Hire capacity of rental services

Abstract

A rental service is a service in which customers arrive to request the hire of a rental unit. Customers arriving when all units are out on hire are turned away and considered lost to the service. Customers, successful in obtaining the hire of a unit, pay a hire fee per unit per day. A graphical tool is presented as a decision aid in determining the total number of units to be made available for hire. The graphical tool minimises the total daily relevant costs and provides an easy means of visually examining the sensitivity of the “optimal” number of units to changes in estimates of the associated demand, hire fee and cost parameters. A short account of the application of the graphical tool by a small car hire business is presented.

Citation

Walker, J. (1999), "Hire capacity of rental services", Managing Service Quality: An International Journal, Vol. 9 No. 2, pp. 116-120. https://doi.org/10.1108/09604529910257966