Interval type-2 fuzzy multiattribute group decision-making for logistics services providers selection by combining QFD with partitioned Heronian mean operator (Q2424641)

Summary: Logistics service (LS) has key impacts on customers' satisfaction. Quality function deployment (QFD) can guarantee that logistic services provider's (LSP) attributes are in accordance with the customer's preferences for the LS. The partitioned Heronian mean (PHM) operator assumes that all attributes are partitioned into several clusters. Herein, the attributes in the same clusters are interrelated, while the attributes in different clusters are independent, and the operator can be utilized to solve LSP selection (LSPS) problems in which all attributes are partitioned into several clusters. Interval type-2 fuzzy sets (IT2FSs) can more competently express the ambiguity and vagueness and have more powerful processing abilities. In this paper, we propose a novel LSPS method from the customers' perspective by combining QFD with the PHM operator in IT2FSs environments. First, we develop the interval type-2 fuzzy PHM (IT2FPHM) operator and the interval type-2 fuzzy weighted PHM (IT2FWPHM) operator and discuss some properties of them. Then, based on the relationships between the customer requirements (CRs) and the technical attributes (TAs), QFD is utilized in order to convert the CRs for LS concerns into multiple attributes for LSP's TAs. Finally, a case of a fresh E-business LSPS is used in order to demonstrate the validity and rationality of the proposed method, and some comparisons are used in order to show the superiority of the proposed method.