Anybody else having problems? Does anybody know of another company that can service the Firefly POS system?
Please see my other thread. I assure you it is not going to get better. It all started with tech support issues and then the whole security breach. I have heard so many rumors on what Granbury is doing with Firefly. Anyways, I hit the door and switched systems. There are a lot of options out there. I hated to spend the coin, but the nail in the coffin was a printer going down on a Friday night, It was the server, not the printer and I couldn’t get a call back. And in my other store, credit card processing went down around the same time and again I couldn’t get any help. And not to sound like I am whoring out another company as I know a lot of people have strong feelings about them, we switched to Revention and they have been great and it has been a pretty easy transition. But, ultimately there are so many other systems out there, find one that will stand behind their customers that fits your store and will make a deal you can’t refuse. I really liked Point of Success and FoodTec also. And in my opinion, if you are running multiple locations, tech support is almost more important than the system itself. I guess I got 7 years out of Firefly and that is probably all I could expect.
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MrHowie…We have had the same problems you mentioned plus many others. I am getting the feeling that the new owner (Grandbury?) is the source of most of the problems. Little comments here and there and then reading between the lines. Wonder why they bought FireFly if they are almost in the self destruct mode? Tired of being hung out to dry. With respect to the breaches I have heard they are really trying to distance themselves from any liability. Several audit companies have commented that they majority of their breach issues have been with FireFly systems. Well, we live and learn but sometimes the lessons are expensive.
I can’t believe a reputable company like this can treat their paying customers like this.
I woulda dumped them a long time ago.
Typical buyout. I think Firefly had gotten too big and things were getting bad before Granbury. But Granbury can’t even handle the systems they have, let alone another one. I heard different stories from the Security companies I talked to, but ultimately the consensus was that there were around 296 stores breached and 99% of them were Firefly. Firefly wants you to think that it was multiple systems that were affected, it was not. And apparently it isn’t the first time Firefly systems were breached, not proven, but have heard enough for me to infer. I have heard that Granbury is going to dump Firefly. Really sucks, because it could have been a great system.
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The handwriting was on the wall long before Granbury took over – no updates, promised features that never materialized, “included” features that don’t actually work. The tech guys were the best I’ve ever dealt with in regards to them just being knowledgeable, good guys to work with – nice people. But the system was unfinished and it was very evident it wasn’t going to be. My hardware is only three years old and they told me they would not support it anymore – meaning they will not spend time replacing a hard drive as I would just have to buy a new server with a different hard drive setup.
I doubt Granbury bought Firefly to keep it going, but rather to acquire the customer base and technology.
All education is expensive.
Lessons learned.
Go with one of the long term, proven reliable, specialty suppliers. You get what you pay for. We have been with Prism by Microworks now for 12 years. If I were starting over, I would go with them again.
Update. We been talking to various forensic audit companies as well as a security expert with one of the credit card companies. The picture we are getting is that with our systems they are telling us no one should be able to get in unless they have a password. Only one person in our company has a password I told them. “Well, they said, that leaves who”? The only other source of the password in our situation is Firefly. Thoughts come to mind from years past. “There is no such thing as elimination of theft; only acceptable levels.” And there is probably no such thing as a company with employees who are 100% honest. Over the many years I have been in this business I have always innately taken the approach that most, if not all, of my employees have been honest. Many, many years and three companies developed over that time. NEVER have I not had one or more employees who were not straight shooters which includes theft, deliberate injury to the business or just a plain incapability to tell the truth. Why shouldn’t this self-evident truth also apply to POS companies and others as well? It may be time to talk to an attorney. It is not just the expense of changing, it is the expense of a forensic audit, the untold hours to deal with the breaches and damage to customer relationships.
Service is the worst!! quick to charge for the service but are not helpful fixing problems.
Actually they cause more problems then what you originally call them for!
DO NOT BUY THERE SYSTEM IS MY ADVICE
I wish I didnt buy the six that I did
Agreed, lesson learned. It just happened to be a little more expensive than most.
The access point on the firefly systems was through a admin account that you probably didn’t even know about. It was a hidden account that they used for tech support.
I suggest to anyone with a POS that you have a contract with your POS provider that addresses PCI requirement 12.8. Pretty much stating that your service provider is responsible for their access (passwords, logins, etc.) to your system.
Hi, I am the marketing manager at Granbury Restaurant Solutions, and I just would like to invite you to please send me a private message so that we can discuss and resolve any concerns you have. We are committed to the FireFly product & customer base and certainly wish to provide service that you can applaud.
www.granburyrs.com
Just to play the devil’s advocate here, would it not be more effective for you to PM the people with concerns to make arrangements to discuss the matter? I know that is how I would like it handled if I had an issue that I could not get resolved and had to resort to posting them on a public forum.
duessah wrote:
Hi, I am the marketing manager at Granbury Restaurant Solutions, and I just would like to invite you to please send me a private message so that we can discuss and resolve any concerns you have. We are committed to the FireFly product & customer base and certainly wish to provide service that you can applaud.
http://www.granburyrs.com
Surely you jest. I have Firefly systems in multiple locations and the list of issues is to long to recount in a PM or even this post. Ms. Duessah, with all due respect, does this mean you or Granbury have been completely unaware of a long history here of some serious customer issues? Just today I talked with Buccaneer Pizza who is or was on your maintenance plan, you know, the kind where the customer pays monthly and the company promises to prioritize the maintenance plan people to take care of them quickly? He has been trying to get some issues solved for many months. Last week he called again (a regular thing he does to kill time) and Firefly said they would call him back. As usual nothing came of it. They said they were really busy. It has been a few months so when does this customer get some help for the money he has paid?
We get the same treatment when we try to call for help. If we have an emergency that we cannot solve ourselves we are cooked. By the way, we now have dial up for our credit card transactions and all of a sudden we have no breach issues. Multiple locations, is this just a coincidence?
If you or Granbury are completely unaware of these issues and histories then I suspect you would not be the people to seek for resolution because it would then mean that it takes a Think Tank Forum to inform you of what is going on inside your own business.
We loved the Firefly system but the support, customer service, lack of communication and the fact that we cannot rely on anything that Firefly says they will do has destroyed the relationship. Of course, add to that the thousands of dollars in forensic audits we had to pay because of breaches and you have a rather complete package that no operator would wish to experience. We had the same experience that another poster had with regard to security people inferring that the breaches must have come from inside Firefly. Magically, I guess, all issues of breaches have dried up since we switched to dial up.
Well, here is my Firefly HORROR story (I hate to say we have spent over $40k with this company over the last 4 years in multiple stores)…our server blows up friday night, my local tech says gonna need to call Firefly…so I call Firefly tech support…now mind you, in the past, we have always just paid per phone call, because we never use enough tech support to make it worth being under a support contract with them…When they finally call me back, they tell me they cannot help me because I do not have a service contract with them, to which I say, OK how much do i need to pay?..they tell me I CANNOT PAY until monday, meaning I get to go the entire superbowl weekend with NO POS and no credit card processing…Needless to say I will be changing POS providers immediately and If anybody where to ever ask me…I would tell them to run FAR FAR away from this company…Their is NO customer service, and never has been, but this is as bad as I could have ever imagined it…
Thanks for calling Firefly, sorry but you are screwed and we WILL NOT help you…Thanks for that!
Sweet Jesus, i can’t believe this company stays in business. & i bet that if you had a support contract, you would have gotten the run around like everyone else does.
I contacted Firefly before I’d read the horror stories here, thinking about giving them new business. No response. Then, after reading here, and seeing a response from someone with the company, I contacted them again, maybe a month later. A few weeks after that I got a response, to which I then gave them basic information and mentioned that I’m concerned about the poor service being talked about here.
I do realize that it’s usually a few who make the most noise about bad service in any industry, just like our customers who get a bad pie once out of 25 orders.
I never got a reply.
So, sorry Firefly…you were great to work with back in the day, and your product was tremendous. But I’m not going to put my new business in your hands. I can’t afford the risk.
I got an email from Granbury today, I guess I’m on their email list since I asked about Firefly a while back. It sure sounds good. I still haven’t gotten a response to my last inquiry, so I doubt I’ll ask them any more. Maybe I shouldn’t have mentioned the Think Tank and the stories of lousy service???
:lol:
eupher61 go with Prisim. I’ve been with them for over 6 years and have NEVER had a problem.