How much a booking and online ordering system for a restaurant costs

The short answer

There is no single price for every venue. A form that sends a table request to your email is one job. A site with a menu and a cart, a kitchen board, a ticket printer, card payment and a panel your team uses to change the menu is a different one entirely. Both are called "a restaurant system".

So the first question is not the price but what should happen to a request once the customer sends it. Who sees it, where and how fast. The answer sets the scope, and the scope sets the price.

How much a booking system costs: what it depends on

• Bookings only, or orders too A table request is simple: date, time, number of guests and a phone number. An order needs a menu with prices, a cart, an address, a payment method and a confirmation to the customer. That is a different scope.
• Online card payment A connection to a payment provider, testing with real payments and a clear plan for what happens if payment stops working. Without cards, orders are paid on delivery or on site.
• Kitchen board and printing An order can arrive by email. It can also appear on a screen in the kitchen with a sound and come out of a ticket printer. The board and the printing add work and need a trial run in the venue itself.
• The menu: size, photos and languages A short menu and a large one with groups, extras and variants are different jobs. Every language and every photo is prepared and checked separately.
• Who manages the menu If your team changes dishes, prices, opening hours and sold-out items on its own, you need an admin panel. If changes are rare, the developer can make them.
• Delivery rules Zones, delivery fees, opening hours and pausing orders when the kitchen cannot keep up. Every rule has to be built and tested.
• Connections to other systems A POS terminal, till software, accounting software, a spreadsheet or email. Every connection depends on what the other system allows and is tested with real data.

Your own system or a platform

A delivery or booking platform needs no development. But it takes a commission or a fee and holds the relationship with the customer. Your own system is built once, then you pay for hosting and maintenance, and the customer and the data stay with you.

• When a platform is the better choice When orders are few or you are just starting. Then a system of your own will not pay for itself.
• When your own system makes sense When orders and bookings come every day, the commission is already felt and you want customers to come back to you.
• Both at once Your own site does not oblige you to leave the platforms. You can stay on them and point your regular customers to your own site.
• A detailed comparison We look at the differences in more detail in a separate guide.

One-off and ongoing costs

The build is paid once. There may be a one-off cost for equipment as well. Other costs stay for as long as the system runs, and it helps to know them in advance.

• Hosting and maintenance Where the site and the board run from, backups, updates and checks that orders still reach the kitchen. Usually paid monthly.
• The payment provider's fee With card payment, the provider keeps a fee under your own contract with them. It is not part of the price of the build.
• Domain A yearly fee to the registrar. The domain should be registered in your name.
• Messages to customers If the system sends confirmations by text message or email, the providers of those services charge their own fees.
• Equipment A phone or a tablet for the board, and a ticket printer if you need printing. Paid once.

What to ask for in a quote

Before you pay a deposit, ask for this in writing:

• What the system does Bookings, orders, delivery, card payment, a board, printing: what is included and what is not.
• The costs after launch Hosting, maintenance and outside fees, listed separately from the price of the build.
• Whether the developer takes a share of orders Some systems take a fee from every order. Ask in advance and get the answer in writing.
• What happens when something breaks If card payment stops working, how orders continue and who helps you.
• Ownership Whose name the domain and the customer and order data are in, and what you get if you change developers.
• Equipment Which phone, tablet and printer work with the system, before you buy anything.

How we set our price

We do not work from a price list, because two venues rarely have the same scope. We start with a free 20-minute call where you tell us how you take bookings and orders today and where they get lost. After it you receive a written quote with a fixed price for the build and a separate monthly amount for hosting and maintenance. We take no share of your orders.

If you are not sure this kind of system is what you need, the €390 audit maps your processes and shows what to improve first. The fee is credited in full toward the build.

• What we build for restaurants Bookings and online orders, a kitchen board, ticket printing and card payment.