Assessing the Process of Receiving Students’ Meals in Tabriz University of Medical Sciences in 2012

​ Background and Objectives : The process of receiving meal is one of the most important daily events of university students and managers. Since this process happens within a limited time during the day, and all the students are directly involved in this process, proper management is one of the main factors of conducting this process appropriately. The aim of this study was to evaluate the process of receiving meals step by step and analyzing how this process takes place and finally offer some strategies for promoting the quality of conducting this process at Tabriz University of Medical Sciences. Material and Methods : The is a cross-sectional study which was conducted by observation, interview and the questionnaires filled out by students and automation section staff. The flowchart for the process of receiving meals of the university was drawn after step by step observation. The questionnaire including 14 questions were answered by 60 students randomly. A suggested flowchart was adjusted after general and specialized analysis of the flowchart in 5W1H method. For analyzing data, Excel 2007 software was applied. Results : Data analysis indicated that 55% of the students believed that too much time was wasted in this process. Currently, each student spends about 43 minutes for having lunch everyday. Although the university has facilitated food reservation by internet, 80% of students do not use this service and refer to self-service restaurant operators and cause long queues . After interviewing with the manager of food section, it was specified that an average amount of Rls. 300,000,000/- is allocated daily for students’ food by students’ deputy which is Rls. 100,000/- for each student and each student pays only 6.5% of the whole price and 93.5% of the price is supplied by students’ welfare affairs deputy. Conclusion: The process of receiving meals of students at Tabriz University of Medical Sciences is a time-consuming process and will result in customers’ dissatisfaction. This process could be improved by accomplishing some actions such as distributing catalogs and guidelines for using internet services for reserving food among students and considering encouraging services for students who use the internet service and receive less forgotten token such as discount. The number of referees to operators could be reduced by considering the above mentioned suggestions and improve the process of receiving meals.