Beyond the 3PL Black Box: An Integrated Study of Mediating Mechanisms and the Moderating Effects of Perceived Risk and Usage Frequency in Thai Platform-Bound Delivery

Abstract

E-commerce platforms increasingly operate their own captive last-mile couriers—a model termed platform-bound delivery that differs fundamentally from outsourced third-party logistics in brand attribution, data control, and ownership of service recovery. However, how this captive model builds customer loyalty remains poorly understood, and the pathway from service quality through perceived value and satisfaction to loyalty has rarely been tested as an integrated sequence. This study develops and tests a serial-mediation model in which four antecedents—customer trust, last-mile delivery quality, platform reliability, and service recovery quality—shape perceived value and satisfaction, which in turn drive loyalty, with perceived risk and delivery experience frequency examined as boundary conditions. Using survey data from 447 platform-bound delivery users in Thailand and partial least squares structural equation modeling, the study finds that the proposed sequence holds and that satisfaction is the decisive driver of loyalty (β = 0.596, f² = 0.551, p < 0.001), with value and satisfaction acting as coordinated mediators. Trust is the strongest driver of perceived value (β = 0.327), and all four serial value–satisfaction–loyalty chains are significant; the model explains 36% of the variance in loyalty, 51% in satisfaction, and 56% in perceived value. Neither risk perception nor usage frequency showed a detectable moderating effect on satisfaction formation, providing no evidence that the loyalty mechanism differs across customer types. Theoretically, the study validates and refines the value–satisfaction–loyalty chain in the captive-delivery context. Practically, it advises operators to deliver a uniformly trustworthy, reliable, and recovery-capable experience rather than tailoring service by segment.