服务等候中顾客感知的研究述评与展望

在服务传递的过程中,等候通常难以避免且对顾客的整体服务体验有直接的影响。通过对国内外相关文献的梳理,从顾客在等候过程中对时间的感知、对公平的感知、对环境的感知和对沟通的感知等几个研究视角对相关文献进行了总结和评价,分析了相关研究成果对等候环境设计、等候信息发布、等候队列管理的意义和启示。指出＂不同等候阶段的顾客感知差异＂,＂文化因素对等候感知的影响＂,＂基于感知分析的等候流程和等候设施设计＂,＂感知等候质量的内涵和作用机理＂是未来值得关注的研究方向。     

Waiting: integrating social and psychological perspectives in operations management

Waiting time is an important issue in service operations management because of its impact on customer satisfaction and operations capabilities. This paper examines waiting time from a social and psychological perspective. It provides a conceptual framework which identifies social and psychological factors that affect perceptions of waiting. The conceptual framework enables service managers to rethink operational issues, such as layout design, process choices, and service delivery from customers’ perceptions of waiting. Assimilation–contrast theory suggests that perceived waiting time be linked to expected waiting time and its gap leads to customers’ overall evaluation of service. A customer’s willingness to accept delay is related to the causes for delay as explained by attribution theory. Approaching waiting time from a stress management theory, this paper provides service managers with various stress-reduction mechanisms such as giving customers advance notice of expected waiting time, speeding up pre-process waiting time, and acknowledging customers’ rights to quick service. These practical suggestions can aid service managers in reducing perceived waiting time, enhancing customers’ waiting experience, and improving queue management.     

Heavy traffic analysis of roving server networks

This article studies the heavy-traffic (HT) behavior of queueing networks with a single roving server. External customers arrive at the queues according to independent renewal processes and after completing service, a customer either leaves the system or is routed to another queue. This type of customer routing in queueing networks arises very naturally in many application areas (in production systems, computer- and communication networks, maintenance, etc.). In these networks, the single most important characteristic of the system performance is oftentimes the path time, i.e., the total time spent in the system by an arbitrary customer traversing a specific path. The current article presents the first HT asymptotic for the path-time distribution in queueing networks with a roving server under general renewal arrivals. In particular, we provide a strong conjecture for the system’s behavior under HT extending the conjecture of Coffman et al.^{[8 Coffman, Jr, E. G.; Puhalskii, A. A.; Reiman, M. I,. Polling systems with zero switchover times: A heavy-traffic averaging principle. Ann. App. Prob. 1995, 5(3), 681–719.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] [Google Scholar],9 Coffman, Jr., E. G.; Puhalskii, A. A.; Reiman, M. I,. Polling systems in heavy-traffic: A Bessel process limit. Math. Oper. Res. 1998, 23, 257–304.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] [Google Scholar]]} to the roving server setting of the current article. By combining this result with novel light-traffic asymptotics, we derive an approximation of the mean path time for arbitrary values of the load and renewal arrivals. This approximation is not only highly accurate for a wide range of parameter settings, but is also exact in various limiting cases.     

基于异质性顾客心理期望等待时间的优先权服务定价研究

本文以非抢占式M/M/1排队系统为背景,以企业收益最大化为目标,基于顾客异质性(单位时间等待成本不同)将顾客分为两类,针对顾客的心理期望等待时间对服务提供商最优定价策略的影响进行研究。首先研究优先权顾客心理期望等待时间对企业收益的影响以及相应的优先权定价,然后研究优先权顾客和普通顾客同时存在心理期望等待时间对企业收益的影响和相应的优先权定价。研究表明:仅考虑优先权顾客的心理期望等待时间,企业应通过提高优先权定价来获得最优收益;当优先权顾客和普通顾客同时存在心理期望等待时间时,企业仍然采取提高优先权定价的策略,若普通顾客的价值大(获取服务的基本费用大),企业应对普通顾客提供一定的折扣来消除其心理期望等待时间增加企业收益;如果普通顾客的价值较小,企业应"有意"流失部分普通顾客,吸引更多顾客到优先权队列获取服务来获得更多收益。本文研究对于服务提供商在考虑顾客心理期望等待时间基础上设置最合理的队列机制有一定的指导意义和实际应用价值。     

Stationary distributions of the R[X]/R/1 cross-correlated queue

We consider an infinite buffer single server queue wherein batch interarrival and service times are correlated having a bivariate mixture of rational (R) distributions, where R denotes the class of distributions with rational Laplace–Stieltjes transform (LST), i.e., ratio of a polynomial of degree at most n to a polynomial of degree n. The LST of actual waiting time distribution has been obtained using Wiener–Hopf factorization of the characteristic equation. The virtual waiting time, idle period (actual and virtual) distributions, as well as inter-departure time distribution between two successive customers have been presented. We derive an approximate stationary queue-length distribution at different time epochs using the Markovian assumption of the service time distribution. We also derive the exact steady-state queue-length distribution at an arbitrary epoch using distributional form of Little’s law. Finally, some numerical results have been presented in the form of tables and figures.     

Multi-class M/PH/1 queues with deterministic impatience times

This article considers computational procedures for the waiting time and queue length distributions in stationary multi-class first-come, first-served single-server queues with deterministic impatience times. There are several classes of customers, which are distinguished by deterministic impatience times (i.e., maximum allowable waiting times). We assume that customers in each class arrive according to an independent Poisson process and a single server serves customers on a first-come, first-served basis. Service times of customers in each class are independent and identically distributed according to a phase-type distribution that may differ for different classes. We first consider the stationary distribution of the virtual waiting time and then derive numerically feasible formulas for the actual waiting time distribution and loss probability. We also analyze the joint queue length distribution and provide an algorithmic procedure for computing the probability mass function of the stationary joint queue length.     

Waiting on Others: Gender in the Medical Waiting Room

In this article, I describe how gendered interactions and power dynamics play out in medical waiting rooms. While people are spending time idle, waiting for the next thing to happen (i.e., to check in, to see the doctor, to pay), social processes continue to occur and reinforce these gendered interactions and dynamics. Using data collected from ethnographic observations of medical waiting rooms in the Midwestern United States, this article illustrates that waiting offers another opportunity to understand the subtle ways that gendered expectations and hierarchies are perpetuated. Patients, their friends, and families do gender in medical waiting rooms through the amount of auditory and physical space they take up and the ways in which they behave and respond to the actors and expectations in this space.     

成语“守株待兔”的文化人类学解读

“守株待兔”是一个人尽皆知的成语。如果运用文化人类学的成果和古文献资料结合进行分析,可以认定这个成语背后包含着殷商时期人们的普遍思维方式,进而可以看到殷商时期人们一般的思维模型和经验世界的真相,为认识古人的思想打开一扇窗户。     

Exact and asymptotic results for pattern waiting times

Waiting time problems for the occurrence of a pattern have attracted considerable research interest. Several results, including Poisson or Compound Poisson approximations as well as Normal approximations have appeared in the literature. In addition, a number of asymptotic results has been developed by making use of the finite Markov chain imbedding technique and the Perron–Frobenius eigenvalue. In the present paper we present a recursive scheme for the evaluation of the tail probabilities of the waiting time for the first and r-th occurrence of a pattern. A number of asymptotic results (along with their rates of convergence) that do not require the existence of the Perron–Frobenius eigenvalue are also offered. These results cover a quite wide class of pattern waiting time problems and, in most cases, perform better than the ones using the Perron–Frobenius eigenvalue.     

保障房建设完成情况的衡量指标研究

内地公共住房没有一套完整长期持续的计划,衡量一个地区保障性住房的建设成绩是是否按质按量按时完成政府分配的保障性住房任务,即以计划建设量与开工量来衡量,该种方式在当下环境中是不科学的,建立合理的衡量指标问题日益迫切。从香港公屋的"轮候配屋制"入手,探讨衡量保障房建设情况的合理方法,得出应用平均轮候时间衡量地区保障房落实情况的结论。