Managing Real and Virtual Waits in Hospitality and Service Organizations

Nearly all service and hospitality experiences require customers to wait at some point in the service process. Unless the provider of the service has unlimited capacity or can precisely match customer demand to available capacity, customers will be forced to wait for the experience they seek. Although waiting is an expected part of many services (say, gracious dining), for most customers waiting is an annoyance to be minimized or avoided. Waiting can also cause customer dissatisfaction that can greatly influence the intent to return whenever that service experience is sought again. To minimize the negative aspects of waiting, managers have available the following three strategies. The first is to manage the reality of the actual wait through the use of techniques that can help better match capacity with customer demand. The second is to manage the perception of thewait by responding to how customers perceive the wait. The third, and most innovative, is to make the wait invisible through developing virtual queues, which allow customers to participate in other activities while they wait for an appointed time at their desired activity.