IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ejores/v238y2014i1p300-312.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Branch-and-price and constraint programming for solving a real-life technician dispatching problem

Author

Listed:
  • Cortés, Cristián E.
  • Gendreau, Michel
  • Rousseau, Louis Martin
  • Souyris, Sebastián
  • Weintraub, Andrés

Abstract

We consider a real problem faced by a large company providing repair services of office machines in Santiago, Chile. In a typical day about twenty technicians visit seventy customers in a predefined service area in Santiago. We design optimal routes for technicians by considering travel times, soft time windows for technician arrival times at client locations, and fixed repair times. A branch-and-price algorithm was developed, using a constraint branching strategy proposed by Ryan and Foster along with constraint programming in the column generation phase. The column generation takes advantage of the fact that each technician can satisfy no more than five to six service requests per day. Different instances of the problem were solved to optimality in a reasonable computational time, and the results obtained compare favorably with the current practice.

Suggested Citation

  • Cortés, Cristián E. & Gendreau, Michel & Rousseau, Louis Martin & Souyris, Sebastián & Weintraub, Andrés, 2014. "Branch-and-price and constraint programming for solving a real-life technician dispatching problem," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 238(1), pages 300-312.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ejores:v:238:y:2014:i:1:p:300-312
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ejor.2014.03.006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0377221714002203
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ejor.2014.03.006?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Louis-Martin Rousseau & Michel Gendreau & Gilles Pesant & Filippo Focacci, 2004. "Solving VRPTWs with Constraint Programming Based Column Generation," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 130(1), pages 199-216, August.
    2. François Vanderbeck, 2000. "On Dantzig-Wolfe Decomposition in Integer Programming and ways to Perform Branching in a Branch-and-Price Algorithm," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 48(1), pages 111-128, February.
    3. Martin Desrochers & Jacques Desrosiers & Marius Solomon, 1992. "A New Optimization Algorithm for the Vehicle Routing Problem with Time Windows," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 40(2), pages 342-354, April.
    4. Tang, Hao & Miller-Hooks, Elise & Tomastik, Robert, 2007. "Scheduling technicians for planned maintenance of geographically distributed equipment," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 43(5), pages 591-609, September.
    5. Olli Bräysy & Michel Gendreau, 2005. "Vehicle Routing Problem with Time Windows, Part I: Route Construction and Local Search Algorithms," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 39(1), pages 104-118, February.
    6. Salani, Matteo & Vacca, Ilaria, 2011. "Branch and price for the vehicle routing problem with discrete split deliveries and time windows," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 213(3), pages 470-477, September.
    7. Guy Desaulniers & François Lessard & Ahmed Hadjar, 2008. "Tabu Search, Partial Elementarity, and Generalized k -Path Inequalities for the Vehicle Routing Problem with Time Windows," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 42(3), pages 387-404, August.
    8. François Vanderbeck, 2005. "Implementing Mixed Integer Column Generation," Springer Books, in: Guy Desaulniers & Jacques Desrosiers & Marius M. Solomon (ed.), Column Generation, chapter 0, pages 331-358, Springer.
    9. A Weintraub & J Aboud & C Fernandez & G Laporte & E Ramirez, 1999. "An emergency vehicle dispatching system for an electric utility in Chile," Journal of the Operational Research Society, Palgrave Macmillan;The OR Society, vol. 50(7), pages 690-696, July.
    10. Cynthia Barnhart & Christopher A. Hane & Pamela H. Vance, 2000. "Using Branch-and-Price-and-Cut to Solve Origin-Destination Integer Multicommodity Flow Problems," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 48(2), pages 318-326, April.
    11. Olli Bräysy & Michel Gendreau, 2005. "Vehicle Routing Problem with Time Windows, Part II: Metaheuristics," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 39(1), pages 119-139, February.
    12. Éric Taillard & Philippe Badeau & Michel Gendreau & François Guertin & Jean-Yves Potvin, 1997. "A Tabu Search Heuristic for the Vehicle Routing Problem with Soft Time Windows," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 31(2), pages 170-186, May.
    13. Cynthia Barnhart & Ellis L. Johnson & George L. Nemhauser & Martin W. P. Savelsbergh & Pamela H. Vance, 1998. "Branch-and-Price: Column Generation for Solving Huge Integer Programs," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 46(3), pages 316-329, June.
    14. Don Weigel & Buyang Cao, 1999. "Applying GIS and OR Techniques to Solve Sears Technician-Dispatching and Home Delivery Problems," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 29(1), pages 112-130, February.
    15. Tallys H. Yunes & Arnaldo V. Moura & Cid C. de Souza, 2005. "Hybrid Column Generation Approaches for Urban Transit Crew Management Problems," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 39(2), pages 273-288, May.
    16. Baldacci, Roberto & Mingozzi, Aristide & Roberti, Roberto, 2012. "Recent exact algorithms for solving the vehicle routing problem under capacity and time window constraints," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 218(1), pages 1-6.
    17. Fred Blakeley & Burçin Argüello & Buyang Cao & Wolfgang Hall & Joseph Knolmajer, 2003. "Optimizing Periodic Maintenance Operations for Schindler Elevator Corporation," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 33(1), pages 67-79, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Zhen, Lu & Gao, Jiajing & Tan, Zheyi & Laporte, Gilbert & Baldacci, Roberto, 2023. "Territorial design for customers with demand frequency," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 309(1), pages 82-101.
    2. Václavík, Roman & Novák, Antonín & Šůcha, Přemysl & Hanzálek, Zdeněk, 2018. "Accelerating the Branch-and-Price Algorithm Using Machine Learning," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 271(3), pages 1055-1069.
    3. Cavada, Juan P. & Cortés, Cristián E. & Goic, Marcel & Weintraub, Andrés & Zambrano, Juan I., 2020. "Accounting for cost heterogeneity on the demand in the context of a technician dispatching problem," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 287(3), pages 820-831.
    4. Kyriakidis, Epaminondas G. & Dimitrakos, Theodosis D. & Karamatsoukis, Constantinos C., 2019. "Optimal delivery of two similar products to N ordered customers with product preferences," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 209(C), pages 194-204.
    5. Ehsan Pourjavad & Eman Almehdawe, 2022. "Optimization of the technician routing and scheduling problem for a telecommunication industry," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 315(1), pages 371-395, August.
    6. F. Errico & G. Desaulniers & M. Gendreau & W. Rei & L.-M. Rousseau, 2018. "The vehicle routing problem with hard time windows and stochastic service times," EURO Journal on Transportation and Logistics, Springer;EURO - The Association of European Operational Research Societies, vol. 7(3), pages 223-251, September.
    7. Guastaroba, G. & Côté, J.-F. & Coelho, L.C., 2021. "The Multi-Period Workforce Scheduling and Routing Problem," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    8. Chen, Xi & Thomas, Barrett W. & Hewitt, Mike, 2016. "The technician routing problem with experience-based service times," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 49-61.
    9. Avraham, Edison & Raviv, Tal & Khmelnitsky, Eugene, 2017. "The decentralized field service routing problem," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 290-316.
    10. Fangzhou Yan & Huaxin Qiu & Dongya Han, 2023. "Lagrangian Heuristic for Multi-Depot Technician Planning of Product Distribution and Installation with a Lunch Break," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 11(3), pages 1-22, January.
    11. Paraskevopoulos, Dimitris C. & Laporte, Gilbert & Repoussis, Panagiotis P. & Tarantilis, Christos D., 2017. "Resource constrained routing and scheduling: Review and research prospects," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 263(3), pages 737-754.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bhusiri, Narath & Qureshi, Ali Gul & Taniguchi, Eiichi, 2014. "The trade-off between fixed vehicle costs and time-dependent arrival penalties in a routing problem," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 62(C), pages 1-22.
    2. Ciancio, Claudio & Laganá, Demetrio & Vocaturo, Francesca, 2018. "Branch-price-and-cut for the Mixed Capacitated General Routing Problem with Time Windows," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 267(1), pages 187-199.
    3. Luciano Costa & Claudio Contardo & Guy Desaulniers, 2019. "Exact Branch-Price-and-Cut Algorithms for Vehicle Routing," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 53(4), pages 946-985, July.
    4. Cavada, Juan P. & Cortés, Cristián E. & Goic, Marcel & Weintraub, Andrés & Zambrano, Juan I., 2020. "Accounting for cost heterogeneity on the demand in the context of a technician dispatching problem," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 287(3), pages 820-831.
    5. Said Dabia & Stefan Ropke & Tom van Woensel & Ton De Kok, 2013. "Branch and Price for the Time-Dependent Vehicle Routing Problem with Time Windows," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 47(3), pages 380-396, August.
    6. Schyns, M., 2015. "An ant colony system for responsive dynamic vehicle routing," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 245(3), pages 704-718.
    7. Marco E. Lübbecke & Jacques Desrosiers, 2005. "Selected Topics in Column Generation," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 53(6), pages 1007-1023, December.
    8. Spliet, Remy & Desaulniers, Guy, 2015. "The discrete time window assignment vehicle routing problem," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 244(2), pages 379-391.
    9. Paraskevopoulos, Dimitris C. & Laporte, Gilbert & Repoussis, Panagiotis P. & Tarantilis, Christos D., 2017. "Resource constrained routing and scheduling: Review and research prospects," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 263(3), pages 737-754.
    10. Drexl, Michael & Schneider, Michael, 2015. "A survey of variants and extensions of the location-routing problem," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 241(2), pages 283-308.
    11. Michael Schneider & Andreas Stenger & Dominik Goeke, 2014. "The Electric Vehicle-Routing Problem with Time Windows and Recharging Stations," Transportation Science, INFORMS, vol. 48(4), pages 500-520, November.
    12. Jans, Raf, 2010. "Classification of Dantzig-Wolfe reformulations for binary mixed integer programming problems," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 204(2), pages 251-254, July.
    13. Stefan Irnich & Guy Desaulniers & Jacques Desrosiers & Ahmed Hadjar, 2010. "Path-Reduced Costs for Eliminating Arcs in Routing and Scheduling," INFORMS Journal on Computing, INFORMS, vol. 22(2), pages 297-313, May.
    14. Chu, James C., 2018. "Mixed-integer programming model and branch-and-price-and-cut algorithm for urban bus network design and timetabling," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 108(C), pages 188-216.
    15. Ines Mathlouthi & Michel Gendreau & Jean-Yves Potvin, 2021. "Branch-and-Price for a Multi-attribute Technician Routing and Scheduling Problem," SN Operations Research Forum, Springer, vol. 2(1), pages 1-35, March.
    16. Niu, Huimin & Zhou, Xuesong & Tian, Xiaopeng, 2018. "Coordinating assignment and routing decisions in transit vehicle schedules: A variable-splitting Lagrangian decomposition approach for solution symmetry breaking," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 70-101.
    17. Nicolas Rincon-Garcia & Ben J. Waterson & Tom J. Cherrett, 2018. "Requirements from vehicle routing software: perspectives from literature, developers and the freight industry," Transport Reviews, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(1), pages 117-138, January.
    18. İbrahim Muter & Ş. İlker Birbil & Güvenç Şahin, 2010. "Combination of Metaheuristic and Exact Algorithms for Solving Set Covering-Type Optimization Problems," INFORMS Journal on Computing, INFORMS, vol. 22(4), pages 603-619, November.
    19. Jeng-Shyang Pan & Qing-yong Yang & Shu-Chuan Chu & Kuo-Chi Chang, 2021. "Compact Sine Cosine Algorithm applied in vehicle routing problem with time window," Telecommunication Systems: Modelling, Analysis, Design and Management, Springer, vol. 78(4), pages 609-628, December.
    20. Schneider, Michael & Schwahn, Fabian & Vigo, Daniele, 2017. "Designing granular solution methods for routing problems with time windows," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 263(2), pages 493-509.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ejores:v:238:y:2014:i:1:p:300-312. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/eor .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.