Cloud-based iPad POS system for the restaurant industry
3.5/5 (77 reviews)Pros
Easy to use, easy to set up and it is self-explanatory. You can go into the backside of the program and checks your sales for the day, how many customers you yourself have waited on.
Cons
Not much about the software that I didn't like. Sometimes though I would have a hard time getting connected on my Ipad.
I started using Lavu Point of Sale about 2 years ago. Before switching to the system we were using paper tickets, I didn't realize how inefficient this really was until I made the switch to an electronic system. Not only are we now spending less time managing each order, accuracy has gone up, and my shrinkage has gone down. The kitchen is only allowed to make items that are rung into the system and print out which has help cut down on theft or giving items away. The biggest time savings is getting the customers checked out. Previously during our lunch rush we would have a line of people waiting to pay and leave, now we are able to handle them as they come up to the counter since everything is already totaled up in the system.
Another big help has been the ability to use iPods to take orders at the table. We usually have a rush after church on Sundays, sometimes a line at the door. Before my servers had to go to the table, take the order, then take the ticket back to the kitchen. Now my servers go to the table, take the order, hit send and it prints in the kitchen. Then they can go straight to the next table. Anything we can do to speed up the time it takes to turn a table is a plus.
The amount of features that have been added in the last couple years has been amazing, it's nice to see that they are actively working on the software. The biggest thing for us has been the addition of 'always offline mode'. You just use the system and the orders go to the cloud in the background. When we first got setup we had some issues with the internet which interfered with using the system. They offered us a local server option but I did not want to install more hardware. While my internet situation was much improved by switching from DSL to cable I always worried that my connection going out could be a possibility. With the new version (3.0.3) the system keeps working even if my internet connection were to go out.
The Lavu POS software has worked great for us and I highly recommend it.
We used this in a tequila bar that I was a bar manager at. We were very high volume so we needed a good POS system that never crashed, and operated quickly to minimize waiting on the system to perform functions. I think in that regard this is a great system and I would recommend it to anyone.
Pros
Better price point
Very intuitive and easy to pick up user-interface
Speedy screen operations, no waiting for screens to load
If you have experience with other POS systems this one will be very easy to get started with
Great team behind it
Easy to add new items to menu (you dont have to be an expert to fulfil managerial roles on the system)
Cons
There is not much that I can say against LAVU. As far as Point of Sale Systems it is just as good as any of the big dog's systems but with an affordable price point. I never had an issue with the system in my year of using it.
Hi Sean,
Thank you for your review. We're so glad to hear Lavu is working well for you and your team! Don't hesitate to call us at 855-767-5288 if you have any questions.
The Lavu Team
I purchased a complete system from LAVU this past April with the intent to upgrade my existing POS from CAKE which served me well the first 4 years of running my restaurant, but being somewhat of a basic system I started feeling like it was holding me back. LAVU was running a 50% off on hardware so I called and spoke to a salesperson. Let me tell you, I wish I had recorded the conversations, as there was very little in common between what was verbally promised and what was actually delivered, VERY LITTLE! Typical sales tactics, they put extreme pressure on you to sign up (do it in the next 6 hours or the promotion expires), give you practically no time to read the fine print, and all of a sudden you find yourself in a 3 years contract with ridicules early termination penalties and a service provider that is incapable of delivering half of what was promised. They count on you not having the time or resources to take them to court. We are now almost at the end of September, just this past week they delivered the last remaining hardware piece originally promised, 5 months later! Thank god I kept my CAKE system going or I would have gone out of business. Their customer service is of the lowest level you would ever see, especially from an IT company, they provide practically no solutions to issues or a very vague future fixes, and their system keeps crashing leaving you with no ability to run your business mid-day and with no warning, time after time.
Pros
Being an iPad based system it offer mobility and flexibility
Cons
Doesn't do many of the functions it promises, and does a poor job at functioning features
Pros
I like the simple interface, it is easy to use and simple to implement
Cons
99% of the time the software works well however we have had consistent problems with the system going offline in the middle of very busy nights. We will have a restaurant full of people 30+ tables with open orders and the system completely stops working (it always happens at peak times when we should be making the most money when we are the busiest, they have not invested enough to function at the scale they are selling for). Servers cannot send orders to the kitchen, we cannot run cards, servers loose track of what the final cost of the bill is for the customers and what their order is. The 1% of the time when Lavu goes offline has irreversible damage to our business. It creates chaos among staff members, it disrupts our reputation as a legit business and damages our relationship with our customers, and it causes us to loose money on tickets that do not get rang in right or when we have to jot down credit card numbers instead of running them to learn the card is no good once Lavu is back online. This has happened to us at least 8-9 times in the 1 year we have had LAVU. Not only is it unacceptable for this to ever happen but we do not get any compensation for our trouble or loss of income and the Lavu team will not return our calls or explain what is happening or reassure us that it wont happen again. There is no backup plan or support on help coming. Unfortunately I feel we are going to have to look for something else.
Thank you for your review, Jennifer. We hear what you're saying and we are working diligently to bring offline mode to our customers by late July. We know that the downtime is unacceptable and we appreciate your patience with us. The Lavu Team.
Pros
Love the ease of use. The customer service has been really good as of late. Would for the most part recommend to any business.
Cons
Need some better basic features:
-Option for end of day report to reconcile as if the credit card tips were given out as cash to the servers, as this is the process for most restaurants.
-Better tip reporting capability for employees. It would be great for it to ask for total tips to be asked when employee is clocking out. There are many reasons for this including tip out, tip pool etc.
Hi Joe. Thank you so much for the feedback. We're glad to hear Lavu is meeting your needs and will strive to keep improving to make your experience even better.
Pros
about the sistem we are of course happy after one year of lavu at our restaurant, our job is helping from lavu, accouting administration kitchen and all is going in perfect harmonies
Cons
fraud by billing request or shut down lavu. Yes that happen two times , last time few days ago I get a message on a strange open windows of lavu account, was about to pay or shutdown the system but we always pay, so I was worry what happen if shotdown lavu at my place then they ask the min payment, so I used my credit card for pay it but at end they took more for Hosting PAID without any consense from me. we used to pay an agent of lavu so he doesn't answer fast half and that can happen. Now he said like last time they will refund to me but of course after some month... so disappointed about it. Hope to try back faster my money because the agent he asks me to pay him to because isn't his fault. hope someone tries to explain and solve my problem.
Nothing to come close to outweighing the cons
Pros
About the only thing that is positive about this system is that it is internet based and we can move freely about the restaurant to serve our guests.
Cons
Billing is constantly inaccurate and the system shuts down during service because of this.
If you're ok with the system going offline with no warning due to inaccurate automated billing issues and 3 hours on the phone with inept customer service reps while having zero access to input orders, print tickets to your kitchen, bills for the customers and not being able to process credit cards than this IS the system for you!
Our sales and install guy was a joke. Over promising on system answers he didn't even know but said yeah it does that. When it came to menu input it took him 2 weeks from start to finish and we had to just take over and redo everything ourselves.
Reporting functions that should be available that weren't we were told would be "coming soon" in the next version have not materialized.
Customer service is absolutely horrendous. If you like long hold times over an hour most times or a we will call you back message many hours most times then again this is the system for you!
Hello Blaine,
We are sorry to hear about your experience and hope we can solve these issues you've been having. Our customer care manager is looking into the issue now and will reach out to you. In the meantime, we recommend reaching out to our 24-hour customer care line 1.855.528.8457 with any immediate issues you may be having. We would be more than happy to address the problems with your system. Again, we apologize for any inconvenience you may have had and look forward to working through these issues.
-Kristin
Pros
Ease of use
Joshua Maestas from customer service was so incredibly helpful. He took time to listen to the complicated scenario we were trying to resolve. He followed up when and how he said he would. Most of the time our customer service experience is frustrating but he was truly a breath of fresh air.
Cons
Back end reporting; customer service. There are programming bugs and we continuously are told "development is working on it" but never saw any resolution. If it isn't a priority for you and not intended to be fixed then don't tell us it is being fixed.
Benefit i get fr lavu are very simple to use, details and accurate. Al cash flow you can control and manage by lavu and anywhere you go. You can check the data anytime event that the table not paid yet.
Thank you marketman
Pros
Easy to use and costumize what do you want it to sell. Lavu has completely modifier to provides any request from the guest and we can set it up on lavu.
Cons
Report of end of the day is very details and completely what you need. You can integrates with many other accounting system. All the featurw and functional is only in one system.
Gede, thank you for your feedback.. every day we strive to improve since your success is all that w strive for.. don't forget to join our referral program in which we pay up to $10,000 a month for word of mouth.. https://lavu.com/referral-partner-program/.
But wait there's more! How about the fact that the kitchen printer prints two checks, that no one can seem to fix. Not only does it waste an enormous amount of paper but it is confusing as the checks are not identical and it blows through a ribbon in 3 or four days!
Occasionally it will resend an order back yo the kitchen that has already been made, etc...
The is no individual item printer assignment either which means that you have to send an entire category instead of just one item to a screen or printer.
Pros
The iPhone app. Really nothing else, really.
Cons
WOW! Where do I begin? Should I start with how they outright lied to me to make the sale? How about sending a completely incompetent tech support personnel company to help me with my network? Maybe I should start with the fact that they billed me today for Quickbooks integration that I DON'T EVEN HAVE!
Let's start with the outright misrepresentation of their product. I specifically asked if they had online ordering and I was told yes we do. After I had purchased the system and went to set it up I asked "Well how do I set up the credit card integration for the online ordering?" Then I was told "Oh we have online ordering but we don't have online payment" WHAT!!? This is 2017 not 1999 what do you mean you don't have online payment? "We had a problem with it and had to take it off line, we should have it back up by Nov."
Well today is 08-21-2018 and guess what I still don't have? You got it - online payment.
Hi John,
We are very sorry to hear about the problems you are experiencing. I will have someone from our care team look into this and get back to you as soon as possible.
Thank you
There is an open ended API for other application integration, but we are not savvy enough to do this ourselves. It would be great if there were more companies and different aspects of integration on the back end for more high end analytics and functionality. (IE: Quickbooks, Simple Order, Etc.).
Pros
Very versatile and easy to use. Easy to make modifications and adjustments within the system and customize to our specific operation.
Cons
Sometimes connection of iPads can be a little shotty as it goes for the order takers communicating with LAVU KDS, and it has been hard to get the problem fully resolved, but it only creates a mild irritant and not a full distraction from the overall business.
To the team at POS LAVU, Just wanted to thank you guys so much for listening to some of our concerns over the years about upgrades to your systems. When we came on board with you guys we were somewhat hesitant to your system. After we made the change we feel as if we all have grown together. We would like to personally say thank you for the time and effort you have put into your growth and we expect to be with you for many many more years. And by the way we now have 3 restaurants with your system and are looking to upgrade two more...Again thank you from all of us at the Pugliese Group...
Pros
The interface is user friendly, and tickets get sent to kitchen without many problems. But we could do this with paper
Cons
Everything else! Whenever we have a issue they send it to the "developmental team" also known as the black hole. When we signed up they said "offline processing was in the works" that was 2 years ago. Reports are literally ALWAYS wrong. If you look at sales on two different reports they never are the same. For a span of about three months they miscalculated sales tax, having us over pay hundreds of dollars! For a long time they randomly doubled numbers on server reports, and now there is a random .50 added to numbers on servers reports. I have a tax background an I informed them the liability they were putting on us and our servers by misreporting so they showed me on the IRS website where they were right, THEY SET UP THERE SYSTEM BASED OFF THE WRONG PART OF THE IRS CODE. Not to mention that it randomly opens tickets from all different times that we have to re-close and I'm not sure we get paid for them or not. When we call customer support they are really nice, but our issues always get sent to the "Developmental Team" to never be heard about again!
I have a pretty big place, with a long wine and cocktail list, but this handled all of our menu, and getting running was fast with one of the distributors we found in our area. We switched from an older POS after our contract ran out, and this seemed like the new, efficient thing to try out. It was a quick install, and way less than what I paid before. I miss some of the inventory ordering and employee scheduling my old system had, but this makes up for it in other ways. My servers picked it up right away, almost no training needed
Went from writing orders for kitchen to being able to send them from front of house lavu system to boh kitchen printer as well as sending beverage orders to the bar printer
Pros
Very easy to use and teach, customization of items, daily sales reports for profit and loss
Cons
Programming printers after loosing power can be difficult the first few times...but now I am a pro
Overall, a good product and always recommend to others.
Pros
System is fairly easy to use and navigate. Easy to setup menus and configure accordingly. Customer support is pretty responsive and quick although sometimes questionable knowledge to help with all situations. Cost for system is excellent.
Cons
Fonts can be a bit small on pos interface and thus hard to read. No big cons to comment on other than have had some big hassles configuring system to work with different credit card merchants and being bounced back and forth with customer support to resolve.
Benefits: It was a band-aid for when I didn't have anything. LAVU has now become an albatross around the neck of our business.
Pros
Generically, the price is what what the draw for me an my small Craft Beer bar. I even recommended it at the beginning to a few other customers, but it was a mistake.
Cons
Not customer support per se, but the fact that when they utter "development team" right there, there is no hope your problem will be solved. None. They now call a problem that needs the development team a "Feature Request" which is the nice way of them saying, "No, we are not going to fix it, ever". A "Feature Request" sounds like you are imposing on them to do something special for you, instead of just fixing the software to work as intended
The back end web software is in shambles and rarely works as advertised. The reporting features give you decent onscreen views, but you cant reprint a ticket that you can see on their backend web interface. The "print layout" for some tables dont work and give random data.
Discounting system is not robust.
Hi Jamie, We're sorry to hear your experience with Lavu has not been positive. We strive to provide the best experience for our customers and would love another opportunity to try and resolve any issues. Please call our 24/7 Customer Care team at 855-767-5288 or email us at [email protected] Thank you, Lavu
Bought the system for my pub about three years ago and I'm glad I did. Lavu has helped my staff open/close tabs much quicker than before I bought the system. I'm making more money and I can say that part of the reason is due to Lavu. Excellent POS system.
Pros
Ease of use and the reliability. Hasn't crashed on me in the three years I've had it.
Cons
Lags every once in a while.
Pros
Ease of use. New employees can figure things out quite easily.
Integrates smoothly with Vantiv (Mercury) including their gift program.
Cons
Until just this week, I would have said that the inability to take EMV, Apple Pay, etc. through our current merchant processor was my biggest challenge.
Thankfully for the support staff, I was able to purchase the equipment necessary and will be up and running with our new terminal and it's new features soon!
Pros
INTEGRATION with 3rd party delivery sites via Chowly (so no more manually inputting orders from seamless/ delivery.com/ eat24/ etc. into the POS system), easy to use, good quality hardware, fantastic customer service (anytime I call, the question gets solved the first time; customer service is friendly & very effective; always easily accessible), lots of amazing features (reports, inventory management, employee management)
When I first contacted Lavu, we were only interested in switching POS systems for 1 reason: integration with 3rd party delivery sites. Lavu didn't have the Chowly integration at the time I first contacted them, but 2 weeks later, I got a call from my sales rep saying they were in the process of speaking/ partnering with Chowly. Lavu is a small company (compared to other POS system companies) and all employees work out of 1 building in Arizona. This is a major advantage to me. There is not a lot of red tape, they work closely together (if I have a question for someone in another department, my sales rep would literally walk over to them and ask) and things get done... FAST!
Cons
Nothing to do with Lavu - it's just that apple software (i.e. iPad) is more costly than using Android-based systems (i.e. tablets) but the iPad is MUCH more user friendly
Financial Reports. Time cards/Payroll. Theft of employees. Tip tracking. Busy hours of operation. Training testimonials. All of this is helpful to us.
Pros
Customer service is fantastic! The best support out there, we really feel like they listen to us and are responsive when we need something.
Cons
Initial set up of the hardware was a little clunkier than I hoped. Software was way easier and then we were up and running.
PLEASE PLEASE don't waste your money.
We are switching to a different solution.
We wasted too much money and time so please let our error help you out!
DON'T BUY THIS POS - (which has multiple acronyms for this POS)!!
Pros
First system I have used with tablets at table, which I like.
Cons
Where to begin on this list.
First - their support is god awful. And I don't think it's their faults.. These folks aren't trained.
It's IMPOSSIBLE to get someone on the phone. They want you to Chat.. Which takes a ton of time and isn't very user friendly.
The system - Front end is "fine" I'd say... When it's up!
The back end system is plain terrible. Trying to break things down is impossible. Their End of Day report on the back end doesn't add up to give you your total cash deposit!!?? WHAT? I've never heard of such a thing! That's like the basics!
Thank you for the review. We are really sorry to hear that your experience with Lavu has not been positive. Our latest release is a big one and addresses the pain points we've heard from our customers. We are confident that our system will continue to improve dramatically. We hope you'll stick around to see the progress.
Feeling frustrated and unheard
Pros
I like the iPads to send tickets to the cook and track sales
Cons
After two years of using the POS system, they still have not corrected the payroll setting s for OT as per Alaska Law. It has been reported over and over again for 2 years, yet we continue to receive automated msgs that they are working to resolve the issue. If you own a business in Alaska, I can guarantee that you are paying too much in OT . If you are an Alaskan owner relying on a manager to trust your payroll settings you had better check this yourself.
Thank you for your review. We appreciate the feedback and we're sorry to hear that you're experiencing frustration. Your review has been shared with our product team to make sure they are aware of the ongoing issue. We value you as a customer and will do our best to resolve the problem. The Lavu Team.
Pros
-Love the ease of using an iPad
-Size of the icons
-Different color option icons
- Different categories available
-Ease of table organization
-Ease of checkouts
-Very well laid out
-Easy clock-in
Cons
-Hard signing process, customers complained
I absolutely love the point of sale system. Helps to be able to take orders from customers and send the order to the kitchen from the table. Then you can move on to the next table. It is so easy to learn and use. I like that you can go into the backside of the program and check your sales for the day, your amount of hours that you worked for the week and also what your own statistics are for tables waited on, amount of food you sold and what the prices of everything are. It is so Awesome!