WAITING LINE ANALYSIS

AND SIMULATION

Chapter Ten
McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright © 2014 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
Learning Objectives
 LO10–1: Understand what a waiting line problem is.
 LO10–2: Analyze waiting line problems.
 LO10–3: Analyze complex waiting lines using
simulation.

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Economics of the Waiting Line Problem

 A central problem in many service settings is the

management of waiting time.
 Reducing waiting time costs money.
 When people waiting are employees, it is easy to
value their time.
 When people waiting are customers, it is more
difficult to value their time.
 Lost sales is one (low) value.

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The Practical View of Waiting
Lines

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More on Waiting Lines
 One important variable is the number of arrivals over the
hours that the service system is open.
 Customers demand varying amounts of service, often
exceeding normal capacity.
 We can control arrivals.
 Short lines
 Specific hours for specific customers
 Specials
 We can affect service time by using faster or slower servers.

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The Queuing System
1. Source population and the way customers arrive
at the system
2. The servicing system
3. The condition of the customers exiting the system
 Do they go back to source population or not?

10-6
 Components of the Queuing System Visually

Customers Customers are served Customers leave

come in
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Customer Arrivals
 Finite population: limited-size customer pool that
will use the service and, at times, form a line
 When a customer leaves his/her position as a member
of the population, the size of the user group is reduced
by one.
 Infinite population: population large enough so
that the population size caused by subtractions or
additions to the population does not significantly
affect the system probabilities

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Distribution of Arrivals
 Arrival rate: the number of units arriving per
period
 Constant arrival distribution: periodic, with exactly
the same time between successive arrivals
 Variable (random) arrival distributions: arrival
probabilities described statistically
 Exponential distribution
 Poisson distribution

10-9
Distributions
 Exponential distribution: when arrivals at a
service facility occur in a purely random fashion
 The probability function is

f(t) = λe-λt

 Poisson distribution: where one is interested in

the number of arrivals during some time period T
 The probability function is

PT n  
 T  e  T
n

n! 10-10
Customer Arrivals in Queues

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Other Arrival Characteristics
 Arrival patterns
 Size of arrival units
 Degree of patience
 Balking
 Reneging

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 The Queuing System
 Length
 Infinite potential length
 Limited line capacity
 Number of lines
 Queue discipline: a priority
rule or set of rules for
determining the order of
service to customers in a
waiting line

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Service Time Distribution
 Constant
 Service provided by automation
 Variable
 Service provided by humans
 Described using exponential distribution

10-14
Line Structure

10-15
Exiting the Queuing System

10-16
Properties of Some Specific
Waiting Line Models

10-17
Notation for Equations

10-18
Equations for Solving Three Model Problems

10-19
Example 10.1: Customers in Line
(1/4)
Western National Bank is considering opening a drive-through
window for customer service. Management estimates that
customers will arrive at the rate of 15 per hour. The teller who will
staff the window can service customers at the rate of one every
three minutes.
Part 1 Assuming Poisson arrivals and exponential service, find
1. Utilization of the teller
2. Average number in line
3. Average number in system
4. Average waiting time in line
5. Average waiting time in system, including service

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Example 10.1: Solution (2/4)
 15
   0.75  75 percent
 20

Lq 
 2

15
2
 2.25 customers
     2020  15
 15
Ls    3 customers
  20  15
Lq 2.25
Wq    0.15 hours or 9 minutes
 15
Ls 3
Ws    0.2 hour or 12 minutes
 15
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Example 10.1: No More Than Three Cars (3/4)

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Example 10.1: 95 Percent Service Level (4/4)

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