Dwell time forecast and checkout optimisation in supermarkets

The procedure to optimize the assignment of operational personal as a resourcein a service environment is the content of this thesis. The allocation of this resource determines waiting time for leaving the environment. For a shop asa case study the inward flow and also the outward flow is measured by using an optical/computer vision based approach in the service environment. This detected data is fed to an evaluation unit. With the aid of this data, which is delivered for a specific moment in time, resource requirements are forecasted. For this research, the service environment was divided into a shop area and a checkout area. The inward flow into the shop area and into the checkout area is also measured in an optical way. Furthermore, the length of the waiting queue and the waiting time which is assigned to a specific resource checkout is measured. A real world problem is driving this research: Controlling the resources depending on the expected number of customers at the checkout desk. The outcome of this is an improvement of operational resource planning, avoiding over-capacity while not increasing or reducing queues and waiting time of customers.