Int. J. Productivity and Quality Management, Vol. 24, No.

2, 2018 219

Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of

quality cost analysis in manufacturing firms

A. Sailaja*
Management Department,
School of Management,
Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU),
New Delhi, India
Email: sailajaasree@gmail.com
*Corresponding author

P.C. Basak
Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU),
New Delhi, India
Email: parimalbasak1@gmail.com

K.G. Viswanadhan
Mechanical Engineering Department,
N.S.S College of Engineering,
and
College of Engineering,
Kidangoor, Kerala, India
Email: kgv1964@yahoo.co.in

Abstract: Modern manufacturing industries face a myriad of challenges due to

globalisation and effective quality management programmes which increase
productivity and customer satisfaction through superior quality with least
possible incurred costs and most optimal utilisation of resources has become
the need of the hour. Quality cost analysis can provide a basis for planning the
quality operations. But the interrelationship between different cost categories
due to its varied patterns of investments and benefits, the approximations used
in the assessment of hidden quality cost elements, the differences in the degree
of importance of cost elements and mutually conflicting objectives makes the
selection of the most optimal quality control program complex. A hybrid model
using the strength of Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) together with the
Fuzzy logic concept and Fuzzy MOORA is proposed in this study to overcome
the limitations of present system as an effective decision making tool for
manufacturing firms.

Keywords: quality cost; fuzzy logic; fuzzy AHP; fuzzy MOORA; hybrid
model; quality improvement.

Reference to this paper should be made as follows: Sailaja, A., Basak, P.C. and
Viswanadhan, K.G. (2018) ‘Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective
utilisation of quality cost analysis in manufacturing firms’, Int. J. Productivity
and Quality Management, Vol. 24, No. 2, pp.219–241.

Copyright © 2018 Inderscience Enterprises Ltd.

220 A. Sailaja et al.

Biographical notes: A. Sailaja holds an MTech degree from the Indian

Institute of Science and PhD in Management from Indira Gandhi National
Open University (IGNOU), New Delhi, India. She has more than 29 years of
industrial experience and is currently the Chief Manager at the ITI Limited,
Palakkad, Kerala, India. Her research was in the area of quality management.
She has several national and international publications in journals as well as
conferences. Her areas of interest include quality management, manufacturing
management, failure analysis, and quality processes.
P.C. Basak is a former Professor in the Management Department at Indira
Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), New Delhi, India. He holds a PhD
in Industrial Management from IIT, Madras. His previous degrees are in
Mechanical and Production Engineering from REC (NIT), Rourkela, He has
attended six FDP on strategic management at IIMs. Prior to joining teaching, he
spent a few years in industry (HAL and MICO/Bosch Nasik) and management
consultancy. He has more than three decades of experience in research and
education. He is currently a Professor of Decision Science and Operations
Management in Bharatiya Vidyabhavan’s Management Institute, New Delhi.
He has guided few PhD research scholars. He has published several papers in
various international journals and also presented several papers in conferences.
His areas of interests are production and operations management and strategic
management. He is a Fellow of Institution of Engineers (India) and Indian
Institution of Industrial Engineering.
K.G. Viswanadhan is a former Professor of Mechanical Engineering
Department, N.S.S College of Engineering, and currently Principal, College of
Engineering, Kidangoor, Kerala, India. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in
Mechanical Engineering and Master’s degree in Production Engineering. He
holds a PhD in Quality Engineering and Management form Indian Institute of
Science. He has more than 28 years of experience in research and education.
He has guided few PhD research scholars. He has published several papers in
various national and international journals and also presented several papers in
conferences. His areas of interests are production engineering, quality
management and strategic management.

1 Introduction

Quality is one of the key issues, which defines an organisation’s competitive position in
the market. Quality is conformance to customer requirements (Miller and Morris, 2000).
A well designed and properly produced product without any error may not be perceived
as a quality product by the customers if it does not satisfy their requirements. It should
meet customer demands of increased quality, decreased costs, and delivery rate by
devising new control strategies for continuous improvement (Reed et al., 2000).
Customer requirements such as flexibility, quality, time and innovativeness together with
cost determine competitive advantage (Gibbs, 2012).
Quality improvement initiatives are often perceived as expensive due to the
non-awareness of the benefits gained when executed with due diligence (Giakatis and
Rooney, 2000; Mantri and Jaju, 2015). If the process improvement programs are
carefully planned and executed, the painstaking investment in the initial cost, effort, and
people may be rewarded by overwhelming results (Gill, 2009).
 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 221

1.1 Cost of quality

The improvement alternatives are to be measured and monitored in monetary terms to
identify means for maximum possible cost reductions and to avoid resource wastages
(Miller and Morris, 2000). The quality cost analysis is considered as the most effective
management tool for this purpose as well as for pinpointing the areas for improvement
(Harrington, 1999; Schiffauerova and Thomson, 2006; Su et al., 2008; Trehan et al.,
2015).
The real quality cost is the cost of avoiding non-conformance as well as the cost of
not having quality, losing customers and wasting resources (Juran and Gryna, 1988).
Hence each quality improvement alternative has to be wisely devised and evaluated based
on the associated costs to identify the most appropriate alternative to attain planned
objectives with optimal costs (Setijono and Dahlgaard, 2008).
However this selection is a complex issue due to many constraints like
interdependence of cost elements (Omachonu et al., 2004; Chopra and Garg, 2011;
Rajeev et al., 2014), vagueness in assessment of hidden costs (Giakatis et al., 2000;
Krishnan, 2006), conflicting objectives of the alternatives etc. (Sharma et al., 2007; Weng
et al., 2010)
Even though the concept of quality cost has gained much academic attention, the
utilisation of this as an effective decision-making tool is lacking in the practical scenario
due to the non-awareness as well as absence of a user friendly procedure for solving its
complexities (Jafari and Rodchua, 2014; Pires et al., 2015).
In this study, a hybrid model using the strength of analytic hierarchy process (AHP)
technique together with the fuzzy logic concept and fuzzy multi-objective optimisation
and ratio analysis (MOORA) technique is developed with an objective to overcome the
limitations of present quality cost systems as an effective tool for decision making in any
manufacturing firms.

2 Overview of the theories used in this model development

2.1 Fuzzy logic

Fuzzy logic is a form of multi-valued logic derived from fuzzy set theory developed by
Zadeh (Zadeh, 1988). To describe the uncertainty, vagueness and impreciseness, which
are the prominent characteristic of the expert’s opinion, fuzzy logic can be used. In the
case of traditional binary logic, variables may take the values either true or false, whereas
fuzzy logic variables range in degree between 0 and 1. In fuzzy logic, each
natural-language word is described by a membership function µ(x), a function that
assigns, to every number x, the degree µ(x)  [0, 1] (Zimmermann, 2010).
Among the various shapes of fuzzy number, triangular fuzzy number (TFN) is the
most popular one, as they are convenient to use in applications due to their computational
simplicity (Ayhan, 2013). It is a fuzzy number represented with three points, a triplet
(l, m, u) and its membership function μA(x) can be defined by equation below:
222 A. Sailaja et al.

­ x l
°m  l , l d x d m
°
μ A ( x) ®ux , md x du
°u  m
°
¯0, otherwise

where x is the mean value of A and l, m, u are real numbers, representing lower, middle
and boundary values of TFNS.
The fuzzy algebraic operations of two TFNs, A and B, defined by the triplets
A = (l1, m1, u1) and B = (l2, m2, u2) as given below:
1 Addition
A B  l1 , m1 , u1  †  l2 , m2 , u2   l1  l2 , m1  m2 , u1  u2 
2 Subtraction
A B  l1 , m1 , u1    l2 , m2 , u2   l1  l2 , m1  m2 , u1  u2 
3 Multiplication
Au B  l1 , m1 , u1  …  l2 , m2 , u2  #  l1l2 , m1m2 , u1u2 
4 Division
A B  l1 , m1 , u1    l2 , m2 , u2  #  l1 u2 , m1 m2 , u1 l2 

5 Inverse

 l1 , m1 , u1 1 # §¨
1 1 1·
, , ¸
© u1 m1 l1 ¹
where # represents ‘approximately equal to’.

2.2 Fuzzy AHP

In the traditional formulation of the AHP, human’s judgements are represented as exact
numbers (Saaty, 2008). However, in many practical cases, the human preference model is
uncertain and decision makers might be reluctant or unable to assign exact numerical
values to the comparison judgements. Since basic AHP does not include vagueness for
personal judgements and inadequate to handle the inherent uncertainty and imprecision
associated with the mapping of the decision makers perception to exact numbers, fuzzy
analytic hierarchy process (fuzzy AHP) has been developed with the integration of AHP
method with fuzzy logic concept (Kahraman et al., 2003). It represents the elaboration of
AHP method into fuzzy domain by using fuzzy numbers instead of real numbers to take
the uncertainties into consideration. In fuzzy AHP, the pair wise comparisons are
performed through the linguistic variables, which are represented by triangular numbers
with a certain range and the decision makers are more positive to give interval
judgements than fixed-value judgements.
 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 223

2.3 Multi-objective optimisation and ratio analysis

Multi-objective optimisation, also known as multi-criteria or multi attribute optimisation
is the process of simultaneously optimising two or more conflicting objectives, subject to
certain constraints. It uses the decision matrix formed from the judgement of various
conflicting alternatives with respect to the various criteria. This multi-objective
optimisation technique, first introduced by Brauers and Zavadskas (2006), can be
successfully applied to solve various types of complex decision-making problems in the
manufacturing environment (Vatansever, 2014).
Fuzzy MOORA, which is a variant of MOORA technique, is used in this study, in
order to take full advantage of MOORA method for solving the MCDM problems related
to selection of quality improvement alternative, which generally have vague and
imprecise data (Dey et al., 2012). It is also necessary to make a trade-off between the
conflicting tangible and non-tangible factors. The decision maker’s judgements on
alternatives are captured in linguistic language and transformed to equivalent TFNs,
instead of the crisp value judgements in case of MOORA method. This will help the
decision makers to be more precise in his judgements and to overcome the limitations in
analysing the alternatives with vague and imprecise subjective information, since
fuzzification of attributes plays a vital role in such situations (Mandal and Sarkar, 2012,
Brauers and Zavadskas, 2012).

3 Proposed hybrid model for cost of quality analysis

From the studies conducted, it is observed that the quality cost analysis is not properly
utilised in manufacturing firms as an effective decision-making tool for identification and
accomplishment of improvement opportunities. Even in the firms where the quality cost
analysis is being conducted systematically, high value elements are identified as cost
items with highest contribution to the overall quality cost. Even though this method
appeared to be fruitful in controlling the quality cost, it is only an over simplification of a
complex problem.
The root cause analysis of high cost elements provides various options of quality
control programs to the management, but the selection of the most optimal one with the
incurrence of the lowest possible expenses and the highest benefits in controlling quality
is difficult due to many constraints in the practical application.
The major constraints are:
1 The inter-dependency of cost elements plays a major role, as the reductions in some
cost elements may trigger to increases in some other. For example, reductions in the
calibration cost of manufacturing equipments directly affect the quality of the
products and will trigger to the increase of failures. This will further lead to
repetition of production processes, excess loading of raw materials, re-tests, delay in
dispatches and ultimately to dissatisfied customers and may end up in loss of sale
orders. That is, a reduction in a prevention cost element leads to an increase in failure
cost, appraisal cost, indirect costs and also opportunity costs. Even though the
correlation patterns of cost categories and elements are known, the exact ratio of
relationship between them cannot be measured; only the directions are known.
224 A. Sailaja et al.

2 The measurements of data connected to hidden and indirect cost elements are
ambiguous and can only be assessed. This leads to approximations in overall
assessments.
3 Prioritisation of cost items cannot be correctly ascertained only with the measured
values of cost items. The degree of importance of quality cost elements depends on
its impact on the control of overall quality cost. This factor also has to be taken into
consideration to get more realistic picture while doing the comparisons and
prioritisation.
4 Cost control/reduction plans are with multiple, conflicting objectives, which are to be
assessed before finalising the best suitable alternative.
To overcome these constraints, a hybrid quality cost analysis model using fuzzy AHP and
fuzzy MOORA technique is developed for identification of best optimal alternative of
quality improvement programs with the lowest possible resource utilisation in the
manufacturing industries.
The flow diagram of the proposed model is given in Figure 1 (Appendix C2).
The steps in the proposed model are explained in detail.

Step 1 Comprehensive analysis of cost of quality

A comprehensive analysis to be done throughout the whole supply chain of the
manufacturing firm; right from Marketing analysis to after sales support process, for
capturing all cost elements pertaining to ensure the quality of each process as well as its
maintenance . This includes indirect elements and opportunity cost elements also.

Step 2 Identification of most significant quality cost items

The few most significant cost elements which contribute to major portion of overall
quality cost to be found, using Pareto principle.

Step 3 Identification of root causes

Cost driver analysis to be conducted to identify the root causes of most significant cost
items, using cause and effect (fish bone) diagram.

Step 4 Identification of major alternatives

Identification of various alternatives of improvement opportunities for the major cost
items.

Step 5 Selection of most optimal alternative

5a Identification of weights of quality cost elements by fuzzy AHP method
The flow diagram used in the fuzzy AHP to identify the criteria weights, given in
Figure 2.
 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 225

1 Breaking down the complex, unstructured situation into its component parts and
form its hierarchical structure
A multilevel hierarchy structure of the quality cost categories and elements is to be
formed, with goal in the top most level, criteria and sub-criteria in the subsequent
lower levels and alternatives in the lowest level.
2 Pair wise comparison of the criteria using fuzzy AHP
The degree of importance of each item in the hierarchy is to be evaluated with
respect to its impact on the element in the immediately above hierarchical level. Pair
wise comparison judgements on relative importance of items in each hierarchal level
to be collected in linguistic terms from experts and to be transformed to TFNs using
the Fuzzy triangular scale shown in Table 1 (Appendix C1). δ is the measure of
degree of fuzziness in judgements , the values of which normally ranges from
0.5 to 1 (Zhu et al., 1999; Tang and Beynon, 2005).
3 Formation of judgemental matrices
Form the Fuzzy pair wise judgemental matrices, based on the comparison
judgements in TFNs.

dijk is the element of the matrix, which represents kth decision maker’s preference of
ith criterion over jth criterion in fuzzy triangular number demonstration. For example,
1
d12 represents the first decision maker’s preference of first criterion over second
1
criterion, and if it is fairly important (FI), then, d12 = (1.5, 2, 2.5) with δ = 0.5.

For each decision maker k, the decision matrix

ª d11k d1kn º
« »
Ak « »
« k k »
¬ d n1 d nn ¼

where i, j = 1 … n; and the subscripts i and j refer to the row and column,
respectively ; n represents the number of rows and columns, which is exactly the
number of criteria under pair wise comparison.
The elements in the lower diagonal matrix represent the reciprocal of the elements in
1
the upper portion, i.e., d ji .
dij

Each element of the decision matrix A, dijk is a fuzzy number defined as dij = (lij, mij,
uij) where lij, mij, uij are the lower bound, middle, and upper bound values for dij,
respectively.

If more than one decision maker is involved in the judgements, then the average dij
is calculated using geometric mean of fuzzy numbers representing the judgements
(Forman and Peniwati, 1998)
226 A. Sailaja et al.

4 Order of priority using fuzzy synthetic extent analysis

Once the judgemental and reciprocal matrix with pair wise comparison of items are
formed, then Synthetic Extent Analysis method on fuzzy AHP is used to compute the
order of priority of each cost item over the other in each level (Chang, 1996, Wang
et al., 2008). Chang’s extent analysis is used for this prioritisation due to its
flexibility of usage even in the case of incomplete hierarchal levels.
a Method to find the value of fuzzy synthetic extent
Let C = {C1, C2, …, Cn} be a criteria set, where n is the number of criteria.
Let M ci1 , M ci2 , M ci3 … M cin i = 1, 2, …, n and M cij where j =1, 2, …, m represents
the m extent analysis values of ith criteria, all represented by TFNs.
The value of fuzzy synthetic extent value (Si) with respect to the ith criterion can
be computed using equation (1) making use of fuzzy algebraic operations on
TFNs.
1

¦ M cij … ª ¦ ¦ M cij º
m n m
Si (1)
j 1 «¬ i 1 j 1 »¼
where

¦
m
j 1
M cij ¦ m
j 1
lj, ¦
m
j 1
mj , ¦
m
j 1
uj 
and

¦ ¦
n
i 1
m
j 1
M cij ¦ l , ¦n
i 1
i
n
i 1
mi , ¦
n
i 1
ui 
b Calculating sets of weighted values of Fuzzy AHP
To obtain the weight values of each criterion, the principle of comparison for
fuzzy numbers is utilised.
For example, M1 = (l1, m1, u1) and M2 = (l2, m2, u2) are for two TFNs, the degree
of possibility that M1 ≥ M2 is

V  M1 t M 2  sup
xt y ª¬ min  μM1 ( x), μM 2 ( y )  º¼ ,
where sup represents supremum; x and y are the values on the axis of
membership function of each criterion. This expression can be equivalently
written as given in equation below
­1, if m1 t m2
V  M1 t M 2  °0, if l2 t u1 (2)
°
®
° l2  u1
, otherwise
°¯  m1  u1    m2  l2 

To compare M1 and M2, both the values of V(M2 ≥ M1) and V(M1 ≥ M2) are to be
calculated.
 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 227

The degree of possibility for a fuzzy number M to be greater than the number of
k fuzzy numbers Mi (i = 1, 2 … k) is given by the use of the max and min
operations defined by:
V ¬ª M t M 1 , M 2 , M 3 , … , M k  ¼º
V ª¬V  M t M 1  and  M t M 2  and  M t M 3  and …  M t M k º¼ (3)
min V  M t M i 
Assume that d′ (Ci) = min V(Si ≥ Sk), where S is the fuzzy synthetic extent value,
k = 1, 2 … n, k ≠ i, and n is the number of criteria in pair wise comparison.
Then, weight vector

Wc  d c  C1  , d c  C2  , d c  C3  , … , d c  Cn   (4)
where (1, 2, 3, 4 … n) are n elements
Then perform the normalisation to get preference vector W which is non-fuzzy
numbers.
These steps are to be performed to find the normalised local weights of all the items in
each hierarchal level up to the lowest cost elements. The degree of importance of each
cost element in the hierarchy is its composite score, which can be calculated by
multiplying the local weight of the cost element with all the local weights of items in its
higher hierarchy line.

5b Evaluation of alternatives by fuzzy MOORA

Each alternative of quality control programmes identified through cost driver analysis is
associated with a set of criteria with conflicting objectives, which are beneficial to the
firm as well as non-beneficial. For an optimal solution, beneficial criteria (the impact on
quality cost control) are to be maximised and non-beneficial criteria (the investments
against the quality improvement programs) are to be minimised.
Fuzzy MOORA technique, integrated with fuzzy AHP is used to conduct the
benefit-non-benefit analysis of the alternatives to identify the most optimal alternative.
Each quality improvement alternative is to be evaluated with respect to its associated
criteria based on the opinions of the decision makers in linguistic scale and a fuzzy
decision matrix has to be formed. Fuzzy MOORA is used to find the overall ratings of
beneficial and non-beneficial criteria and priority index for each alternative. The
alternative with highest priority index is taken as the best alternative with optimal
utilisation of resources and maximum benefits.
This evaluation is carried out in the following steps:
1 Determine the objective and identify the pertinent evaluation criteria.
2 Develop a fuzzy decision matrix, based on the opinions of the decision makers, in
which each alternative is evaluated with respect to the associated criteria, using
triangular fuzzy scale.
228 A. Sailaja et al.

ª [ x11l m
, x11 u
, x11 ] [ x1ln , x1mn , x1un ] º
« »
A typical fuzzy decision matrix X = « » ; is m × n
«¬[ xm1 , xm1 , xm1 ]
l m u
[ xmn , xmn , xmn ]»¼
l m u

fuzzy matrix, where m is the number of alternatives compared and n is the number of
criteria.
The elements xijl , xijm , xiju respectively denote the lower, middle and upper values of
a triangular membership function for ith alternative with respect to the jth criterion.
In this method, each alternative Ai has to be evaluated based on its effect for
controlling each cost item, in a judgemental scale in Table 2.
Aggregated weight of each alternative with respect to the cost elements are found
using fuzzy arithmetic aggregation operations.
If the fuzzy rating of the all decision makers are described as TFNs;
Rk (ak , bk , ck ) where k = 1, 2 … K decision makers. Then the aggregated TFN
will be

ak
1
k
¦ K
k 1

ak ; bk
1
k
¦ b 
K
k 1
k and ck
1
k
¦ K
k 1
ck  (5)

3 Fuzzy decision matrix, is normalised using vector normalisation procedure using

equations below:
xij
rij where l , m, u (6)
¦ ª x l  2   x m  2   x u  2 º
m
1¬ ¼
ij ij ij
i

4 Determination of weighted normalised fuzzy decision matrix by multiplying the

elements in normalised matrix with the corresponding criteria weight.
vij w j u rij (7)

5 Calculation of overall ratings of beneficial and non-beneficial criteria for each

alternative.
For beneficial criteria, the overall ratings of an alternative for lower, middle and
upper values of the triangular function are computed by using equation (8).

¦
n
Si vij j  j max (8)
j 1

Similarly for non-beneficial criteria, the overall ratings of an alternative for

lower, middle and upper values of the triangular function are computed by using
equation (9).

¦
n
Si vij j  j min (9)
j 1
 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 229

6 Determination of overall priority index (Si) for each alternative. For this, the
defuzzified values of the overall ratings for beneficial and non-beneficial criteria are
computed using the vertex method as:

1 ª l
Si  Si , Si   Si  Sil 2   Si m  Si m 2   Siu  Siu 2 º¼ (10)
3¬
7 Ranking of overall priority indices by arranging in the descending order. The
alternative with highest priority index is the best alternative with optimal utilisation
of resources and maximum benefits.

4 Numerical example

The proposed model has been implemented in a public sector firm under manufacturing
industry producing digital electronic equipments for telecom network. The firm is having
well-established quality management system (QMS) with ISO 9001:2008 accreditation
since 1994. The proposed model is implemented in place of the same with the support of
the top management.
A comprehensive analysis has been conducted to identify and measure all quality cost
elements in the whole supply chain line of the firm and grouped to cost categories of
direct, hidden and opportunity costs. After breaking down them to the subcategories and
cost elements level, Pareto analysis has been conducted to find out the most vital
elements. Then their root causes and improvement opportunities have been identified
using cost driver analysis.
The hierarchical structure formed in this study comprises of goal set as reduction in
overall COQ and subsequent hierarchical levels with main quality cost categories, sub
cost categories and cost elements as depicted in the Figure 3. Explanations of all
abbreviations are given in Appendix A.
Order of priority of each cost element is found using fuzzy AHP-based method.
1 A questionnaire is administered among five experts from different key functions in
the organisation and their judgements on pair wise comparison of the relative
importance of each element over the other in same hierarchal level, based on its
impact in controlling the quality cost, has been collected using the linguistic scale
given at Table 1. Head of functional departments of marketing, finance, quality
assurance, manufacturing and planning are selected as respondents to determine the
priority weights of the quality cost elements, since they are having direct
involvement in quality cost analysis in the firm.
Appendix B shows the sample questionnaire for collecting comparative judgements
between three criteria in the first level – C1, C2 and C3.
2 After forming judgemental matrices, proposed model with fuzzy AHP is used to
calculate the local weights of quality cost categories and sub categories in the first
and second hierarchy levels, using equations (1) to (4).
Table 3 gives the quality cost categories and sub categories of level 1 and 2 of the
hierarchy along with their local weights calculated.
230 A. Sailaja et al.

Similarly, local weights of cost elements in the third hierarchal level also found using
the equations (1) to (4) to the judgemental matrix formed from expert opinions on relative
importance. Global weights are arrived by multiplying the local weights with weights of
higher hierarchal level as in Tables 4, 5 and 6 (Appendix C1).
Based on the measurements of quality cost data and cost driver analysis, various
quality improvement opportunities has been identified by the management of the firm,
each with an associated expense as well as benefits. Next objective of the study is to
identify the most optimal quality improvement alternative with highest benefit in
controlling quality cost and with less expense for implementation.
a List out all the quality improvement alternatives identified.
b Evaluation of alternatives with the proposed model using fuzzy MOORA for
determining the order of priority of the alternatives.
From the cost driver analysis made on the quality cost data measured over a period, four
quality improvement alternatives has been identified, as given below:
x Alternative 1 (A1): Strengthening the vendor development for input materials
Enhancement of reliable vendors with high quality for raw materials is identified as
one of the quality improvement programme. It is observed that the quality cost
elements like raw material inspection cost (C121), consequent cost of rejections
(C232), trouble shooting of failures(C131), repair, rework and retest costs (C132),
scraps and wastages (C133), cost against excess inventory (C134), trouble shooting
of field failures(C141), repair cost of field defects(C142), replacements (C143) etc.
can be controlled or even eliminated with the development of vendors with good
quality and high reliability. But vendor development programs incur costs against
vendor education, training, evaluation and feedback controls (C113).
x Alternative 2 (A2): Customer satisfaction programs
Lost sales opportunities are one of the major contributors against opportunity costs.
Retention of already available customer base is considered wiser than developing
new customers, since the latter require more time and cost. By doing customer
satisfaction programs, the potential markets can be tapped to the maximum possible
level and hence the losses due to lost sales (C323) can be reduced. This in turn will
control the losses against under utilisation of machine capacities (C312). This
requires investment against customer requirement review (C211), customer
surveillance audits (C222), calibration (C116) and strengthening customer support
function (C144).
x Alternative 3 (A3): Product and design reviews
This quality cost control programme will help in controlling the consequent costs
against design changes (C212), mistakes in designs (C231), unwanted process
interrupts (C213), material planning errors (C233) and production planning errors
(C234), whereas it requires investment against the design reviews (C211 and C212).
 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 231

x Alternative 4 (A4): Quality awareness programmes

This includes training on quality standards, theories and practices of quality cost,
awareness on resource wastages due to mistakes and ignorance etc. The investments
required are cost of administration and maintenance of quality system (C111) and
training cost on quality standards, theories and practices (C112). It is having impact
on most of the internal failure cost elements, both direct and indirect.
As it is evident, all these improvement alternatives triggers the reduction of some quality
cost elements and increase of some other. Out of the identified set, the most appropriate
alternative which utilises the resources of the firm wisely in a most cost effective manner
is to be selected for implementation.
Decision matrix based on expert’s judgements is formed separately for cost elements
under direct, hidden and opportunity cost category for benefits gained from each
alternatives A1, A2, A3 and A4 and aggregated.
Impact of each alternative on the quality cost elements were assessed by the same five
experts in the linguistic scale mentioned in Table 2, converted to TFNs and aggregated
using the fuzzy arithmetic aggregation operation.
Then, the vector normalised decision matrices for all these three sets by the linear
scale transformation, using equations (5) and (6) are found as given in Tables 7, 8 and 9.
Then the weighted normalisation matrices are formed by multiplying the importance
weight of cost elements derived from fuzzy AHP method, with the normalised fuzzy
decision matrix using equation (7).
Then the aggregation is made to reach the normalised, weighted fuzzy decision
matrix against each cost category, as given in Table 10.
In this case, cost reduction benefits anticipated due to the implementation of
alternatives are considered as benefit category, while investments are considered as
non-benefit category.
Using vector aggregation method, the performance index against benefits (S+) of
quality cost reduction by these quality improvement alternatives are arrived using
equation (8).
Using the same method, the investments against each alternative are also evaluated
and transformed to the corresponding decision matrix with triangular membership
function. Calculations on aggregated performance index against investments on quality
improvement alternatives (S–) are made using equation (9).
The overall priority index (Si) is calculated based on the equation (10) and ranked.
The performance index of beneficial (S+) and non-beneficial criteria (S–) against each
alternative, the overall priority index (S) and the ranking of alternatives found are given
in Table 11.
The alternative, customer satisfaction programs (A2), with the highest priority index
S = 0.34693 is found as the most optimal alternative for controlling the quality cost in the
firm with optimal resource utilisation. Next best alternative is quality awareness
programmes (A4), with priority index S = 0.12786. Strengthening the vendor
development for input materials (A1) is with third priority, followed by Product and
design reviews (A3).
232 A. Sailaja et al.

5 Conclusions

The studies show that the quality cost model prevailing in the manufacturing firms needs
to be extended with the following additional dimensions of quality costs:
x cost driver analysis to find out the root causes of significant quality cost elements

x identification of all hidden and opportunity cost elements in the supply chain

x high interdependence among quality cost categories and elements

x differences in the degree of importance of various quality cost elements

x inherent fuzziness of quality cost concept and taking care of vagueness in

judgements

x addressing of mutually conflicting nature of quality cost control alternatives using

optimisation tools

x difficulties in determination of an optimal alternative out of the multiple conflicting

objectives, due to the as well as high inter dependence of quality cost elements.
Also, this research attempts to ensure the effective utilisation of quality cost analysis as a
decision-making tool for organisational improvements, by using the results of quality cost
analysis for selection of best quality improvement alternative in the manufacturing firm.
The selection of quality improvement programs, based only on the potential cost
reduction opportunities is not a good practice, as the investments and benefits out of it are
mutually conflicting.
The proposed model using fuzzy AHP and fuzzy MOORA addresses the drawbacks
of present system and put forward a better model which deals with the conflicting
objectives in an efficient way.
As this model helps the organisation to identify and control the expenses incurred in
all process in the manufacturing, it supports the organisation in improving its bottom line.
It provides a better method for identification and elimination of all type of misuse and
wastages of precious resources – man, machine and material and act as an analytic tool to
make decisions on improvement opportunities in a cost effective manner. Also, the
proposed model makes it easy to select the optimal one from a set of quality
improvement alternatives.

6 Managerial implication of this study

The result of this study provides an effective and practical method for the utilisation of
quality cost analysis for the organisational improvements. The proposed method is simple
and any traditional model in practice can be easily transformed to the new method. The
organisation can be benefited with its practicality and acceptability. This model is further
extendable to accommodate quality cost dimensions applicable to the service sectors also.
 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 233

References
Ayhan, M.B. (2013) A Fuzzy AHP Approach for Supplier Selection Problem: A Case Study in a
Gear Motor Company, arXiv preprint arXiv:1311.2886.
Brauers, W.K.M. and Zavadskas, E.K. (2006) ‘The MOORA method and its application to
privatization in a transition economy’, Control and Cybernetics, Vol. 35, No. 2, p.445.
Brauers, W.K.M. and Zavadskas, E.K. (2012) ‘Robustness of multi MOORA: a method for
multi-objective optimization’, Informatica, Vol. 23, No. 1, pp.1–25.
Chang, D.Y. (1996) ‘Applications of the extent analysis method on fuzzy AHP’, European Journal
of operational Research, Vol. 95, No. 3, pp.649–655.
Chopra, A. and Garg, D. (2011) ‘Behavior patterns of quality cost categories’, The TQM Journal,
Vol. 23, No. 5, pp.510–515.
Dey, B., Bairagi, B., Sarkar, B. and Sanyal, S. (2012) ‘A MOORA based fuzzy multi-criteria
decision making approach for supply chain strategy selection’, International Journal of
Industrial Engineering Computations, Vol. 3, No. 4, pp.649–662.
Forman, E. and Peniwati, K. (1998) ‘Aggregating individual judgments and priorities with the
analytic hierarchy process’, European Journal of Operational Research, Vol. 108, No. 1,
pp.165–169.
Giakatis, G. and Rooney, E.M. (2000) ‘The use of quality costing to trigger process improvement
in an automotive company’, Total Quality Management, Vol. 11, No. 2, pp.155–170.
Giakatis, G., Enkawa, T. and Washitani, K. (2000) ‘Quality costs and hidden quality costs: their
importance and their environmental association’, APDSI 2000.
Gibbs, G. (2012) Implications of ‘Dimensions of Quality’ in a Market Environment, Higher
Education Academy, York.
Gill, J. (2009) ‘Quality follows quality: add quality to the business and quality will multiply the
profits’, The TQM Journal, Vol. 21, No. 5, pp.530–539.
Harrington, H.J. (1999) ‘Performance improvement: a total poor-quality cost system’, The TQM
Magazine, Vol. 11, No. 4, pp.221–230.
Jafari, A. and Rodchua, S. (2014) ‘Survey research on quality costs and problems in the
construction environment’, Total Quality Management and Business Excellence, Vol. 25,
Nos. 3–4, pp.222–234.
Juran, J.M. and Gryna, F.M. (1988) Quality Control Handbook, 4th ed., McGraw-Hill, New York.
Kahraman, C., Cebeci, U. and Ulukan, Z. (2003) ‘Multi-criteria supplier selection using fuzzy
AHP’, Logistics Information Management, Vol. 16, No. 6, pp.382–394.
Krishnan, S.K. (2006) ‘Increasing the visibility of hidden failure costs’, Measuring Business
Excellence, Vol. 10, No. 4, pp.77–101.
Mandal, U.K. and Sarkar, B. (2012) ‘Selection of best intelligent manufacturing system (IMS)
under fuzzy MOORA conflicting MCDM environment’, International Journal of Emerging
Technology and Advanced Engineering, Vol. 2, No. 9, pp.301–310.
Mantri, S.G. and Jaju, S.B. (2015) ‘Emerging trends in cost of quality practices: an overview’,
International Journal of Productivity and Quality Management, Vol. 15, No. 4, pp.469–485.
Miller, J.R. and Morris, J.S. (2000) ‘Is quality free or profitable?’, Quality Progress, Vol. 33,
No. 1, p.50.
Omachonu, V.K., Suthummanon, S. and Einspruch, N.G. (2004) ‘The relationship between quality
and quality cost for a manufacturing company’, International Journal of Quality and
Reliability Management, Vol. 21, No. 3, pp.277–290.
Pires, A.R., Novas, J., Saraiva, M. and Coelho, A. (2015) ‘How companies use the information
about quality-related costs’, Total Quality Management and Business Excellence, Vol. 21,
Nos. 5–6, pp.501–521.
234 A. Sailaja et al.

Rajeev, T., Rajiv, G.K. and Anish, S. (2014) ‘Categorization of quality cost: a study in engineering
industry’, Journal of Environmental Research and Development, Vol. 8, No. 3A, p.846.
Reed, R., Lemak, D.J. and Mero, N.P. (2000) ‘Total quality management and sustainable
competitive advantage’. Journal of quality management, Vol. 5, No. 1, pp.5–26.
Saaty, T.L. (2008) ‘Decision making with the analytic hierarchy process’, International Journal of
Services Sciences, Vol. 1, No. 1, pp.83–98.
Schiffauerova, A. and Thomson,V. (2006) ‘Managing cost of quality: insight into industry
practice’, The TQM Magazine, Vol. 18, No. 5, pp.542–550.
Setijono, D. and Dahlgaard, J.J. (2008) ‘The value of quality improvements’, International Journal
of Quality and Reliability Management, Vol. 25, No. 3, pp.292–312.
Sharma, R.K., Kumar, D. and Kumar, P. (2007) ‘A framework to implement QCS through process
cost modeling’, The TQM Magazine, Vol. 19, No. 1, pp.18–36.
Su, Q., Li, Z., Zhang, S.X., Liu, Y.Y. and Dang, J.X. (2008) ‘The impacts of quality management
practices on business performance: an empirical investigation from China’, International
Journal of Quality and Reliability Management, Vol. 25, No. 8, pp.809–823.
Tang, Y.C. and Beynon, M.J. (2005) ‘Application and development of a fuzzy analytic hierarchy
process within a capital investment study’, Journal of Economics and Management, Vol. 1,
No. 2, pp.207–230.
Trehan, R., Sachdeva, A. and Garg, R.K. (2015) ‘A comprehensive review of cost of quality’,
VIVECHAN, International Journal of Research, Vol. 6, No. 1, pp.70–88.
Vatansever, K. (2014) ‘Integrated usage of fuzzy multi criteria decision making techniques for
machine selection problems and an application’, International Journal of Business and Social
Science, Vol. 5, No. 9, pp.12–24.
Wang, Y.M., Luo, Y. and Hua, Z. (2008) ‘On the extent analysis method for fuzzy AHP and its
applications’, European Journal of Operational Research, Vol. 186, No. 2, pp.735–747.
Weng, M.C., Hsiao, J.M. and Chen, L.H. (2010) ‘Quality cost improvement models considering
fuzzy goals’. International Journal of Organizational Innovation (Online), Vol. 2, No. 4, p.61.
Zadeh, L.A. (1988) ‘Fuzzy logic’, Computer, Vol.4, No. 21, pp.83–93.
Zhu, K.J., Jing, Y. and Chang, D.Y. (1999) ‘A discussion on extent analysis method and
applications of fuzzy AHP’, European Journal of Operational Research, Vol. 116, No. 2,
pp.450–456.
Zimmermann, H.J. (2010) ‘Fuzzy set theory’, Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Computational
Statistics, Vol. 2, No. 3, pp.317–332.

Appendix A

Abbreviations
AC Appraisal cost
AHP Analytic hierarchy process
COQ Cost of quality
EFC External failure cost
EOC External opportunity cost
HAC Hidden appraisal cost
HEFC Hidden external failure cost
HIFC Hidden internal failure cost
 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 235

HPC Hidden prevention cost

IFC Internal failure cost
IOC Internal opportunity cost
MOORA Multi objective optimisation using ratio analysis
PC Prevention cost
TFN Triangular fuzzy numbers.

Appendix B

Form for collecting comparative judgements between three criteria in the

first level – C1, C2 and C3
Criteria AI SI FI WI E WI FI SI AI Criteria
C1 C2
C1 C3
C2 C3

Experts are asked to mark their judgement in the corresponding columns, based on their
perception. That is , for example, if the criteria C1 is judged as Fairly more important (FI)
than C2, then the entry should be to the left of the column heading E(Equally important),
under the column FI. On the other hand, if C2 is fairly more important than C1, then the
entry should be in the right side columns of E under FI, and the corresponding value to be
taken for analysis should be 1/FI.
Similar forms are used to find out the judgements of preferences between items in
each level of hierarchy also.

Appendix C

C1: Tables
Table 1 Linguistic terms and triangular fuzzy numbers (TFNs)

Linguistic term Explanation Fuzzy triangular

scale
Equally Two factors contribute equally to the objective (1, 1, 1)
important (EI)
Weakly Experience and judgement slightly favour one over (1/(1 + δ), 1, 1 + δ)
important (WI) the other
Fairly important Experience and judgement fairly favour one over the (2 – δ, 2, 2 + δ)
(FI) other
Strongly Experience and judgement very strongly favor one (3 – δ, 3 , 3 + δ)
important (SI) over the other.
Absolutely The evidence favoring one over the other is of the (4 – δ, 4, 4 + δ)
important (AI) highest possible validity
236 A. Sailaja et al.

Table 2 Judgemental scale for alternative evaluation

Linguistic scale Triangular fuzzy numbers

Very poor (VP) (0, 0, 1)
Poor (P) (0, 1, 3)
Medium poor (MP) (1, 3, 5)
Fair (F) (3, 5, 7 )
Medium good (MG) (5 , 7 , 9)
Good (G) (7, 9, 10)
Very good (VG) (9, 10, 10)

Table 3 Quality cost categories and sub categories (level 1 and 2) with local weights

Hierarchy level 1 Hierarchy level 2

Local Local
Category Subcategory
weights weights
C1 Direct quality costs 0.1838 C11 Direct prevention cost 0.1487
C12 Direct appraisal cost 0.0537
C13 Direct internal failure cost 0.3969
C14 Direct external failure cost 0.400
C2 Hidden quality costs 0.1036 C21 Hidden prevention cost 0.1684
C22 Hidden appraisal cost 0.1402
C23 Hidden internal failure cost 0.3812
C24 Hidden external failure cost 0.3101
C3 Opportunity costs 0.7126 C31 Internal opportunity cost 0.266
C32 External opportunity costs 0.733

Table 4 Weights of level 3 – cost elements of direct category

Local Global
Level 3: Cost elements of direct category
weights weights
C111 Cost of maintenance of quality system 0.0408 0.0011151
C112 Training cost on quality standards, theories and practices 0.0024 0.0000656
C113 Cost on vendor quality assurance 0.3489 0.0095358
C114 Preventive maintenance of equipments and machineries 0.2228 0.0060894
C115 Preventive maintenance of test jigs and tools 0.1480 0.0040450
C116 Cost of calibration of equipments 0.2371 0.0064802
C121 Raw material inspection 0.0803 0.0007926
C122 In-process inspection – subassemblies and assemblies 0.124 0.0012239
C123 Post integration tests of subassemblies and modules 0.358 0.0035335
C124 Pre-dispatch QA tests 0.437 0.0043132
C131 Internal trouble shooting and failure analysis 0.01039 0.0007580
C132 Repair, rework and retest 0.1128 0.0082288
C133 Scrap/wastages 0.3331 0.0242997
 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 237

Table 4 Weights of level 3 – cost elements of direct category (continued)

Local Global
Level 3: Cost elements of direct category
weights weights
C134 Excess material drawn against rejections, scraps etc. 0.1359 0.0099139
C135 Interest on non moving inventory 0.04483 0.0032704
C136 Machine break down 0.3119 0.0227532
C137 Materials written off due to product design changes 0.05089 0.0037124
C141 Trouble shooting of field failures 0.0773 0.0056831
C142 Repair, rework of defective parts from fields 0.2259 0.0166082
C143 Warranty replacement of defective parts 0.5560 0.0408771
C144 Expenditure on customer support activities 0.14075 0.0103479

Table 5 Weights of level 3 – cost elements of hidden category

Level 3 – Cost elements of hidden category Local weights Global weights

C211 Customer requirement review 0.0401 0.0006996
C212 Engineering design changes 0.1129 0.001967
C213 Process validation costs 0.8469 0.0147752
C221 Audits at vendor premises 0.3770 0.0054758
C222 Customer surveillance audits 0.6229 0.0090474
C231 Engineering/design mistakes 0.3358 0.0132615
C232 Consequent costs on raw material rejections 0.1149 0.0045377
C233 Material planning errors 0.2133 0.0084237
C234 Production planning errors 0.3358 0.0132615
C241 Litigation costs on warranty disputes 0.6379 0.0204934
C242 Billing errors and rework/recall of bills 0.0572 0.0018376
C243 Extra field assistance on repeated complaints 0.3047 0.0097889

Table 6 Weights of level 3 – cost elements of opportunity cost category

Local Global
Level 3: Cost elements of opportunity cost category
weights weights
C311 Extra shipping costs to meet urgency/delayed dispatch 0.1155 0.0218932
C312 Under utilisation of machine capacity 0.1426 0.0270300
C313 Loss due to delayed payments to vendors 0.2541 0.0481650
C314 Customs charges on delayed clearance of materials 0.2335 0.0442602
C315 Penalties imposed by banks 0.2541 0.0481650
C321 Liquidate damages (LD) 0.0019 0.0009924
C322 Interest on sundry debtors 0.0240 0.0125360
C323 Lost sales 0.974 0.5087550
238 A. Sailaja et al.

Table 7 Normalised decision matrix for direct quality cost elements

Direct
A1 A2 A3 A4
costs
C121 (0.5091, 0.6, 0.62) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0)
C131 (0.3467, 0.44, 0.5) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.221, 0.326, 0.525)
C132 (0.393, 0.48, 0.52) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.181, 0.287, 0.479)
C133 (0.364, 0.46, 0.53) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.188, 0.298, 0.497)
C134 (0.393, 0.47, 0.51) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.20, 0.309, 0.479)
C135 (0.238, 0.36, 0.49) (0.013, 0.05, 0.138) (0.239, 0.364, 0.49) (0.038, 0.138, 0.314)
C136 (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.075, 0.338, 0.938)
C137 (0, 0, 0) (0.012, 0.061, 0.159) (0.502, 0.587, 0.612) (0, 0, 0)
C141 (0.362, 0.48, 0.56) (0.198, 0.315, 0.432) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0)
C142 (0.396, 0.53, 0.63) (0.082, 0.20, 0.341) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0)
C143 (0.287, 0.38, 0.46) (0.33, 0.437, 0.511) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0)
C144 (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.201, 0.428, 0.881)

Table 8 Normalised decision matrix for hidden quality cost elements

Hidden
quality A1 A2 A3 A4
cost
C211 (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.26, 0.497, 0.828)
C212 (0, 0, 0) (0.378, 0.498, 0.585) (0, 0, 0) (0.134, 0.256, 0.427)
C213 (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.494, 0.595, 0.633) (0, 0, 0)
C231 (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.459, 0.538, 0.56) (0.067, 0.168, 0.392)
C232 (0.537, 0.596, 0.596) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0)
C233 (0.175, 0.331, 0.506) (0, 0, 0) (0.017, 0.087, 0.227) (0.192, 0.366, 0.611)
C234 (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.26, 0.497, 0.828)
C241 (0, 0, 0) (0.44, 0.583, 0.683) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0)
C242 (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0, 0, 0) (0.26, 0.497, 0.828)
C243 (0, 0, 0) (0.363, 0.489, 0.589) (0, 0, 0) (0.138, 0.263, 0.439)

Table 9 Normalised decision matrix for opportunity quality cost elements

Opportunity
A1 A2 A3 A4
cost
C311 (0.23,0.389,0.545) (0,0,0) (0.016,0.093,0.234) (0.171,0.327,0.545)
C312 (0,0,0) (0.451,0.588,0.671) (0,0,0) (0,0,0)
C313 (0.381,0.50,0.590) (0,0,0) (0,0,0) (0.111,0.234,0.43)
C314 (0.022,0.112,0.292) (0,0,0) (0,0,0) (0.247,0.472,0.786)
C315 (0,0,0) (0,0,0) (0,0,0) (0.260,0.497,0.828)
C321 (0.266,0.372,0.457) (0.223,0.329,0.436) (0.01,0.064,0.16) (0.117,0.223,0.372)
C322 (0,0,0) (0.44,0.583,0.683) (0,0,0) (0,0,0)
C323 (0,0,0) (0.461,0.593,0.659) (0,0,0) (0,0,0)
 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 239

Table 10 Aggregated weighted fuzzy decision matrix

Alternative Direct cost Hidden cost Opportunity cost

A1 (0.0378, 0.490, 0.0570) (0.003, 0.0055, 0.0069) (0.0247, 0.0381, 0.0537)
A2 (0.016, 0.23, 0.030) (0.0133, 0.0177, 0.0209) (0.252, 0.325, 0.362)
A3 (0.003, 0.003, 0.004) (0.135, 0.0166, 0.0186) (0.00035, 0.0021, 0.005)
A4 (0.012, 0.025, 0.53) (0.008, 0.016, 0.285) (0.0326, 0.0634, 0.107)

Table 11 Performance indices and ranks of alternatives

Performance Index on Performance index on Overall

Alternatives Rank
benefits (S+) non-benefits (S–) index (S)
A1 (0.06646, 0.09272, 0.1175) (0.00750, 0.00838, 0.00985) 0.08609 3
A2 (0.28218, 0.36660, 0.41354) (0.00658, 0.0109, 0.0152) 0.34693 1
A3 (0.01653, 0.02214, 0.02784) (0.0084, 0.00135, 0.00186) 0.02123 4
A4 (0.05303, 0.10516, 0.18891) (0.00047, 0.00066, 0.00084) 0.12786 2

C2: Figures

Figure 1 Flow diagram of the proposed model (see online version for colours)
240 A. Sailaja et al.

Figure 2 Fuzzy AHP flow chart

Identify the objective

Identify quality cost categories, subcategories and cost elements

Establish hierarchal structure by placing goal in the first level and subsequent
items in lower levels.

Collect experts’ judgements in fuzzy scale and establish

fuzzy pair-wise comparison matrices for items in each level.

No
Check consistency
of judgements

Yes

Form fuzzy judgemental and reciprocal matrix and compute relative weight
of the each criterion over the other

Compute global weights of each cost element.

 Hybrid fuzzy MCDM model for effective utilisation of quality cost analysis 241

Figure 3 Hierarchy structure (see online version for colours)