Provided is a method, computer program and system for controlling the flow of service requests originated by a plurality of requesters. The method includes adding an additional control mechanism, which includes a serializer and a serializer queue, between the requesters and the service provider. The serializer inhibits the requesters when the serializer queue size reaches a threshold for a period proportional to the number of requesters already waiting, the queue length and the serializer service time. When the service provider queue is full or at a critical level, the serializer is inhibited for a period of time that is the approximately the difference between the service times of the serializer and the service provider. In addition, when the service provider queue is full, the service provider service time is recalculated as a function of the serializer service time and of the time required to process requests by the service provider.