Pete's Market is a small local grocery store with only one checkout counter. Assume that shoppers arrive at the checkout lane according to a Poisson probability distribution, with an arrival rate of 15 customers per hour. The checkout service times follow an exponential probability distribution, with a service rate of 25 customers per hour. The manager’s service goal is to limit the waiting time prior to beginning the checkout process to no more than five minutes. Also the manager of Pete's Market wants to consider one of the following alternatives for improving service. Calculate the value of W_q for each alternative.

1. Hire a second person to bag the groceries while the cash register operator is entering the cost data and collecting money from the customer. With this improved single-server operation, the service rate could be increased to 32 customers per hour. Round your answer to three decimal places. Do not round intermediate calculations.
   
   W_q = fill in the blank 1 minutes
2. Hire a second person to operate a second checkout counter. The two-server operation would have a service rate of 25 customers per hour for each server. Note: Use P₀ values from Table 11.4 to answer this question. Round your answer to three decimal places. Do not round intermediate calculations.
   
   W_q = fill in the blank 2 minutes
   
   What alternative would you recommend? Justify your recommendation.
   
   Recommend

   one checkout counter with two employeestwo checkout counters with two employeesone checkout counter with two employees

   .
   
   The two counter system

   has better service but costs morehas better service and is cheaperhas worse service but is cheaperhas worse service and costs morehas better service but costs more

   .

Answer rating: 100% (QA)

From the given data Average arrival rate 15 per hour Average service rate 25 per hour The ave... View the full answer