Journal of Applied Mathematics and Decision Sciences
Volume 2006 (2006), Article ID 53928, 13 pages
doi:10.1155/JAMDS/2006/53928
Synergistic modeling of call center operations
Qwest Communications International, Boulder 80301, CO, USA
Received 14 July 2005; Revised 30 November 2005; Accepted 9 December 2005
Copyright © 2006 Dennis C. Dietz and Jon G. Vaver. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
We synergistically apply queueing theory, integer programming, and
stochastic simulation to determine an optimal staffing policy for
a repair call handling center. A stationary Markovian queueing
model is employed to determine minimal staffing levels for a
sequence of time intervals with varying call volumes and mean
handling times. These staffing requirements populate an integer
program model for determining the mix of call agent shifts that
will achieve service quality standards at minimum cost. Since the
analytical modeling requires simplifying assumptions, expected
performance of the optimal staffing policy is evaluated using
stochastic simulation. Computational efficiency of the simulation
is improved dramatically by employing the queueing model to
generate an analytic control variate.