Technology comes to the rescue with tools and apps to manage queues, making both customers and employees happier but distraction works too! Andrew Hennigan reports.

When London’s Gatwick airport revamped the check-in areas of the South Terminal one of the goals was to manage queues more effectively.

“One of the pillars of our passenger charter is that ‘we hate queues’ so we looked to technology to support us in making queues the exception rather than the rule,” says Guy Stephenson, Chief Commercial Officer at the airport.

Gatwick’s new check-in areas provide real-time data on queues and a real-time visualisation of the queue status in the check in zones.

“This enables the airlines, handlers and airport to have immediate ability to deal with service issues as they arise,” says Stephenson, who will be speaking at the upcoming Connected Traveller Event in London

The data also allows the airport to record a detailed history of what has taken place, enabling continuous learning and adaption of business processes to improve future queuing experiences.

Systems that measure queues in real time and provide displays both for staff and consumers are available from many vendors and include Human Recognition Systems, Blue Eye Video and Qmetrix. Most systems display wait times in the queue area, but some also send information directly to apps.

Disneyland’s official app, for example, displays real-time wait information for each attraction, so visitors can plan their day without needing to look for a public wait time display. This is extremely useful in such a large resort where visitors need to plan ahead.

There are also third-party apps like Mousewait from companies not affiliated with the resort that use crowd-sourced data to give estimated wait times. Anyone providing wait time data through an app should be aware that for popular venues consumers might have an independent source to compare with. And for anyone who isn’t providing any wait time app there is a possibility someone else is already providing it without any official data.

Data with a difference

It’s not just in theme parks and airports that queue management is important. It can also be very useful in situations where there is no structured queue at all. Stockholm’s commuter train company Stockholmståg’s Pendelkollen app gives passengers waiting for commuter trains real-time data on which parts of an incoming train are likely to have the most free seats – information obtained by repurposing existing data from onboard carriage weight sensors. The busiest sections are marked in red, moderately busy sections in yellow and emptiest in green. Guided by the graphics on the app, savvy commuters know exactly where to stand in a station, easing both congestion and frustration.

While airports, theme parks and transport companies can invest in sophisticated queue management systems, there are also many inexpensive mobile apps like Qender, Qminder and Qless that bring queue management technology to smaller businesses with surprisingly little effort. Most of these apps replace the physical queue with a virtual line managed by the app, so that the people in line can do other things while they are waiting.

Diversion with a smile

Keeping customers occupied is one of the alternative strategies for managing queues that are less focused on wait times and more focused on the consumer’s perception. Theme parks rely on this approach to distract visitors from the usually long lines. They are reluctant to discuss details on the record but some techniques are clearly visible.

At Disney World, for example, when the wait for a popular ride becomes uncomfortably long they might arrange for capacity to be increased or send some characters to entertain the waiting visitors. This psychologically driven approach is one that any consumer facing business can apply. Because what we know is this: that occupied time feels shorter than unoccupied time. So, whether it’s a TV screen to pass time, games to play, an interesting view, memorabilia to look at or even just a mirror, thinking about how you can occupy your guests can ease the wait.

Another important lesson from psychology is that a known wait is perceived to be less stressful than an unknown wait, so whatever the approach you choose, that wait time display or app is always going to be a great help in managing customer satisfaction.