This post was updated Jan. 28 at 11:02 p.m.

UCLA Housing’s Transact Mobile app – which students on the Hill use to order meals – was unavailable Monday morning and came back online around 2:38 p.m.

The pause in mobile orders was due to a global issue affecting the vendor, according to a 10:48 a.m. email UCLA Housing sent to students living on the Hill. Customer support representatives for Transact, the company that runs the mobile ordering software, said they did not have any information regarding the issue or contact details for the team’s head office, communications or marketing teams.

“The issue is not specific to UCLA, and we are actively working with the company to understand when the service will be restored,” the UCLA Housing email said.

All meal ordering for Bruin Café, Rendezvous, Epicuria at Ackerman and The Study at Hedrick was done in person at their locations during the app shutdown. The mobile ordering app was first introduced in September 2023, and a UCLA Dining spokesperson said at the time that it was designed to increase efficiency. 

“Mobile ordering is unavailable, please visit location,” is written under the names of dining halls on the app. When a user clicks on a specific cafe to order, the app says it is “Closed Today.”

UCLA Housing apologized for the inconvenience in the email and said it appreciates students’ patience as it works to resolve the issue.

“We will update you again when it is back online,” it said.

Hannah Toch, a first-year world arts and cultures student, said her pizza order from Epicuria at Ackerman was canceled and refunded around 11:30 a.m. after the app went down while she was in class. 

“I was really sad about my pizza because I was really excited about it,” she said. 

Toch said she decided to dine in at Epicuria at Ackerman, but the line was longer than usual because of the app shutdown and she got takeout instead, which she said was faster than it usually is with the app. However, she said that if mobile ordering remained unavailable at the four restaurants, she would reconsider visiting them.

“You’re not sure when it (your food) is going to come,” she said. “You don’t know what the line is going to be like, so it just might not be worth it to go all the way there and figure it out.”

Hanadi Kamal, a second-year microbiology, immunology and molecular genetics student, said she faced a similar situation, and her order was canceled and refunded around 11:30 a.m. while she was in class. 

“I was honestly frustrated because I only had that small gap to go pick up my food,” she said. “I was like, ‘Oh, I guess I’m just not going to eat until 2 o’clock.’”

Rita Kamal, a third-year microbiology, immunology and molecular genetics student, said the line for dining in for Epicuria at Ackerman at 1 p.m. was long and not moving, but a worker told her they opened a takeout line, and she was able to get her food in five to 10 minutes. She said she was grateful for the dining hall staff’s efficiency in resolving the issue and making a new line. 

“It’s good that people don’t have to wait longer, because people who do takeout usually want their food faster,” she said. “It’s good that they were really quick and responsive with fixing the issue.”

Michael Fehlberg, a food service manager at Epicuria at Ackerman, said the halt of mobile orders made business slower at the cafe. He said dine-in operations were similar to usual, and canceled orders would not lead to food waste. 

“Most of our orders were scheduled for later in the day, so they just got canceled from our IT side,” he said. “We make everything fresh.”

At 1:45 p.m., Fehlberg said he had not heard from UCLA Housing regarding the mobile ordering issue since the first statement at 10:48 a.m.

The mobile ordering app came back online around 2:30 p.m., according to a 2:38 p.m. emailed statement from UCLA Housing.

“Thank you for your patience while we worked with the vendor to resolve the issue,” the statement read.

Contributing reports from Dylan Winward, News editor.