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Comment by klenwell | Hacker News Reader

I actually come across this scenario quite often in retail outlets with poorly designed queue layouts (e.g. an H&M with with 2-4 registers behind a long counter and a single ad-hoc queue lined up in front of one of them).

My reasoning is a little different (and a little more charitable I suppose in its generalization about human nature): I don't want to go step in front of the register with no one waiting in it because I don't want to look like a sociopathic jerk. I also assume that is why most people haven't done so.

At the same time, I know as soon as someone does step up and do it, people will grumble but the single ad hoc queue will redistribute itself into 3 more balanced queues. I'm usually waiting for someone else to be that sociopathic jerk.

What I wish is that the manager of the store gave a little more thought to this issue in the first place.

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Actually, scientifically, one queue for all registers is the superior solution. It reduces wait times for customers in general vs. one queue for each register (where one of the lines might get stuck for a long time). That's why you find banks and other places are all setup to have one queue used by all the clerks. The only real problem with H&M is that they haven't put stuff in the way of people forming multiple lines when keeping them in one line is the best practice.

It doesn't reduce average wait time, but the variance in wait times.

Well, it might bring down the average, but not as much as the variance, because the work is now load-balanced across multiple counters, more or less, evenly; and so, the productivity might be a bit on the higher side?

I presume that one of the problems with one queue for all registers is that people will perceive it as a longer line. A five person line at a particular register doesn't seem as bad as a fifty person line for all ten registers.

People quickly learn that it's better.

That works only if all registers are being utilized to pull people off the front of the queue. The grandparent poster described a situation where everybody queues in front of one register while the other registers sit idle, which isn't optimal for anyone.

Could average wait time be increased, as the distance from the front of the queue and the checkout in a single queue solution is longer, between 2 and 5 meters for a 4 checkout setup. This distance and walking the 2-5 meters to the checkout increases time total checkout time.

I'm not sure I understand how that continues for very long. Once the clerks no longer have customers, they can just call people over and the queue will redistribute. If they're not doing that, presumably it's because they're doing something else that takes priority, like replacing the till or handling a problem with a previous transaction.

It only seems like it would be a problem at businesses with bad staff.

In my experience, clerks tend to circumvent the issue by simply yelling out, to no one in particular, something like "Next in line!"

I've also noticed the acquired habit in more experienced retail staff, when confronted with a queue of indeterminate order, to say, "I can help the next customer in line" and leaving implementation of the next method as an exercise for the customers themselves.

FWIW, I find the best arrangement is a Fry's style mega-queue with boundaries clearly defined by racks of candy, magazines, or other impulse-purchase crap that feeds into multiple registers.

Here, clercs use o say something like "This register is also open.", and a new line will form.

Single queue multiple registers work really well. Especially for high volume (see: whole foods).

Teaching customers how to use them, on the other hand.....

And for some situations, like a movie theater box office, a single long line actually drives people away (on non-blockbuster-opening-nights) because it looks like a big crowd, compared to two small lines. Even if it means they'd get through it faster. .... at least, before the age where everyone just buys their ticket on fandango.

tl;dr Thank goodness for sociopathic jerks

The other tl;dr is that managers need to know and buy into concepts of group psychology.

Progress depends on the unreasonable man.

I've long held the theory that humans have differing degrees of rudeness because it breaks deadlocks like "after you", subdivide-or-finish the divisible food item, and who takes the last piece. (In places that were too polite, I have seen the last piece of a cake go stale uneaten.)

My friend and I used to have a serious case of "after you" deadlocks during our studies; we would get stuck in front of a door insisting the other goes through first. We eventually figured out a simple solution - if we found ourselves about to get stuck in another "after you" loop, we'd play rock-paper-scisors, and the loser had to go first. It quickly became almost a second nature for us, and it looked pretty confusing/hilarious to people stuck behind us in the queue.

I live by the rule that I never follow an "after you" with a "no, after you" without good reason. If they want demonstrate their politeness, why compete?

The obvious reason is because you get to play rock-paper-scissors.

The less obvious reason is that after a certain number of back-and-forths, you can interrupt the other person saying "aft-", cut them in line sideways so you both sort of swoop through the doorway, which then leads to a warp zone.

You clearly don't understand the meaning of "sociopathic"

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