Queuing

Theory
 What is queuing theory?
• Queuing Theory is a collection of
mathematical models of various queuing
systems. It is used extensively to analyze
production and service processes
exhibiting random variability in market
demand (arrival times) and service times.
 Why queues form?
• Queues or waiting lines arise when the
demand for a service facility exceeds the
capacity of that facility, that is, the
customers do not get service immediately
upon request but must wait, or the service
facilities stand idle and wait for customers.
• Most waiting line problems are centered
about the question of finding the ideal level
of services that a firm should provide.
For example
• Supermarkets must decide how many cash
register check out positions should be opened.
• Manufacturing plants must determine the optimal
number of mechanics to have on duty in each
shift to repair machines that break down.
• Banks must decide how many teller windows to
keep open to serve customers during various
hours of the day.
 BASIC COMPONENTS OF A
QUEUING SYSTEM
• INPUT SOURCE OF QUEUE
An input source is characterized by
• Size of the calling population
• Pattern of arrivals at the system
• Behaviour of the arrivals
 Size of the calling population
The size represents the total number of potential customers who will require service.

According to source
• The source of customers can be finite or infinite.
For example, all people of a city or state (and others) could be the potential customers at
a supermarket. The number of people being very large, it can be taken to be infinite.
Whereas there are many situations in business and industrial conditions where we
cannot consider the population to be infinite—it is finite.

According to numbers

• The customers may arrive for service individually or in groups.

Single arrivals are illustrated by patients visiting a doctor, students reaching at a library
counter etc. On the other hand, families visiting restaurants, ships discharging cargo
at a dock are examples of bulk, or batch arrivals.
According to time

• Customers arrive in the system at a service facility according to

some known schedule (for example one patient every 15
minutes or a candidate for interview every half hour) or else they
arrive randomly.
Arrivals are considered random when they are independent of one
another and their occurrence cannot be predicted exactly. The
queuing models wherein customers’ arrival times are known with
certainity are categorized as deterministic models. (insofar as this
characteristic is concerned) and are easier to handle. On the other
hand, a substantial majority of the queuing models are based on the
premise that the customers enter the system stochastically, at
random points in time.
 Pattern of arrivals at the system
• The arrival process (or pattern) of customers to the service system
is classified into two categories:
• Static
• Dynamic.

• These two are further classified based on the nature of arrival rate
and the control that can be exercised on the arrival process.
– In static arrival process, the control depends on the nature of arrival
rate (random or constant). Random arrivals are either at a constant rate
or varying with time. Thus to analyze the queuing system, it is
necessary to attempt to describe the probability distribution of arrivals.
From such distributions we obtain average time between successive
arrivals, also called inter-arrival time (time between two consecutive
arrivals), and the average arrival rate (i.e. number of customers arriving
per unit of time at the service system).
 – The dynamic arrival process is controlled by both service
facility and customers. The service facility adjusts its capacity to
match changes in the demand intensity, by either varying the
staffing levels at different timings of service, varying service
charges (such as telephone call charges at different hours of the
day or week) at different timings, or allowing entry with
appointments.
• Frequently in queuing problems, the number of arrivals
per unit of time can be estimated by a probability
distribution known as the Poisson distribution, as it
adequately supports many real world situations.
 Behavior of arrivals
• On the basis of the behavior or attitude of
the customers entering the queuing
system, the customers may be classified
as being
(a) patient, or
(b) impatient.
 Some interesting observations of
human behavior in queues :
• Balking – Some customers even before joining the queue get
discouraged by seeing the number of customers already in service
system or estimating the excessive waiting time for desired service,
decide to return for service at a later time. In queuing theory this is
known as balking.
• Reneging - customers after joining the queue, wait for sometime and
leave the service system due to intolerable delay, so they renege.

– For example, a customer who has just arrived at a grocery store and
finds that the salesmen are busy in serving the customers already in the
system, will either wait for service till his patience is exhausted or
estimates that his waiting time may be excessive and so leaves
immediately to seek service elsewhere.
• Jockeying - Customers who switch from one queue to another
hoping to receive service more quickly are said to be jockeying.
 SERVICE SYSTEM
• The service is provided by a service facility (or
facilities). This may be a person (a bank teller,
a barber, a machine (elevator, gasoline pump),
or a space (airport runway, parking lot, hospital
bed), to mention just a few. A service facility
may include one person or several people
operating as a team.
• There are two aspects of a service system—
(a) the configuration of the service system and
(b) the speed of the service.
(a) The configuration of the service
system
• The customers’ entry into the service system
depends upon the queue conditions. If at the
time of customers’ arrival, the server is idle, then
the customer is served immediately. Otherwise
the customer is asked to join the queue, which
can have several configurations.
• By configuration of the service system we mean
how the service facilities exist. Service systems
are usually classified in terms of their number of
channels, or numbers of servers
 Single Server – Single Queue

The models that involve one queue – one service

station facility are called single server models
where customer waits till the service point is
ready to take him for servicing. Students arriving
at a library counter is an example of a single
server facility.

• Arrivals Queue Service Facility

Customers Leave
Single Server – Several Queues

• In this type of facility there are several

queues and the customer may join any
one of these but there is only one service
channel.
 Several (Parallel) Servers –
Single Queue

• In this type of model there is more than

one server and each server provides the
same type of facility. The customers wait
in a single queue until one of the service
channels is ready to take them in for
servicing.
 Several Servers – Several
Queues

• This type of model consists of several

servers where each of the servers has a
different queue. Different cash counters in
an electricity office where the customers
can make payment in respect of their
electricity bills provide an example of this
type of model.
 Service facilities in a series

• In this, a customer enters the first station and

gets a portion of service and then moves on to
the next station, gets some service and then
again moves on to the next station. …. and so
on, and finally leaves the system, having
received the complete service.
• For example, machining of a certain steel item
may consist of cutting, turning, knurling, drilling,
grinding, and packaging operations, each of
which is performed by a single server in a series.
 b) Speed of Service

• In a queuing system, the speed with which

service is provided can be expressed in either of
two ways—as service rate and as service time.
• The service rate describes the number of customers
serviced during a particular time period.
• The service time indicates the amount of time needed
to service a customer.
• Service rates and times are reciprocal of each other
and either of them is sufficient to indicate the capacity
of the facility.
Generally, we consider the service time only.
 QUEUE CONFIGURATION
• The queuing process refers to the number
of queues, and their respective lengths.
The number of queues depend upon the
layout of a service system. Thus there
may be a single queue or multiple queues.
– Length (or size) of the queue depends upon
the operational situation such as
• physical space,
• legal restrictions, and
• attitude of the customers.
 QUEUE DISCIPLINE
• The queue discipline is the order or manner in which customers from the
queue are selected for service.

(a) Static queue disciplines are based on the individual customer's status in
the queue. Few of such disciplines are:
– i If the customers are served in the order of their arrival, then this is known as the
first-come, first-served (FCFS) service discipline. Prepaid taxi queue at airports
where a taxi is engaged on a first-come, first-served basis is an example of this
discipline.
– ii Last-come-first-served (LCFS)-- Sometimes, the customers are serviced in
the reverse order of their entry so that the ones who join the last are served first.
For example, assume that letters to be typed, or order forms to be processed
accumulate in a pile, each new addition being put on the top of them. The typist
or the clerk might process these letters or orders by taking each new task from
the top of the pile. Thus, a just arriving task would be the next to be serviced
provided that no fresh task arrives before it is picked up. Similarly, the people
who join an elevator last are the first ones to leave it.

• .
• (b) Dynamic queue disciplines are based on the individual customer
attributes in the queue. Few of such disciplines are:

• i Service in Random Order (SIRO)-- Under this rule customers are

selected for service at random, irrespective of their arrivals in the service
system. In this every customer in the queue is equally likely to be selected.
The time of arrival of the customers is, therefore, of no relevance in such a
case.

ii Priority Service-- Under this rule customers are grouped in priority classes
on the basis of some attributes such as service time or urgency or according
to some identifiable characteristic, and FCFS rule is used within each class
to provide service. Treatment of VIPs in preference to other patients in a
hospital is an example of priority service.

• For the queuing models that we shall consider, the assumption would be
that the customers are serviced on the first-come-first-served basis