Online ordering that runs through your POS instead of around it
The tablet farm on the pass is a symptom. Ordering that lands in your own ticket flow removes the transcription step and the commission at once.
Online ordering built into the POS sends a web order to the same printer or kitchen display as a dine in ticket, with no extra tablet on the pass and no commission taken per order. Both platforms we carry publish it as included. You still pay card processing on those orders, and delivery is a separate decision from ordering. Owning the ordering channel is mostly about owning the customer data.
“We are not mosquitoes. You will not be swatting us away. But we are not disappearing after the install either.”
Should we take orders on our own site or on the delivery apps?
Both, and in that order. Your own ordering page should be the cheapest and best path for a guest who already knows your name, because that order carries no marketplace commission and the customer record belongs to you. The marketplaces are a discovery channel you pay for, and they are worth paying for when they bring you somebody who had never heard of you.
The mistake is treating the marketplaces as your ordering system. When they are your only channel, you do not own the customer list, you cannot email your regulars, and your margin on your most loyal guests is the same as your margin on a stranger. Shift4 makes the same argument in blunter terms, describing its online ordering as commission free and framing it as keeping orders in house rather than paying third party platform fees.
What do the two systems include?
Clover lists a Clover online menu page, no fee online ordering, pickup and delivery order types and remote order firing as included on every published restaurant package, full service and quick service, at Starter, Standard and Advanced alike. It also lists third party menu integrations as included at every tier.
Shift4 lists online ordering among the features included with Shift4 Dine, describes it as commission free, and states that it integrates directly into the POS so orders reach the kitchen without additional devices. It also publishes order throttling, so the kitchen is not handed twenty web tickets at the same moment as a full dining room, and a Marketplace that connects DoorDash, Uber Eats and Postmates back into the same order flow.
Both also publish QR code ordering and payment. On Clover it appears as contactless dining, QR code order and pay, included at every published tier. On Shift4 Dine it appears on the pricing page as a free QR code solution. For a patio, a taproom or a high top area, a QR menu with pay at table removes the two longest waits in the meal.
What does commission free actually mean?
It means no percentage of the order goes to a marketplace. It does not mean the order is free to process. Every card taken online is a card not present or a stored card transaction, and it carries a processing cost like any other sale. On Clover the published keyed rate is 3.5 percent plus 10 cents, and a phone order typed into a terminal is billed at that higher rate rather than the 2.3 percent plus 10 cents card present rate.
That gap is worth a moment of thought, because it is the clearest argument for a real online ordering page. A guest entering their own card on your ordering page is not the same transaction type as a staff member keying a card number off a phone call, and the difference shows up on your statement every month.
Commission free also does not mean delivery free. If a driver has to move the food, somebody pays for that driver: you, the guest through a delivery fee, or a marketplace taking a cut. Decide which, in advance, and put it on the menu.
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How do online orders reach the kitchen?
The right answer is that they print or display exactly like a dine in ticket, in the same format, on the same device, routed to the same prep station. Shift4 states its online orders route directly into the POS and the kitchen with no additional devices required. Clover lists remote order firing as included at every published restaurant tier.
The wrong answer is the tablet farm. Four screens on the pass, four different ticket layouts, four different chimes, and one member of staff whose actual job is retyping orders into the POS. Every transcription is a chance to get a modifier wrong, and every wrong modifier is a remake.
Ask any vendor to show you a web order printing on the kitchen printer during the demo. Not a slide about it. The actual ticket, with a modifier and a special instruction on it, so you can see how it renders for a cook at eight on a Saturday.
What actually breaks online ordering?
Menu drift. The dine in menu changes and the online menu does not, so guests order things you stopped making in March. This is why we build the online menu from the same item records as the POS menu and show you how to change both at once.
Hours and holidays. An ordering page that accepts orders while the kitchen is closed generates refunds and one star reviews at the same time. Set the hours, then set the holiday exceptions, then check them before every long weekend.
Prep times and throttling. If your page promises fifteen minutes at seven on a Friday, you have promised something the kitchen cannot deliver. Shift4 publishes order throttling for exactly this, and it is worth configuring on day one rather than after the first bad Saturday.
Items you have 86ed. If marking an item sold out on the POS does not remove it from the ordering page, you will sell it anyway. Test this specific behaviour during the demo, because it is the single most common complaint operators have about bundled ordering.
Ordering through your POS versus the marketplaces
Not a choice between good and evil. A choice about which orders you pay a commission on and which customer records you own.
What works
- No per order commission on your own ordering page, on either platform we carry.
- The customer record, the email address and the order history stay yours.
- Orders arrive in the same ticket format as dine in, so the kitchen learns one workflow instead of four.
- Both platforms publish QR code order and pay, which covers patios and large parties without extra hardware.
- Shift4 publishes order throttling, so the kitchen has a valve during a rush.
- Marketplace orders can be pulled back into the same order flow rather than living on a separate tablet.
What does not
- Commission free is not fee free. Card processing still applies to every online sale, and card not present pricing is usually higher than card present.
- Your own ordering page has no audience on day one. The marketplaces are a discovery channel and replacing them entirely takes months of pointing guests at your link.
- A POS bundled ordering page will not out design a dedicated ordering platform. It is competent, not remarkable, and if your brand lives or dies on the ordering experience you should look at it critically before you commit.
- Delivery is still a separate problem. Bundled ordering does not put a driver in your car park.
- Every included tool needs configuring. Hours, prep times, throttling, tax by category and 86ing behaviour are all setup work, and skipping them is how included ordering gets a bad name.
- If you drop the marketplaces entirely you lose the discovery traffic with them. Most restaurants should run both channels and price them differently.
Questions restaurant owners ask
Does online ordering cost extra on these systems?
Clover lists no fee online ordering and an online menu page as included on every published restaurant package. Shift4 lists online ordering among the features included with Shift4 Dine and describes it as commission free. Neither removes card processing costs on the resulting sale, and that is the cost worth modelling before you switch channels.
Can I stop using DoorDash entirely?
You can, but do it gradually. The apps are a discovery channel, and turning them off on day one removes orders from people who have not yet learned your ordering link exists. A better sequence is to launch your own page, promote it hard on receipts, packaging and your Google listing, then reassess the marketplace mix after a few months.
Will online orders print in my kitchen automatically?
They should. Shift4 states online orders route directly into the POS and kitchen with no additional devices required, and Clover lists remote order firing as included at every published restaurant tier. Insist on seeing a real web order print on a real kitchen printer during the demo, complete with a modifier and a special instruction.
What is QR code order and pay, and is it worth it?
A code at the table opens your menu, the guest orders and pays from their phone, and the ticket fires to the kitchen. Both platforms publish it as included. It earns its keep on patios, in taprooms and with large parties, where the wait to catch a server is the longest part of the visit.
How do I keep the online menu matching the real menu?
Build both from the same item records rather than maintaining a separate online list. That way a price change, a new item or an 86 flows to both. Ask specifically how marking an item sold out behaves on the ordering page, because that one behaviour causes more refunds than anything else in online ordering.
Vendor pricing and tax rates change without notice. Confirm current figures with the vendor, the city or your accountant before you rely on them. Not tax, legal or accounting advice.
Every number on this page traces to a primary source
- Clover lists an online menu page, no fee online ordering, pickup and delivery order types, remote order firing and third party menu integrations as included at every published restaurant package tier.clover.com / restaurant
- Clover lists contactless dining, QR code order and pay, as included at every published restaurant package tier, and publishes a keyed rate of 3.5 percent plus 10 cents versus 2.3 percent plus 10 cents card present.clover.com / restaurant
- Shift4 Dine online ordering is commission free, integrates directly into the POS with no additional devices, includes order throttling, and connects to DoorDash, Uber Eats and Postmates through Marketplace.dine.shift4.com / online ordering
- Shift4 Dine pricing page lists a free QR code solution among included features.dine.shift4.com / pricing