Hanoi University

Km 9 Nguyen Trai Road, Thanh Xuan Bac, Nam Tu Liem District, Hanoi - Vietnam
Telephone:(84 4) 8544338, Facsimile:(84 4) 8544550, E-mail: [email protected] , Website: www.hanu.edu.vn

ENGLISH FOR SPECIFIC

PURPOSES DEPARTMENT EAP 2021 - WRITING A RESEARCH PAPER
ROOM 207 - BUILDING C
TEL: (04) 5535728

Statement of authorship
]]]]]

Students’ names: Chu Duc Tam & Tran Huyen Van

Class: 5Q-20 ACN
Student Number: 2006080113 & 2008080142
Subject: ESP Writing
Lecturer: Vu Thuy Duong
Name of research paper:
ADVANTAGES AND DISADVANTAGES OF E-COMMERCE
FOR COLLEGE STUDENTS
Declaration
I declare that the work attached is entirely my own, and that I have given due acknowledgement
as required by the Foundation Studies Department.
I understand that the work submitted may be reproduced and/ or communicated for the purposes
of detecting plagiarism.
Signed Date 21st JUNE, 2021

1
 Plagiarism
By signing the declaration, you are stating that you have not plagiarized.
Use the following as a checklist.
 This work is entirely my own.
 I have not copied another student’s work.
 I have not copied or used in any way material from a text, journal, website or
other published source without acknowledgement (including non – English
sources)
 I have cited and referenced fully and correctly as required by the Foundation
Studies Department where applicable.
 I have not reworded material from another source and presented it as my own.
 I have not used this work in a previous class (self – plagiarism).

2
 HANOI UNIVERSITY
ENGLISH FOR SPECIFIC PURPOSES DEPARTMENT

Advantages and disadvantages of e-commerce

for
College students

3
Teacher: Vu Thuy Duong
Student: Chu Duc Tam, Tran Huyen Van
Class: 5Q-20 ACN
Course: ESP Writing
Date: 21st June, 2021

4
 ABSTRACT

E-commerce is becoming increasingly significant in all sectors of society. Vietnam is the

only country in Southeast Asia to achieve a double-digit growth rate in e-commerce.
Students are potential subjects who have been promoting the economy in general, and the
e-commerce economy in particular. We research how e-commerce may be used in a
traditional, noncommercial environment such as a university by using a quantitative
technique that includes secondary and primary research (questionnaires and interviews).
Based on data obtained from universities and reviewed literature, this paper investigates
the extent to which e-commerce sites are used to make purchases with the benefits and
harms that students encounter, thereby offering some effective solutions to help them
become smart consumers and catch up with the changing trends of society.

5
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Abstract....................................................................................................................................4
List of figures...........................................................................................................................6
1.Introduction......................................................................................................................................7
2.Method...............................................................................................................................................8
3.Results................................................................................................................................................8
4.Discussion of findings...................................................................................................................13
4.1 The customers…………………………………………………………….13

4.2 The advantages of e-commerce..................................................................14

4.3 The disadvantages of e-commerce.............................................................14
5.Recommendation...........................................................................................................................16
6. Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................17

References..............................................................................................................................18
Appendices.............................................................................................................................19

6
 LIST OF FIGURES

Figure 1: The usage habit towards E-commerce apps.................................................8

Figure 2: Expenses per month for E-commerce activities..........................................9

Figure 3: Satisfaction level............................................................................................10

Figure 4: Benefits of E-commerce apps........................................................................10

Figure 5: Limitations and drawbacks..........................................................................11

Figure 6: Unsatisfied experience………………………………………………………12

Figure 7: Trend merch category………………………………………………………12

7
1. Introduction

E-commerce (electronic commerce) is the activity of buying or selling products on online

services. This particular branch first appeared in the 1960s, after 3 decades, the industry
witnessed remarkable development progress and in 2018 the estimated global sales value was
equivalent to 30% of global GDP (UNCTAD, 2020) that same year. The idea of E-commerce
brought up many advantages to humanity, it accelerated the development of the economy,
changed the way people purchase goods and drove away from the problem of distance where you
can buy goods from anywhere in the world. With the great use of this development, the number
of people using this shopping method rises over the year. This particular method not only
provides services for customers (B2C-Business to the customer, C2C-Customer to customer) but
also for and between businesses (B2B-business to business).

Because of its economic potential, this amazing technology may be introduced late in Vietnam
but it attracts a huge number of customers who are around my age and older. According to Dang
Hoang Linh (2020), Vietnamese consumers will spend more and more online since they are
easily influenced by word-of-mouth and social media. The author also mentioned the act of
counterfeit goods and fraud as an alarming reality state. It is because of the E-commerce boom
hence people start conducting research on it, publishing their point of view of the problems
related along with its effectiveness in economic development. Nevertheless, not many of those
research focus on the college students’ role as customers in this business, mainly focusing on
how much and how great it can contribute to the nation’s economy.

This research is based on the data collected from participants who are college students studying
in Hanoi. In this article, we are concentrating on answering the question of what is the role of E-
commerce in college students? After that, we focus on explaining why E-commerce is popular
among students. And lastly, a study of why such an amazing tool can harm any college students?

8
2. Method

This research paper is based on primary source of data collected by conducting questionnaires
from 100 random college students in Hanoi. All of the participants are randomly selected to fill
in the questionnaire and the questions were divided into 3 main groups. Firstly, the classification
questions help to divide the participants into groups of users based on their gender, age, using
frequent to evaluate the level of dedicating or forming a habit of using or shopping on E-
commerce market. Secondly, a set of quiz multiple-choice questions with an additional fill in the
blank answer helped determine whether the users heavily rely on the beneficial effect of E-
commerce or only using a small proportion of its potential and to discover any unchecked perk it
provides. Lastly, the questionnaire end with a set of 1 multiple-choice and fill in the blank to
cover up any unexpected poorly sides of E-commerce and also to gather the most common bad
experience of the participants with their purchases. With the fundamental data from the
questionnaire and many unforeseen results, the main goal is to study college students' habit and
attitude towards E-commerce activities alongside the negative effect of its. Some useful and
realistic ways for E-commerce based company to increase the revenue to this particular assigned
client.

3. Results

Always Sometimes Only when I need to Only during discount Never

6% 2%

17%

46%

29%

Figure 1: The usage habit towards E-commerce apps

9
In response to the question about the students' habit of using e-commerce sites to shop online, the
highest percentage (46%) claimed that they frequently use these websites, proving that it plays
an essential role in their lives. On the other hand, when compared with those who have little need
to shop, according to a specific purpose of buying when needed, this figure is only about two-
thirds (17%). It is also noticeable that it is rare for students not to buy online, with the number
accounting for only 2%, standing in the last position in the chart.

Under 500.000 VND 500.000 VND - 1.000.000 VND 1.000.000 VND - 2.000.000 VND
2.000.000 VND - 3.000.000 VND 3.000.000 VND - 4.000.000 VND More than 4.000.000 VND

2% 1% 1%

9%

28%
59%

Figure 2: Expenses per month for E-commerce activities

From figure 2, it is clear that more than half (59%) of the students who responded have the
opinion that they spend less than 5 hundred VND per month for e-commerce activities because
most of the students' financial level depends on their families. In the same way, more than a
quarter of the users spend 5 hundred to 1 million on online shopping. In particular, the number of
people who buy things from 3 to 4 million VND and over 4 million accounts for the lowest
percentage of 1%.

10
 Figure 3: Satisfaction level

Turning to figure 3, overall, people prefer to make purchases on e-commerce apps with 55% of
them satisfied using it, followed by more than a quarter of quite satisfied people ranked 2nd on
the chart. In addition, 17% of the students gave a very positive rating that they were extremely
satisfied with their online shopping. In contrast, the number of people who are not satisfied with
online purchases is extremely low at 2% showing that the benefit of online shopping is very
significant.

Freeshipping 1

Variety types of 68
goods
People

Saving cost 54

Saving time 80

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90

Figure 4: Benefits of E-commerce apps

As shown in figure 4, there are some advantages of e-commerce websites that students receive
when they purchase online. To begin with, shopping on e-commerce applications saves much

11
time because students no longer need to travel a long distance or wait in a long queue to pay their
bills or withdraw cash (with 80%). Furthermore,68% of people choose to buy on e-commerce
sites because it gives users a wide range of products with many models to choose from easily and
the number of buyers has saved lots of money accounts for 54%.

90 82
80
70
60 57 56
50
40 32
30
21
People

20
10
1
0

Figure 5: Limitations and drawbacks

As can be seen that online shopping does not allow someone to physically inspect a product
before buying it and this often leads to customer dissatisfaction with 82%. Likewise, the
percentage of users with damaged and long delivery times is 56 and 57%, respectively. Among
the drawbacks of online shopping, identity theft and digital scams are also quite common,
accounting for 32%.

12
 45 41
40
35
30 27
25
20
15 12
10 9
10
People

5 1
0
ne g e
ag
e ity re ee
s
No ka ck al ca f
ac pa qu er ry
s t p
ng fie
d um il ve
Lo ro sti ons de
W nju
ad
c ive
U B e ns
p
ex
o
To

Figure 6: Unsatisfied experience

Turning to unsatisfied user experience, nearly a half (41%) of students responded that they
usually encounter “unjustified quality’’ while others experienced bad customer care (12%), lost
package (10%), etc. However, more than a quarter (27%) of customers experience no problems
or negative experiences occur insignificantly. And just 1 % of students have problems with
shipping cost because it is too expensive for them.

Other 25

Electronic devices 22
Peole

Accessories and phones 42

Food 47

Jewelry 36

Fashion 74

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80

Figure 7: Trend merch category

13
Overall, the number of people who buy fashion items accounts for the highest proportion with
74%. Next, food and phone accessories are also popular items with 47% and 42 % respectively.
Besides, ectronics devices make up a relatively small number of buyers, only nearly a quarter of
the number of buyers.

4.Discussion of findings

The results presented above comes from a highly culture diverse range - College students in
Hanoi city, thus we believe, the presented numbers can summarize the state of the E-commerce
market towards college students at a certain level. Despite the fact that the number of participants
remains small (100 people) compared to the number of students studying in the city, we can
assure that our findings will be able to cover the facts and attitudes of the students to Ecommerce
along with some positive factor and negative effect of the businesses.

4.1 The customers

The given number from the survey reveal that E-commerce is now a familiar activity among
college students, even when they have no intention of buying or selling, surfing through many
products to search for a hefty price or in-need products during their free time which makes the
act of online shopping be seen as a pleasurable pastime or form of entertainment. Only a small
proportion of the participants (Figure 1) had never used E-commerce apps before, this success
came from the fact that E-commerce businesses had done a great job in marketing and although
there is no policy favouring college-based clients, the access frequently remains high. After the
survey, a hypothesis of ours was proved which shows the enthusiasm of college-based students
towards the discount and perks of E-commerce. It is a waste to skip all of the "freeships",
"saving points", "supersale" exclusively on the apps, besides the products which are sold are the
same as ones sold offline but with no perks, scarce discount. That is why the average spend is at
under 500,000 VND/a month.

4.2 The advantages

Attracting clients by waves of discount and perks is a unique strength of E-commerce activities.
This explain the second figure which shows a common range of spend around under 500.000

14
VND, this is when those discounts and free shipping kicks in, it reduces the number of money
people had to spend to purchase a product. This particular advantage of online shopping is
heavily striking the client purse with a major discount for every 2 weeks and every holiday. The
strategy is too good and can stimulate demand for goods. Furthermore, this form of strategy can
outplay the traditional way of shopping where discounts or sale/cut were rare, hence E-
commerce is better for students to engage. Students’ low income is also associated with
discounts, for this reason, it is preferable to buy the same product but with a lower price tag.

Another hypothesis of ours is due to its convenience and the variety of goods, students tend to
aim for E-commerce more hence the number of participants answers that they had never used
before remain low. In particular, students normally have an enormous amount of work or they
can be lazy, thus sitting at one place and going shopping through their phone or personal
computer can save a lot of time for travelling from places to places (Figure 4). There are
countless reasons to mention when it comes to moving which could be mentioned such as bad
traffic, distance, or as simple as laziness, all it takes to gain access to E-commerce apps is an
electronic device with internet access and clients can purchase goods from anywhere in
anywhere. Nevertheless, these products shall require a process to come to your hand, it surprises
us when discovering the factor of "freeship" is not supported or being favoured as a unique
benefit online shopping grant. An example that can directly demonstrate the superiority of its
convenience is in the category of fashion (Figure 7), the old way of shopping requires moving
from stores to stores in order to find the perfect piece in case one does not have. By
revolutionizing the shopping method, clients can shop anywhere anytime, one shop does not
have the dress they want, they just go back and scroll to the other shop so on and so forth until
they find and buy it. This makes fashion the most popular type of goods which reflect just as
expected in our findings.

All of the mentioned advantages both expected and unexpected are somehow related and
strongly connected, it is a chain reaction of many discounts due to the low income of college
students who do not have much free time, thus its convenience and variety led to it being
favoured the most and widely used.

4.3 The disadvantages

15
Parallel to the many advantages of E-commerce, there are many disadvantages that held down
the full potential of this fledgling industry. We come up with a theory of the human factor, where
E-commerce was not wrong or bad or wanted to deceive anyone. It was created of good intention
and desire to contribute to the economy better than any type of business, but it is the
person/human who takes advantage of its flaws and weaknesses to steal and make dirty money
out of client’s pocket.

This theory can be easily justified, due to its convenience, the product is normally displayed as a
series of photos and/or videos to describe its characteristics to the customers through a mobile
phone or computer display since customers do not have to come to see and feel the product in
hand. By taking advantage of this, many stores can falsify the data, showing a better or maybe
completely different version of the product being sold to profiteering from this wrong deed.
Exploiting this distinct flaw, many customers fell victim to sellers' selfish intent. Our participants
were also victims of this problem, losing money even though there are policies to protect them.
Those policies may act as a defence made by the platform creator to secure a clean and
transparent trading industry, but it is too easy for the con to bypass the system when their
account got banned. It took a mere 40 seconds to create a new seller account and sell a fraudulent
product, compared to the client’s time and money to save up and make the purchase. This is a
huge problem and popular among retail trading activities where the fraudster just remains to
outmatch the clients even with the help of the reviewing section where people evaluate the
products after the purchase with words and pictures which can still be faked.

Other major issues that can be mentioned are prolong shipping time and damage goods during
transportation, this can happen anywhere during the process, whether the customs officers do not
allow the cargo to pass the border due to many reasons or the missing transfer of the
transportation personnel. Cross-country transportation is very popular during this era of
globalization. However, if the cargo came late due to the transportation personnel take too many
orders than their capability then it can cause a great deal of frustration for the customers since
some of the cargo is in desperate need and there is nothing they can do because the system has
no power to prevent or to make ease of the action. Damaged and/or miss shipping goods is also a
problem, the buyer pays for the perfect condition of the product, by all means, there is no right
for the personnel to damage the all the way to the customers’ hand. It is their responsibility to

16
handle and keep with care, but still, there are 57 reports of damaged goods during shipping
(Figure 5) from our survey. Miss shipping goods on the other hand is much more painful, some
of the people (who do not own the package) receive it then they do not want to return because it
is a free package there is no need to return. For this problem, the clients are the most affected as
much as being frauded, they paid their time and money to possess something now in the hand of
others which because of the system’s mistake and the receiver, the person who involved.

All of the mentioned problems showed many downsides of E-commerce towards the customers,
there is a correlation between many of its factors where all of the problems start from the greed
of human. This exposes a great weakness of E-commerce, its lack of policy and action to
preserve a transparent trading industry which made the customers vulnerable and in this case is
college students.

5. Recommendation

College students enjoy several advantages to help grow the e-commerce market. It has a large
and young population with growing incomes, consumer confidence with high conversion rates,
expanding mobile usage and internet penetration, and the popularity of social media. However,
many factors affect profitability, such as low consumer confidence in online purchases, limited
logistics and delivery services, weak physical and digital infrastructure, inadequate regulatory
frameworks as well as wide digital gaps between regions. Despite the preference of young
consumers for foreign e-commerce websites, the greater understanding of customer preference,
needs, and shopping habits is on the side of domestic e-commerce providers. Customer trust is a
significant part of the long-term business process, so e-commerce businesses should promote the
supply of products with clear and certified origins and control fake and shoddy goods on their
platforms. A program that traces product origin is one recommendation, which can also be a
means to promote themselves transparently. In addition, e-commerce businesses should develop
their infrastructure to adapt to new challenges, from order processing systems, transportation
speed, to customer care services. One of the main driving forces of e-commerce in recent years
can be attributed to the development of advanced 4G telecommunication technologies such as
artificial intelligence and machine learning. E-commerce websites should also regularly review
and update their legal system. A special organization that serves as a state management agency

17
should be established to handle incidents, for example, cybersecurity issues, which arise from the
development of the digital economy. To bridge the digital divide between regions and promote
long-term sustainability, policies should aim to provide e-commerce with an efficient network of
transport and delivery services to improve the order fulfillment process. And last but not least,
most e-commerce stores should have a Return or Refund Policy. An e-commerce company’s
return policy is essentially a marketing tool. Consumers were more likely to purchase with
retailers that had favorable return policies. What’s more, those consumers were even willing to
spend more for the option to return their items! To help reduce the anxiety around returning an
item, consider creating videos that are easy for your customers to digest, so they don’t have to
read about the process in your help center or call your support line. These are some keys to
improving the e-commerce environment in Vietnamese universities.

6.Conclusion

To sum up, E-commerce has revolutionized the way people do business and purchase products,
and receive various services. With many internet users, online shopping is no longer a hypothesis
but a reality, and it has changed people’s lifestyles and buying habits to a great extent.
Hopefully, this research provides an insight into e-commerce about the benefits and harms that
student customers encounter when making purchases, thereby providing an effective solution.
Besides, we expect that the analysis could serve as a prototype of future projects, in an attempt to
thoroughly investigate and examine all the potential aspects of this problem. Except for a few
disadvantages, online shopping has tremendous benefits, and it will dominate global business
even more in the coming days to promote the development of mankind's commodity economy in
the future.

18
 REFERENCES

Ian Kennedy, 2002, How can e-commerce be applied to a traditional, noncommercial

environment such as a university? Retrieved from
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/3964774_How_can_e-
commerce_be_applied_to_a_traditional_noncommercial_environment_such_as_a_universi
ty

Kavyashree, 2018, E-COMMERCE INDUSTRY IN VIETNAM. Retrieved from

http://www.ukabc.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/EVBN-Report-E-commerce-Final-
Update-180622.pdf

Nawaz Ahmad, 2017, Attitude of Business Students towards E-Commerce: A Case Study.
Retrieved from
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/320558763_Attitude_of_Business_Students_towa
rds_E-Commerce_A_Case_Study

Niranjanamurthy, 2013, Analysis of E-Commerce and M-Commerce: Advantages,

Limitations and Security issues. Retrieved from
https://www.ijarcce.com/upload/2013/june/7-Niranjanamurthy-Analysis%20of%20E-
Commerce%20and%20M-Commerce%20Advantages.pdf

S.Jagannath, 2020, TRADE IN SERVICES, INVESTMENT AND E-COMMERCE.

Retrieved from http://www.iisd.org/toolkits/sustainability-toolkit-for-trade-negotiators/wp-
content/uploads/2016/06/tradoc_154210.pdf

19
 APPENDICES
APPENDIX A

QUESTIONNAIRE

ADVANTAGES AND DISASVANTAGES OF E-COMMERCE FOR COLLEGE

STUDENTS

We are Chu Duc Tam and Tran Huyen Van, ESPD students, Hanoi University. We are
doing a research on college students toward online shopping.
This questionnaire is designed to help us obtain data for our research. We highly
appreciate your opinions which are apparently crucial to the completion as well as the
quality of our paper. Thank you for your cooperation.

1. What is your gender?

 Male
 Female
 Other

2. Which year are you in?

 Freshman
 Sophomore
 Junior
 Senior
 Other

3. How often do you buy on e-commerce sites?

 Always
 Sometimes
 Only when needed
 Only during discount
 Never

20
4. On average, how much do you spend on online shopping a month?

 Under 5 hundred VND

 From 5 hundred to 1 million VND
 From 1 million to 2 million VND
 From 2 million to 3 million VND
 From 3 million to 4 million VND
 More than 4 million VND

5. What items do you often buy?

 Fashion
 Jewelry
 Food
 Phones and Accessories
 Electronics and Refrigeration
 Other

6. How satisfied are you with your online shopping experience?

 Very dissatisfied
 Dissatisfied
 Neutral
 Satisfied
 Very satisfied

7. What are the benefits that online shopping has brought to you?

 Saving time
 Saving cost
 Variety types of goods
 Other

8. What are the limitations you face when buying online?

 Unable to verify quality of goods

 Easily damaged goods and broken on shipping
 Prolonged shipping time
 Personal information leak

21
  Bad customer service
 Other

9. What was your most negative experience when shopping online?

……………………………………………………………………….

10. Would you like to contribute any suggestion to the policy of E-commerce businesses
for student consumers?

……………………………………………………………

APPENDIX B
22
 QUESTIONNAIRE RESULTS

ADVANTAGES AND DISASVANTAGES OF E-COMMERCE FOR COLLEGE

STUDENTS

1. What is your gender?

 Male 35%
 Female 51%
 Other 14%

2. Which year are you in?

 Freshman 79%
 Sophomore 9%
 Junior 8%
 Senior 4%
 Other

3. How often do you buy on e-commerce sites?

 Always 46%
 Sometimes 29%
 Only when needed 17%
 Only during discount 6%
 Never 2%

4. On average, how much do you spend on online shopping a month?

 Under 5 hundred VND 59%

 From 5 hundred to 1 million VND 28%
 From 1 million to 2 million VND 9%
 From 2 million to 3 million VND 2%
 From 3 million to 4 million VND 1%
 More than 4 million VND 1%

5. What items do you often buy?

23
  Fashion 74 (vote)
 Jewelry 36 (vote)
 Food 47 (vote)
 Phones and Accessories 42 (vote)
 Electronics and Refrigeration 22 (vote)
 Other 25 (vote)

6. How satisfied are you with your online shopping experience?

 Very dissatisfied 0%
 Dissatisfied 2%
 Neutral 26%
 Satisfied 55%
 Very satisfied 17%

7. What are the benefits that online shopping has brought to you?

 Saving time 80 (vote)

 Saving cost 54 (vote)
 Variety types of goods 68 (vote)
 Other 1 (vote)

8. What are the limitations you face when buying online?

 Unable to verify quality of goods 82 (vote)

 Easily damaged goods and broken on shipping 57 (vote)
 Prolonged shipping time 56 (vote)
 Personal information leak 32 (vote)
 Bad customer service 21 (vote)
 Other 1 (vote)

9. What was your most negative experience when shopping online?

 Unjustified quality 41%

 Bad customer care 12%
 Too expensive shipping fees 1%
 Lost package 10%
 Wrong package 9%
 None 27%

24
10. Would you like to contribute any suggestion to the policy of E-commerce businesses
for student consumers?
 None 49%
 More freeship 20%
 Better price 5%
 Improve customer care services 5%
 Faster delivery 2%
 Better products review 2%
 Personal Information secure 3%
 Able to Check the goods before paying 4%
 Diverse models ,catching up with trends 4%
 Product quality assurance 6%

25