Berlin, May 04, 2022. luca has begun the digitization of the restaurant industry: As of today, guests can pay securely and cashlessly with the luca app on their smartphone in the first test restaurants in Hamburg, Berlin and Rostock as part of an Early Bird phase. The Germany-wide rollout is scheduled for the end of June.

Prior to the launch of the new service, luca completely deleted all user data that had been encrypted and stored in the luca system in connection with contact tracking during the pandemic. This data is now only stored and visible locally on the user’s smartphone, to which luca has no access whatsoever.

Patrick Hennig, CEO and founder of luca, says: “Germany is still lagging behind in digital payment. We want to change that. In just three months, we have developed luca Pay, a new product that makes the customer experience in the hospitality industry more digital and efficient. With luca Pay, guests and service staff save valuable time with every transaction. Other digital services are in development and will follow soon. Our goal is the complete digitization of the customer journey from reservation to ordering to payment, extending beyond Germany.”

With luca Pay, guests can easily and conveniently scan a luca-typical QR code and pay the bill. The new payment function from luca offers operators of restaurants, cafés and hotels, as well as event organizers, transaction fees that are significantly below the market average and therefore below the prices of the large, often American payment service providers. The payment service comes without basic fees or new devices. Similar to mobility apps, luca Pay has a preset for tips. Further services such as table reservations and the connection of common cash register systems are planned for the current year.

Since its inception, luca has been about finding the best solutions to facilitate social life in culture and gastronomy. During the pandemic, luca, as a digital tool for contact tracing, helped to eliminate paperwork almost nationwide in just a few months. Now luca’s focus is clearly on providing efficient tools to support the hospitality and events industry, which has been particularly affected by the economic consequences of the pandemic.