseworthy, and it also made a mark in the logistic business. The business of the company made
unprecedented expansion in the recent year. The study effectively explores the business process of transport
services and Asset Hire. Planning and consultation have been done with the Service Providers who have been
selected. The study depicts increasing service quality. It was observed that regular maintenance of the vehicle
takes a high cost of maintenance. Scheduled maintenance is cost-effective. The vehicle's maintenance on time
reduces the risk of failure of the vehicles in the middle of the travelling. It was also found that scheduled
maintenance helps to maintain vehicles capability. Schedule maintenance had the deliberate actions that integrate
the maintenance value of vehicles if schedule maintenance is not done. The study further explored that the
enrolment of schedule maintenance is the prominent factor to evolve the maintenance service of the vehicle. It can
also be said that mobile service also uses the concept of on-wheel service. Usage of the internet and mobile in-car
technology has increased to a great extent in the recent year. All people tend to use mobile phone and internet
technology to get car service. It is also found that the use of the mobile phone with the internet has greatly
influenced the consumer behaviour of the recent generation. The company requires embedding mobile technology
permanently. It is found that there is a great demand for an upgrade in the cars service digitalization. The digital
technology in all vehicles manufactured requires the necessary inclusion of mobile internet connectivity and
technology. It is also explored that over the recent past, the increased number of ad-hoc reactive vehicles
maintenance requires in addition to scheduled maintenance. The business organization was unable to gain
customer satisfaction when the customer requirement is not addressed correctly. The involvement of mobile
service and routine service had increased service capability of the service centre, which plays a crucial role in
giving the company a backup to the feedbacks the company receives. A large number of customer grievances
require reliable customer service to address customer grievance. The valid customer grievance address leads to
the prosperous sale of the vehicles. Optimization of scheduled maintenance of the vehicles ease mechanics

activity, and it also improves technological factors of the customer grievances cell or service centre. The evaluation
of mobile service also assisted the customers to resolve the different query about the maintenance of the vehicles.
The customer using mobile technology to get car service also needs to visit the service centre as there are experts
who can satisfy customer requirements in a better way than mobile technology. It can be said that the inclusion of
modern technology in the vehicles increase the ease of the drivers and mechanics for driving and repairing,
respectively. The mobile service also provides the user with enough knowledge regarding the maintenance of the
vehicles.
The descriptive research design had been included in the study. The descriptive research design to promote the
research study as it pledges significant information for the research. The descriptive research design gathered
information about vehicle maintenance. Moreover, organizational management also focused on consumer
retention and transport service. The inflation of descriptive documents leads to promote extensive information
about vehicle maintenance.
Moreover, it can prevail in the maintenance resources to promote the organizational business strategy. In addition,
data collection had been inaugurated as the main perspective to involve the significant information for the
research. The study reflected on the operational issues of the vehicle maintenance organization. There are three
specific types of research approaches that had been identified. Those approaches are deductive, inductive. The
study had concerned the deductive approach to construct the research. The deductive research approach helped
to provide information regarding the consumer expectation and emerging vehicle maintenance procurement. The
research had been constricted to influence consumer engagement. Consumer engagement can be deduced with
effective vehicle services, although the deductive approaches helped to identify the authentic information about the
exaggerating vehicle services. Thus, the deductive approach reveals the research study to enhance and to provide
the crucial data based on vehicle servicing. The descriptive research design inaugurated information about vehicle
maintenance.
Moreover, organizational management also focused on consumer retention and transport service. The inflation of
descriptive documents leads to promote extensive information about vehicle maintenance. Moreover, it can prevail
in the maintenance resources to promote the organizational business strategy. Data analysis had been considered
as another crucial part of the study. The data analysis had been considered as the most significant factor as it
analyses the information provided from the research method. The primary approach had been dedicated in the
present study to accumulate the extensive data collection process. In addition, ethical consideration had been
recognized as the immersive part of the study. The ethical consideration included the relevancy of the gathered
data. It also deduced the research anatomies. Hence the primary approach of data collection increased the
confidentiality of the participants of the research study. The data collection process helped to inaugurate the
scheduled maintenance as the prominent aspect to influence the vehicle maintenance service. Scheduled
maintenance helped to prevail in the vehicle servicing process. The predetermined maintenance mostly influences
the scheduled maintenance of the vehicle. More than that the finding is of the study also reflected on the mobile
service and routine services of the vehicle service centre.
Recommendation
● Mobile service had been identified as the magnificent factor to influence the vehicle maintenance process.
● The exaggeration of schedule and unscheduled maintenance of vehicles lead to promote the maintenance
service of the vehicle. Thus, unscheduled and scheduled maintenance had to be opted to evolve the
maintenance service of a vehicle.
● The routine service had been identified as the mesmerizing process to influence consumer engagement as it
helped the consumer to fulfil their expectation.
● The technological factors are another motivating factor in increasing the sustainability of vehicle service centre.
Since it had to be enhanced to provide extensive vehicle maintenance and to improve the organisational
inducement.
● Scheduled maintenance is cost-effective. The vehicle's maintenance on time reduces the risk of failure of the
vehicles in the middle of the travelling. It was also found that scheduled maintenance helps to maintain
vehicles capability.
● Usage of the internet and mobile in-car technology has increased to a great extent in the recent year. Thus,
the collation of internet and mobile services can prevail the execution of vehicle service centre.

Service Request vs Completed
(Source: Serco, 2019).
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Appendices
Fig: Research Onion
Month Number of Open Service
Request
Number of Service
Requests closed
Number of Service
Requests carry forward
Dec-18 45 32 13
Jan-19 63 46 17
Feb-19 85 40 45
Mar-19 88 47 41
Apr-19 54 38 16
May-19 82 40 42
Jun-19 54 38 16
Jul-19 80 45 35
Aug-19 46 35 11
Table 1: Table of service request numbers (till solution implementation)
Fig: Statistics of Secro

Month Number of Open Service
Request
Number of Service
Requests closed
Number of Service
Requests carry forward

Dec-18 45 32 13
Jan-19 63 46 17
Feb-19 85 40 45
Mar-19 88 47 41
Apr-19 54 38 16
May-19 82 40 42
Jun-19 54 38 16
Jul-19 80 45 35
Aug-19 46 35 11
Sep-19 58 85 0
Oct-19 35 94 0
Nov-19 31 60 0
Table 2: Table of service request number (post solution implementations)
Fig: Graph of Vehicle Service Request VS. Completed ones.