The impact of environmental variables on efficiency evaluation: a fuzzy DEA approach

Efficiency in the service section is a significant issue in the global trade. The increase of the influence of the service industry on the economy causes more and more firms to be sensitised to service and service management. As one of the businesses, bank branches have a pioneering role in the service sector. Therefore, analysis of bank branches efficiency is important for investors, creditors, business partners and the government. But due to locating in different environments, bank branches have different performance form each other. A part of this difference is caused by non-discretionary environmental factors such as population density. These factors are not controllable by the branch manager. With respect to the importance of the problem, this research applies fuzzy logic for evaluating bank branches efficiency in order to consider the environmental variables with imprecise data.