A new policy for the service request assignment problem with multiple severity level, due date and sla penalty service requests

Abstract

We study the problem of assigning multiple severity level service requests to agents in an agent pool. Each severity level is associated with a due date and a penalty, which is incurred if the service request is not resolved by the due date. Motivated by Van Meighem (2003), who shows the asymptotic optimality of the Generalized Longest Queue policy for the problem of minimizing the due date dependent expected delay costs when there is a single agent, we develop a class of Index-based policies that is a generalization of the Priority First-Come-First-Serve, Weighted Shortest Expected Processing Time and Generalized Longest Queue policy. In our simulation study of an assignment system of a large technology firm, the Index-based policy shows an improvement of 0-20 % over the Priority First-Come-First-Serve policy depending upon the load conditions. © 2008 IEEE.