Factors influencing couriers’ acceptance of crowdsourcing in last-mile delivery in Saudi Arabia

Purpose – Crowdsourcing delivery services, a novel solution to urban last-mile logistics, heavily rely on sustained couriers’ participation for success. This study aims to investigate the factors influencing a courier’s continuing participation in crowdsourced last-mile delivery in Saudi Arabia. There is currently limited research on models studying factors influencing couriers’ decisions to continue participating as crowdsourced couriers. Design/methodology/approach – We propose an innovative model integrating the social exchange theory (SET) and the Extended Unified Theory of Acceptance and Use of Technology (UTAUT2). This integrated framework forms the basis for exploring the relationships between demographic characteristics and behavioral variables affecting couriers’ decisions to continue participating in crowdsourcing last-mile delivery. A survey was conducted with 345 participants in Saudi Arabia, and collected data were analyzed and validated using structural equation modeling with IBM SPSS Amos 26.0. Findings – The results indicate that factors such as effort expectancy, hedonic motivation and work autonomy significantly influence the couriers’ willingness to continue participating in crowdsourced delivery. However, there was no evidence that Esteem Influence, economic benefit (EB), and perceived concerns had a major effect on couriers’ desire to maintain participation in crowdsourcing delivery. Besides, there were differences in motivation between occasional and committed workers that influenced their intentions to stay in their jobs. While EB did not significantly affect the intentions of couriers to continue participating in crowd logistics, it was found that EB positively impacted male and committed couriers’ intentions. Originality/value – This study on crowdsourcing delivery is the first in Saudi Arabia. It provided valuable insights for the last-mile crowdsourcing delivery platforms to attract and retain crowdsourced couriers.