Buyer-supplier behaviour in electronic reverse auctions: a relationships perspective

This paper presents a conceptual framework for studying and understanding buyer–supplier behaviour in Electronic Reverse Auctions (E-RAs) from a relationships viewpoint. The E-RAs are very popular with buyers, though suppliers view them as being harmful to the health of their business in the long run. This has resulted in various issues, which can be detrimental for the future of E-RAs. These issues have been addressed by various researchers (Beall et al., 2003; Griffiths, 2003; Jap, 2003) as being unethical practices and the auction providers have built in some codes of conduct in the process to curb this behaviour. Though this has been successful to some extent, it has not eliminated these practices. This paper tries to explain some of the behaviour from a different perspective, using a new conceptual framework and a tool used in psychological therapeutic counselling, ''Transactional Analysis'' (TA).