On Competition to Join a Simple Queueing System Before the Facility Opens

Colin E. Bell
Additional contact information
Colin E. Bell: Department of Management Sciences, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa 52240

Management Science, 1985, vol. 31, issue 3, 358-368

Abstract: A single server provides FIFO services commencing at time 0. Each member of a population of N potential customers must decide whether or not to arrive at the facility. Customers choosing to arrive must do so no later than time 0. This paper studies the benefit to customers: the value of service received minus the cost of waiting time. This model is studied under a variety of assumptions and the impact of customer behavior on average benefit (value of service minus cost of waiting) is examined. Self-interested customers compete with each other (by arriving sufficiently early) to the extent that much of the potential benefit is dissipated through high waiting costs before time 0. A common finding is that no customer can attain a benefit which improves on that which would result from arriving exactly at time 0 and being last in line. The impact of charging entrance tolls is investigated.

Keywords: queueing optimization; individual vs social optima; equilibrium behavior (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1985
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.31.3.358 (application/pdf)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:31:y:1985:i:3:p:358-368

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Management Science from INFORMS Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Asher ().