A telephone-order sales company must determine how many telephone operators are needed to staff the phones during the 9-to-5 shift. It is estimated that an average of 480 calls are received during this time period and that the average call lasts for 6 minutes. There is no “queueing.” If a customer calls and all operators are busy, this customer receives a busy signal and must hang up. If the company wants to have at most 1 chance in 100 of a caller receiving a busy signal, how many operators should be hired for the 9-to-5 shift?

Base your answer on an appropriate simulation. Does it matter whether the service times are exponentially distributed or gamma distributed? Experiment to find out.