What is Transaction Speed?

When we log in our Bank Account online, the time it takes for us to access into a system after we log in our username and password is its transaction speed. It is the amount of time a system takes to perform a transaction. The more the transaction speed is, the better the customer satisfaction and provides more system availaibility and faster process.  Similarly, when we pay online using our credit card number, it involves some kind of a transaction speed too. This speed depends on the type fo connection server, i.e, if you are connected through a dial-up or a DSL or comcast cable. Sometimes, because of slow connection, some databases take so long that the system times out. It makes the user more frustrated trying to log in again and again.

 How is it linked to other web services?

    More and More Companies are trying their best to make their online systems better. Google search engine is a perfect example of transaction speed, when a user enters and submits a keyword, google’s database processes transaction speed, the one that brings up the query. The transaction speed is some less than half a second before it brings up all the keywords entered in the search engine. Their speed has to be extremely efficient so the users can always rely on the fast service. When we go to a store, we do shopping and then go to a counter to pay with our credit card or debit card. Once we slide the card, we are asked to put in a pin or something for the system to identify us and then we have to wait for a minute or two to get the receipt. All this time, our credit card was making a transaction processing to our bank and that is how we get charged from our bank.
    Transaction speed is one of the factors of Efficiency IT metrics. Efficiency IT matrics measures the impact IT has on business processes and activities including customer satisfaction, conversion rates, and sell-through increases. Efficiency focuses on the extent to which an organization is using its resources in an optimal way, “Doing things right”. Effectiveness focuses on how well an organization is achieving its goals and objectives, “Doing the right things”.  Apple could use Effectiveness IT metrics to determine if its customers, suppliers, and even employees are satisfied with the applications. It could determine if the application is easy to use and if first-time customers are converting due to a banner ad or a pop-up ad. These would be particularly useful for the iTunes website.

Benchmarking Process 

Transaction speed is monitored online to determine if the system was performing faster or slower than expected. Benchmarking is a process of continuously measuring system results, comparing results (benchmark values the system seeks to attain), and identifying improvements. If benchmarking is not done, it is hard to determine the performance of a system. This process is done by checking the number of transactions made per minute and then compared with other search engines to determine which system is working faster.

Even though Transaction speed is assumed to be better if it is faster, but still some systems allow a slower speed to take all the time to verify that the user is identified. One of the examples is the university’s my.sjsu.edu that takes forever to process further once an entry is made. Even the secure logins at work never proceed faster because they are made to process slow to allow only a certain identified users to access to a system. Moreover, most customers put have their private informatin typed into the sytems and the companies do not want to lose their trust and thus risking their business if it cannot protect its customer’s private rights.

The big companies also take into account factors other than transaction speed.

•         Throughput - the amount of information that can travel through a system at any point

•         System availability - the number of hours a system is available for users

•         Information accuracy - the extent to which a system generates the correct results when executing the same transaction numerous times

•         Web traffic - includes a host of benchmarks such as the number of page views, the number of unique visitors, and the average time spent viewing a Web page

•         Response time - the time it takes to respond to user interactions such as a mouse click