Waiting time

You can show queuers an estimated wait time in their queue view so they know roughly how long they have. Just enter the average time it takes to serve one queuer and Flowby calculates the estimate from there.

The queuer sees the time rounded to the nearest 5 minutes: “~10 min” rather than a false-precision “7 min 23 sec”.

Setting it up

Per queue:

1. Open the queue in Flowby admin.
2. Click Edit on the queue.
3. Enter the average service time in minutes: how long, on average, you spend serving one queuer at this queue.
4. Save.

The estimate goes live immediately.

How the estimate is calculated

For a queuer in position N: estimate = average service time × N, rounded to the nearest 5 minutes.

That’s a simple multiplication. It doesn’t account for staff levels. If you have two staff members at one queue, the queue effectively moves twice as fast as the configured service time suggests.

Adjust for typical staffing

Set the service time based on the average staffing of the queue, not best-case. A 4-minute “with two staff” service time and a 4-minute “with one staff” service time give very different estimates. If you usually have one but configured for two, the queuer thinks the wait will be half what it actually is.

Tips

• Don’t pad heavily. Queuers tolerate “longer than expected” waits better than “I was told it’d be 5 minutes and it was 15”, but over-padding makes them leave.
• Review periodically with the analytics tab. Your real average wait time (see statistics) is the truth; the configured service time is your best estimate of it.
• For variable-time queues (returns, repairs), compare the average with what staff see during a normal shift. Outliers can be very long and would skew your estimate too high.

Related

Statistics Find your real average wait time and compare to your configured value.