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Climate change has led to a rise in the frequency, intensity and scope of droughts, posing significant implications for businesses. This study examines the impact of local community drought levels on audit pricing. Additionally, it explores the moderating effects of high-tech industries, auditor busyness and the level of local community concern regarding the drought crisis.

This study employs a mixed-methods approach to rigorously test the research hypotheses. The quantitative phase of the study utilizes a sample of 1,278 firm-year observations from Iran’s capital market. For the analysis of the quantitative data, ordinary least squares regression with clustered robust standard errors is used. Additionally, this research supplements its quantitative findings with qualitative evidence obtained through semi-structured interviews with 19 Iranian audit partners.

The results suggest that firms operating in provinces facing severe droughts experience notably higher audit fees. Furthermore, the positive relationship between drought and audit fees is weakened when auditors are busy, local community concern regarding the drought crisis is high or the firm operates within high-tech industries. These findings are supported by a range of robustness checks and qualitative evidence gathered from the field.

This research contributes to the growing literature on climate change by examining the influence of local community drought levels on audit pricing within an Iranian context. Additionally, our study sheds light on how high-tech industries, auditor workload and the level of local community concern regarding the drought crisis moderate the relationship between drought and audit fees. Importantly, our study pioneers in providing mixed-methods evidence of the association between drought severity and audit fees.

Distribution network design involves a set of strategic decisions in supply chains because of their long-term impacts on the total logistics cost and environment. To incorporate a trade-off between financial and environmental aspects of these decisions, this paper aims to determine an optimal location, among candidate locations, of a new logistics center, its capacity, as well as optimal network flows for an existing distribution network, while concurrently minimizing the total logistics cost and gas emission. In addition, uncertainty in transportation and warehousing costs are considered.

The problem is formulated as a fuzzy multiobjective mathematical model. The effectiveness of this model is demonstrated using an industrial case study. The problem instance is a four-echelon distribution network with 22 products and a planning horizon of 20 periods. The model is solved by using the min–max and augmented ε-constraint methods with CPLEX as the solver. In addition to illustrating model’s applicability, the effect of choosing a new warehouse in the model is investigated through a scenario analysis.

For the applicability of the model, the results indicate that the augmented ε-constraint approach provides a set of Pareto solutions, which represents the ideal trade-off between the total logistics cost and gas emission. Through a case study problem instance, the augmented ε-constraint approach is recommended for similar network design problems. From a scenario analysis, when the operational cost of the new warehouse is within a specific fraction of the warehousing cost of third-party warehouses, the solution with the new warehouse outperforms that without the new warehouse with respective to financial and environmental objectives.

The proposed model is an effective decision support tool for management, who would like to assess the impact of network planning decisions on the performance of their supply chains with respect to both financial and environmental aspects under uncertainty.

Water/Al₂O₃ nanofluid with volume fractions of 0, 0.3 and 0.06 was investigated inside a rectangular microchannel. Jet injection of nanofluid was used to enhance the heat transfer under a homogeneous magnetic field with the strengths of Ha = 0, 20 and 40. Both slip velocity and no-slip boundary conditions were used.

The laminar flow was studied using Reynolds numbers of 1, 10 and 50. The results showed that in creep motion state, the constricted cross section caused by fluid jet is not observable and the rise of axial velocity level is only because of the presence of additional size of the microchannel. By increasing the strength of the magnetic field and because of the rise of the Lorentz force, the motion of fluid layers on each other becomes limited.

Because of the limitation of sudden changes of fluid in jet injection areas, the magnetic force compresses the fluid to the bottom wall, and this behavior limits the vertical velocity gradients. In the absence of a magnetic field and under the influence of the velocity boundary layer, the fluid motion has more variations. In creeping velocities of fluid, the presence or absence of the magnetic field does not have an essential effect on Nusselt number enhancement.

In lower velocities of fluid, the effect of the jet is not significant, and the thermal boundary layer affects the entire temperature field. In this case, for Hartmann numbers of 40 and 0, changing the Nusselt number on the heated wall is similar.

The purpose of this study is to assess customers’ perceptions of Islamic banks (IBs) of customers who have used or intend to use Ijarah service to purchase a car. The study further examines the mediating role of clarity and accuracy (CAA) of service offered between customer perceptions and customer satisfaction. This paper focuses on connecting in quantitative terms customers’ perceptions of IB services to customer satisfaction by providing the first evidence of this relationship in the context of car Ijarah financing.

In this paper, a model is proposed to assess customers’ perceptions of the Ijarah service used by IBs to finance car purchases. The model connects customers’ perceptions to customer satisfaction with this Shariah-compliant service. The data are drawn from 300 randomly selected customers living in five major cities in Pakistan, and factor analysis and structural equation modeling are used to understand the patterns of correlation/covariance among a set of variables and to evaluate customers’ perceptions of Ijarah financing for car purchases.

The results of the study show a significant positive relationship between customers’ perceptions and customer satisfaction. In particular, the CAA of the services provided is a significant predictor of customer satisfaction. This paper finds that CAA is a partial mediator between customers’ perceptions and customer satisfaction.

As this study is based on only one country and one simple car Ijarah financing product, the results cannot be generalized to the entire industry. Therefore, deeper research is needed in which data from other countries are used and a range of models and approaches are applied to secure knowledge about the multinational and multifactor variations of Ijarah financing.

In terms of their implications for IBs, the study results provide a basis for the banks to more effectively cater to their customers by improving the services offered in line with customers’ expectations and thereby increasing profitability. This investigation is much needed in academia and industry because the market share for Ijarah financing is growing and competition between IB products and conventional banking products is increasing.

This study presents the first endeavor to use exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling to assess customer satisfaction in Ijarah financing using Pakistani banking clients’ data. This approach is also applicable to various IB financial products and Shariah contracts.

The main aim of this paper is to measure customers’ perception of car Ijarah financing transactions services provided by the Islamic banks and financial institutions in Pakistan.

The paper uses two research methodologies: Kruskal–Wallis and Mann–Whitney test (non-parametric) and logit regression model (parametric). Both methods are then applied to a real data set of 300 respondents from various cities of Pakistan in the car Ijarah financing industry. The demographic effects are also investigated to see the perception about the degree of Shari’ah compliance and the quality of service of transaction offered by banks.

Main finds of the paper reveal that the customers who used the car Ijarah facility from Islamic banks have positive attitude toward this sort of transaction. In addition, gender, income, marital status affect the perception about the quality of Shari’ah compliance, and the quality of service of transaction issues are very important to selected clients in the industry.

These findings are limited to the car Ijarah financing industry and may not be applicable in other banking products in Pakistan and elsewhere.

Based on the results of this study, potential Islamic bank customers may find it helpful choose products or make product decisions conveniently. The findings of the paper also support Islamic banks in improving the Ijarah facility to increase their customer base in the geo-political locality with similar characteristics as Pakistan.

Shari’ah compliance in the Islamic finance industry is a sensitive issue in Pakistan, and hence, car Ijarah’s Shari’ah compliance can affect banks’ reputation and sensitivity.

The work reported in this paper is original, unpublished and the paper is not submitted elsewhere for publication.