A review of management issues related to express line systems

Abstract

As time-based competition is gathering ground among leading companies, express checkouts become more and more widely used for waiting time reduction. Express line systems, however, can be formed and operated in several ways. This article reviews the most important management issues related to the analysis and improvement of waiting process at the checkouts of express line systems. The most important parameter of express line systems is the limit value. This parameter determines the group of customers who are entitled to use the express checkouts. In this way, the limit value has significant effect on waiting experience as well. In express line systems, the classical objective of operations management, waiting time minimization, should be complemented by the consideration of other factors as well. In these systems, the variation of waiting, the perceived waiting time and the evaluation of waits are important issues as well. The operation of these systems should be evaluated only knowing the effects of introducing express checkouts on all of these parameters.