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Impact of Queue Configuration on Service Time: Evidence from a Supermarket

Author

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  • Jingqi Wang

    (Faculty of Business and Economics, University of Hong Kong, Pokfulam, Hong Kong)

  • Yong-Pin Zhou

    (Michael G. Foster School of Business, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195)

Abstract

We study how queue configuration affects human servers’ service time by comparing dedicated queues with shared queues using field data from a natural experiment in a supermarket. We hypothesize that queue configuration may affect servers’ service rate through several mechanisms: pooling may affect service rate directly as a result of social loafing effect and competition effect and indirectly via its impact on queue length. To investigate these impacts, we take advantage of the supermarket’s checkout layout and use a data set containing both checkout transaction details and queue information collected from video recordings in the supermarket. After we control for the queue length, we find that servers in dedicated queues are about 10.7% faster than those in shared queues, mainly because of the social loafing effect. We also demonstrate that pooling has an indirect negative effect on service time through its impact on queue length. In addition, the queue configuration’s direct effect and its indirect queue length effect function independently of each other. In aggregation, the social loafing effect dominates, and servers slow down (a 6.86% increase in service time) in shared queues.

Suggested Citation

  • Jingqi Wang & Yong-Pin Zhou, 2018. "Impact of Queue Configuration on Service Time: Evidence from a Supermarket," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(7), pages 3055-3075, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:64:y:2018:i:7:p:3055-3075
    DOI: 10.1287/mnsc.2017.2781
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    6. Fabian Schéele & Darek M. Haftor & Natallia Pashkevich, 2022. "Predicting delays in service operations," Service Business, Springer;Pan-Pacific Business Association, vol. 16(2), pages 211-226, June.
    7. Mor Armony & Guillaume Roels & Hummy Song, 2021. "Pooling Queues with Strategic Servers: The Effects of Customer Ownership," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 69(1), pages 13-29, January.
    8. Liu, Jian & Chen, Jian & Bo, Rui & Meng, Fanlin & Xu, Yong & Li, Peng, 2023. "Increases or discounts: Price strategies based on customers’ patience times," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 305(2), pages 722-737.
    9. Sezer Ülkü & Chris Hydock & Shiliang Cui, 2020. "Making the Wait Worthwhile: Experiments on the Effect of Queueing on Consumption," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(3), pages 1149-1171, March.
    10. Tomasz Antczak & Rafal Weron & Jacek Zabawa, 2020. "Data-driven simulation modeling of the checkout process in supermarkets: Insights for decision support in retail operations," WORking papers in Management Science (WORMS) WORMS/20/16, Department of Operations Research and Business Intelligence, Wroclaw University of Science and Technology.

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