Hair Salon Software that gets it

Generic booking systems are designed for dog groomers, personal trainers, and dentists. They don't understand that a client booking highlights needs a skin test beforehand, or that your graduate stylist needs twice as long for a cut and finish as your creative director. When your software doesn't know how a hair salon works, your diary ends up with impossible bookings and expensive gaps.

Luminate includes skin test compliance built into the booking flow. It tracks and flags skin test records so you can see who needs a patch test before they sit in your chair. You can set up staff levels in your diary to reflect different experience tiers across your team.

You can save colour notes to track the shade and mix for every client. Hair colour is one of your biggest expenses, and wasting product directly eats into your profit. Advanced formula tracking and overage billing are coming soon, which will let you charge for the exact amount of colour you use.

Generic booking tools leave gaps in your schedule because they don't understand how hair services overlap. A stylist can't wash hair while they're applying foils, but they can cut another client's hair while a colour is developing. Luminate lets you build development gaps directly into your service timings, so you can book a cut and finish during a colour development window to keep your columns full.

Most software companies charge you more money as you hire more people. They call it per-user pricing, and it sounds reasonable until you're paying £30 a month for each of your stylists. A salon with six staff members paying £30 per user spends £180 a month, and that's £2,160 a year. With Luminate, you pay a flat rate of £69 per month, and that's £828 a year. You'll save £1,332 every year, and you'll never pay extra for adding staff or opening new terminals.

Your monthly subscription of £69 includes every feature in the system. There aren't any paid add-ons, tiered packages, or surprise charges. You get unlimited staff accounts, unlimited tills and terminals, and 300 SMS credits each month. Email and WhatsApp messaging are also included, so you don't have to worry about running out of ways to reach your clients.

• Diary and booking. Manage your day with a drag-and-drop calendar, multi-service bookings, waitlist management, online booking with card deposits, and smart reminders so you don't have empty gaps.
• Till and checkout. Take payments quickly using quick POS checkout across unlimited terminals with digital receipts, cash drawer management, gift vouchers, and deposits and pre-payments directly at the counter.
• Client relationships. Keep detailed customer profiles with customer badges, track habits with visit analytics, and stay in touch using two-way messaging, marketing campaigns, and automated birthday messages so they'll keep coming back.
• Colour notes. Record shades and mixes in client notes to keep your work consistent, with advanced formula tracking and overage billing coming soon.
• Staff management. Organise your team with rostering and leave management while tracking hours with hours tracking. You can set staff levels, use commission automation, set role permissions, and monitor performance with staff performance reporting.
• Admin and compliance. Stay on top of your business with skin test compliance tracking, GDPR tools to protect client data, product inventory management, multi-salon support, and detailed revenue reports.
• Lumen assistant. Get help inside the app from Lumen, the in-app AI assistant that helps you navigate and manage your daily tasks so you don't get stuck.

No-shows and late cancellations are frustrating. When a client doesn't turn up for a three-hour balayage appointment, you've lost that time and money, and you can't recover that lost revenue. Luminate stops this leak with online booking with card deposits. You can set a deposit for each service, choosing either a fixed sum or a percentage of the total price.

Each online payment costs 2.5% + 25p, which covers card processing. There aren't any monthly gateway fees, setup costs, or subscription charges for taking online payments; you're only charged when a payment is taken. For example, taking a £20 online payment costs 75p, and taking a £50 online payment costs £1.50.

If a client starts booking an appointment online but doesn't complete the deposit payment, you don't want your calendar blocked. Luminate holds the slot for 30 minutes, and if the deposit remains unpaid after 30 minutes, the booking cancels itself automatically. This frees up the slot so another client can book the appointment, and you won't spend your day chasing unpaid bookings.

Switching software can feel like a chore, and you don't want to pay for something before you've seen how it works in your salon. That's why Luminate offers a 30-day free trial with no credit card required. You can test the system before you decide to pay, though SMS and WhatsApp stay off until you convert to a paid account.

To help you get started, you'll get a free onboarding call with a real person who can help set up your diary, staff profiles, and services. You'll also have access to step-by-step video tutorials and 137 pages of detailed documentation whenever you want to look something up. If Luminate doesn't make your life easier within your first month, you can walk away with no questions asked and no cancellation fees.