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Launching Lightspeed Restaurant checklist

Getting started guide

In this article, ensure you've set up every feature that's relevant to your business needs and trained your staff. Go live with Lightspeed to transition out of setup mode and start processing orders for actual customers. Navigate to other articles in the guide using the carousel below.

Welcome to the final stage in your Lightspeed setup journey: going live!

The goal of this guide is to make the launch process as seamless as possible. Review the checklists below to make sure you've set up all features relevant to your specific business needs and for staff training resources. When you're ready, log in to the Back Office to transition your account from setup to live mode before using Lightspeed to take actual orders.

Setup checklist

This section provides a checklist of setup tasks that goes beyond the Getting started guide itself. Review this checklist to ensure that you set up all features relevant to your specific business needs before launching Lightspeed Restaurant.

Getting started guide

Menus and items

  • Set up combos for groups of items that are sold together, like a value meal.
  • Attach modifiers to items to communicate cooking instructions and sub-items to the kitchen.
  • Assign barcodes to items so they can be scanned with a connected barcode scanner.
  • Add additional languages to the names and descriptions of your items.

Payment processing

Hardware

Settings

  • Set up preset discounts that employees can apply to orders or individual items at the POS.
  • Create order profiles to automatically apply specific order settings at a particular time (like Happy Hour, for example).
  • Customize printing templates to change what prints on receipts and invoices by default.
  • Edit POS device settings to control how individual devices operate; for example, to change which printer or payment terminal is used.
  • Adjust your reporting shifts if you want to track sales by meal (breakfast, lunch, dinner).
  • Learn how to add and process payments in other currencies.

Add-ons and integrations

Miscellaneous

Training checklist

Next, here's a checklist of tasks that serves as a guide for training your employees. Make sure your staff is well-versed in the day-to-day tasks they'll need to know to use the Lightspeed Restaurant POS.

Transactions performed at the POS before you go live will be deleted from your account after going live. If you're training staff after you've done so, make sure to set up a training user so they can process test transactions without affecting actual sales.

Starting your day

Placing orders

  • Learn how to use the Register screen, where you navigate the menu, search for items, and manage individual orders.
  • Place a basic table service order, including adding items by course or seat, firing courses, sending orders to the kitchen, and more.
  • Place a basic direct sale order, where you process the entire order at the POS without saving it to a table.
  • Open a bar tab to pre-authorize a customer’s credit or debit card before they start ordering.
  • Visit the Order management screen to view all open orders, including dine-in, pickup and delivery, and bar tabs.

Managing items

Managing tables

Other order actions

  • Add discounts, change the number of covers, and perform other order editing actions.
  • Sell, activate, redeem, and check the balance of gift cards.
  • View, manage, and enter online orders manually.
  • Create and process a customer invoice.
  • Visit the Settings menu to manage printing and connected hardware, view POS reports, see order payments, reload the device configuration, and more.

Payments and receipt

Ending your day

Going live with Lightspeed Restaurant

After you're completely set up and your staff has been trained, the next step is to transition from setup mode to production mode in the Back Office. After "going live," all future transactions will be counted as real ones and will directly impact your reporting.

Transactions performed at the POS during setup mode will be deleted from your account after going live. After transitioning to production mode, you cannot delete transactions.

  1. Open the Lightspeed Restaurant POS (K) app on all of your location's devices, including iPads, iPhones, display systems, etc.
  2. Log in to the Back Office with your Lightspeed credentials.
  3. Click your name or profile icon in the upper-right corner, and select Go live.
  4. If prompted, verify your business information, agree to its accuracy, and click Submit to continue.
    The 'Business location information' page with sample business info filled in
  5. Review the information on the page about going live.

    After going live and transitioning to production mode, you won't be able to delete transactions. Going live will set the subscription start date in your contract to the current date. You will receive a subscription fee invoice after going live.

    Disclaimer page explaining what happens when you go live and the effect on your Lightspeed subscription
  6. Click Go Live | Activate Subscription to transition your account from setup mode to production mode.
  7. Review the confirmation that you're live, then click the button to continue to the Back Office.
    Confirmation page explaining the account is now live, including a 'Click here to continue' button
  8. After your billing invoice is generated, select Actions > Pay Invoice to pay it. To enable auto billing and rolling payments, select Pay Invoices.
  9. Close and reopen the Restaurant POS app on each POS device to reload the configuration.

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