A Study on Customers’ Perception and Readiness to Accept E-Shopping in Uganda

Abstract

Whereas E-Shopping has been accepted worldwide due to its capability and flexibility to ease the shopping process in terms of costs, time, risks and quickly identifying products of interest among others, supermarkets customers in Uganda have failed adopt e-shopping. Supermarkets have showed readiness to operate the e-shopping system, through availing the required processes and infrastructure like internet, websites, visa cards, credit card readers among others, but customers have been reluctant to easily accept the new technology. This could be attributed to lack of awareness, negative perceptions and mistrust in the e-shopping system. The purpose of the study was to customers’ perceptions and readiness to accept e-shopping in Uganda. A questionnaire was designed and tested for validity and reliability before it was administered in collecting data. A total of 207 questionnaires were fully filled in and analyzed. The researchers used descriptive statistics together with correlation and regression methods to analyze the collected data. Results reveal a positive significant relationship between Perception and readiness to accept e-shopping (r=.637**, p<.01), which means perception influences readiness to accept e-shopping. This reveals that when customers perceive e-shopping positively, probably they will be ready to accept e-shopping. The study concludes that perception is very important in acceptance of e-shopping. This is also because of the positive significant relationship between customer perception and readiness to accept e-shopping. The way the customers perceive e-shopping in terms of usefulness, ease of use and the risks attached to it influences their readiness to accept it. Since perception had a positive relationship with readiness to accept e-shopping, customers perception towards supermarkets that are preparing to adopt e-shopping should be considered especially those concerning the way they perceive the usefulness of the shopping technology, its simplicity in the process of using it and whether customers will be able to operate it or not. Having a positive perception on these issues will psychologically prepare them to adopt e- shopping.