Transact Mobile, online meal ordering becomes temporarily unavailable
A UCLA dining hall is pictured. The Transact Mobile app students use to order takeout meals was unavailable Tuesday morning, with a UCLA spokesperson saying they are hoping service will resume by dinnertime. (Daily Bruin file photo)
By Nury Salazar-Ibanez
March 4, 2025 12:25 p.m.
This post was updated March 4 at 4:56 p.m.
Transact Mobile, the app used by students living in university housing to order meals, became unavailable late Tuesday morning.
A global issue affecting the vendor has caused the app to be unavailable, according to a 10:54 a.m. email from UCLA Housing Services. UCLA is working with the company to restore the service as soon as possible, the email said. The email also stated that students are transitioning to in-person ordering at dining locations.
The app was back online as of 3:57 p.m., according to an email from UCLA Housing.
Daniel Nava, food service worker at Epicuria at Ackerman, said the app’s unavailability meant students were no longer able to order food while in class and pick it up afterward. However, he said the outage did not make a significant difference to staffing operations.
When selecting dining locations on the app, the listing says each location is “closed today,” even though all dining locations are operating at regularly scheduled hours.
“We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience this may cause,” the email from UCLA Housing services said.
Marlen Gonzalez, a third-year psychobiology student, said she was disappointed to hear the app was not working. She added that swiping in off-campus friends was more difficult because she could not plan ahead during the outage.
Gonzalez dined at Rendezvous for lunch and said the location was quite empty. Nava added that he believes the app’s outage might have actually decreased dining wait times.
“The negative thing about the mobile app is that … the students have to wait longer periods to get their orders … because people order faster,” he said.
Nava also said students who did not receive their orders because of the app’s unavailability were offered a swipe refund.
“We actually tried, regardless of the situation, regardless of how busy we are,” he added. “We actually try to do our best and have everybody served on time, on a less waiting time period.”
A UCLA Housing spokesperson said in an emailed statement that the issue is due to a problem with the Transact Mobile app and is not campus-specific.
“We are hoping to have it back online for dinner,” the spokesperson said in the statement. “To help mitigate, we redistributed staff to support in-person ordering.”
