Contactless Ordering Options for Restaurants

With the effects of COVID-19 still being felt worldwide, the restaurant industry continues to deal with capacity restrictions, labor shortages, and safety issues. When it comes to handling customer concerns regarding sanitation and safety in particular, restaurants have adopted a couple of different solutions.

Some have begun using disposable menus while many others have transitioned to QR-based menus and ordering systems. These contactless solutions vary in complexity and range from simple PDF menus to web-apps with in-depth features that allow users to place orders and pay directly from their phones.

4 Benefits of Using QR Menus and Contactless Ordering

Besides safety, contactless ordering systems provide other benefits:

1. Easily Modifiable Menus
Many solutions provide the ability to quickly add-to, remove-from, and update digital menu items, thereby providing restaurants a level of flexibility that can’t be had with physical menus.

2. Increased Table Turnover
Digital menus that allow users to place orders and make payments from their own phones make it so that customers don’t need to spend as much time waiting for a server. Additionally, some restaurants discovered that each of their servers was able to handle 30% more tables when customers were placing their own orders.

3. Reduced Costs
Printing disposable menus everyday adds up. QR menus let you avoid this cost.

4. More Customer Insight
Many digital menus collect data on which items are ordered and in what quantities, letting restaurant owners and managers monitor the popularity of each menu item.

3 Popular POS Systems That Have Added a Contactless Ordering Feature

In the wake of COVID-19, many POS system providers have begun adding contactless ordering functionality to their product offering either as a feature or as an add-on. Here are a few examples:

1. Square
A popular POS system for new businesses, Square for Restaurants provides all the basic features that one would need from such a system. Square recently added a feature called “self-serve ordering”, which lets you generate QR code stations that can be printed out and placed at tables, seats, or sections in your restaurant. When a customer scans the code they are brought to an ordering page. Orders placed through this self-serve feature show up as Delivery orders associated with a particular QR code. If a customer wishes to place an order for a follow-up item, they will need to re-scan the QR code.

Pricing: Square offers their self-serve ordering feature at no additional charge if you are already using their POS system.

2. Toast
A more premium POS system, Toast offers an abundance of features and was built specifically for restaurants from the start. Toast’s contactless ordering module is called “Order & Pay” and is an add-on to its existing POS product. Similar to Square’s implementation, Order & Pay lets restaurants print out QR codes that can be scanned by customers who can then place orders and pay from their own mobile devices.

Pricing: Toast charges $69/month + 0.5% per transaction for the “Order & Pay” module, which is an add-on to Toast’s standard monthly subscription plans.

3. Upserve
Another POS system made exclusively for restaurants, one of Upserve’s differentiating factors is that its software also includes many restaurant management features, such as a built-in CRM system, workforce scheduler, menu manager, and even a marketing ROI analyzer. Upserve recently added a QR-based contactless ordering feature that works similarly to Square’s implementation.

Pricing: Upserve includes its contactless ordering feature as part of its “Upserve Online Ordering” add-on, which comes at an additional cost of $99/month to its core monthly subscription but is currently being included for free with its ‘pro’ and ‘pro plus’ monthly subscriptions.

3 Standalone Contactless Ordering Systems

These solutions are built from the ground-up to facilitate mobile-ordering and exist independently from POS software, though many on this list do support POS integration to some extent:

1. Orderspot
Orderspot’s mobile ordering system lets customers scan QR codes and place orders from their phones in much the same way as the other solutions on this list. It supports takeout and delivery and also comes with marketing insights features that give you the ability to build customer profiles and track preferences. Additionally, Orderspot’s solution lets you quickly update your digital menu and program happy hours, specials, and events.

Pricing: Initial setup fee is $189 per location. Afterwards, Orderspot charges a flat monthly subscription of $49/month as well as an online ordering fee. Printers can also be purchased for an additional cost of $200/printer.

2. MyMenu
MyMenu provides a QR Ordering solution that integrates with any POS system and has built-in credit card processing. Although they offer basic QR menus for free, their solution will also allow guests to place orders and make payments directly from their phones if one signs up for one of the several monthly subscription packages they offer. Something MyMenu also provides that most of the competition does not is a large library of tutorial videos on how to use their product.

Pricing: The cheapest package that comes with the self-ordering feature is $39/month, and limits you to having 15 QR codes. The next package up is $55/month allows you up to 30 QR codes. There are 3 additional packages that allow you to support even more QR codes for an increasing monthly price.

3. Zuppler
Zuppler has been offering a variety of different online ordering solutions to restaurants, hotels, sports stadiums, and more since 2009. The company has recently introduced a product called “On Premise Ordering” that lets customers scan QR codes and place orders from their phones. The product supports integration with a variety of existing POS systems. Zuppler also accepts requests for custom POS integrations.

Zuppler’s digital menu has been designed to be very personalized and interactive. It dynamically encourages customers to add related items to their order and provides real-time offers to join loyalty programs. Those who decide to sign up will be able to to see their entire order history and favorite items among other things. In addition, when placing an order, guests are given estimates for when the food will be ready.

Pricing: The standard Zuppler package is $129/month with credit card processing fees being 2.75%, plus $.25 per transaction. However, due to COVID-19, they are also offering a flex plan that starts at $49/month + $1 per order.