Queue Server Efficacy in the Retail Industry: A Behavioral Study

Inspired by behavioral operations and supply chain management this research explores the queuing behavior in retail operations. Customers frequently experience waiting for service in a queue at retail stores. Customer waiting time has a psychological and economic costs. Traditional mathematical models of queuing systems do not consider these psychological costs. Retail stores face the challenge of optimizing queue performance with thin profit margins and high labor costs. This leads to dissatisfied customers who may switch to competitive service offerings with efficient queue management systems. This research focuses on managing the queue server, to increase the efficacy in retail counter queues. A leading Sri Lankan supermarket chain acts as the focal company for this research. A behavioral study was conducted and servers who operate the cash register are the subjects. We observe servers' behavior using a carefully planned field study, where we identify issues and factors that should be addressed in order to increase server efficiency. We find several factors that affect queue servers' efficacy such as speed and the quality of the machines and equipment at queue server points, unawareness of incentives for efficient service, delays due to the erroneous entry of products, the workload of the queue server and queue server's job satisfaction.