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Epsilon Airlines services predominantly the eastern and southeastern united States. The vast majority of Epsilon's customers make reservations through Epsilon's website, but a small percentage

Epsilon Airlines services predominantly the eastern and southeastern united States. The vast majority of Epsilon's customers make reservations through Epsilon's website, but a small percentage of customers make reservations via phones. Epsilon employs call center personnel to handle these reservations and to deal with website reservation system problems and for the rebooking of flights for customers whose plans have changed or whose travel is disrupted. Staffing the call center appropriately is a challenge for Epsilon's management team. Having too many employees on hand is a waste of money, but having too few results in very poor customer service and the potential loss of customers.

Epsilon analysts have estimated the minimum number of call center employees needed by day of the week for the upcoming vacation season (June, July, and the first two weeks of August). These estimates are as follows:

Day Minimum Number of Employees Needed
Monday 90
Tuesday 60
Wednesday 50
Thursday 75
Friday 45
Saturday 60
Sunday 50

The call center employees work for five consecutive days and then have two consecutive days off. An employee may start work on any day of the week. Each call center employee receives the same salary. Assume that the schedule cycles and ignore start up and stopping of the schedule.

Develop a model that will minimize the total number of call center employees needed to meet the minimum requirements.

Let Xi = the number of call center employees who start work on day i
(i = 1 = Monday, i = 2 = Tuesday...)

Min X1 + X2 + X3 + X4 + X5 + X6 + X7
s.t.
X1 + X4+ X5+ X6+ X7 =

fill in the blank 2

X1 + X2+ X5+ X6+ X7 =

fill in the blank 4

X1 + X2+ X3+ X6+ X7 =

fill in the blank 6

X1 + X2+ X3+ X4+ X7 =

fill in the blank 8

X1 + X2+ X3+ X4+ X5 =

fill in the blank 10

X2 + X3+ X4+ X5+ X6 =

fill in the blank 12

X3 + X4+ X5+ X6+ X7 =

fill in the blank 14

X1, X2, X3, X4, X5, X6, X7 0

Find the optimal solution.

X1 =

fill in the blank 15

X2 =

fill in the blank 16

X3 =

fill in the blank 17

X4 =

fill in the blank 18

X5 =

fill in the blank 19

X6 =

fill in the blank 20

X7 =

fill in the blank 21

Total Number of Employees = fill in the blank 22

Give the number of call center employees that exceed the minimum required.

Excess employees:

Monday =

fill in the blank 23

Tuesday =

fill in the blank 24

Wednesday =

fill in the blank 25

Thursday =

fill in the blank 26

Friday =

fill in the blank 27

Saturday =

fill in the blank 28

Sunday =

fill in the blank 29

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