Effective utilization of idle time in an (s,S) inventory with positive service tim

Abstract

We deviate from the Berman et al. models in inventory with positive service time. We establish a necessary and sufficient condition for system stability. Several performance measures are computed. An optimisation problem is discussed. Our analysis suggests that it is optimal to place the replenishment order when the inventory level is positive (even in the zero lead time case). Numerical illustrations are provided.