Reach can matter more than commission
Restaurant owners often compare delivery apps by commission first. That is understandable: commission appears in every statement. But it is charged on an order, and that order needs to arrive first.
App use differs between cities and even neighbourhoods. Customers may favour one app in your area and another a few streets away. Low commission will not bring orders if a platform has no local couriers. A platform with higher commission and many active customers within your delivery area may bring more business.
Your first question should be how many people nearby order through the app.
Check local reach before signing
You can make useful checks in an afternoon without a market report:
- Open each app as a customer, using your venue's address and nearby addresses you could realistically deliver to.
- Look at restaurants serving similar food and their estimated delivery times.
- Repeat at lunch, in the afternoon and in the evening. Monday afternoon may look very different from Friday evening.
- Ask your team and regular guests which apps they use. This is not a statistical sample, but it gives local context.
Few competitors and long delivery times may indicate an opportunity, or a shortage of couriers. One check cannot settle the question. Several checks at different times tell you more.
Payments and cash flow
Apps differ in payment frequency and how refunds and complaints are settled. With a thin margin, payment timing may matter as much as the commission rate: you buy ingredients today and receive order payments later.
Before joining another platform, ask:
- How often are payments made, and how long after orders?
- Which amounts are deducted: commission, promotion fees or customer refunds?
- Is the statement easy to understand?
- Who pays for an order reported as incomplete?
Several apps mean several statements, payment schedules and deduction rules. Checking them can take your accounts team considerable time every month.
When you cook our brands, we settle monthly. You receive a VAT invoice for our commission, and the rest goes directly to your account. You do not have to monitor each app's settlement separately.
Complaints, refunds and reviews
Each platform has its own complaint process. A customer reports missing sauce or cold fries in the app, and the platform decides whether to refund them and how much. Compare the time allowed to respond, whether you can explain your side, and the effect on your payment.
Reviews matter too. A customer choosing between restaurants looks at stars and recent comments. Several poor reviews can discourage new customers long after a one-off problem. Replying to reviews and monitoring complaints is ongoing work.
Ask who handles an unhappy customer and how quickly, as well as the rate. With us, Rebel Tang handles customer service and complaints. You keep cooking.
Promotions and visibility
Apps offer discounts, free delivery and highlighted listings. These offers have similar aims, but their details differ. Understand them before accepting.
For each promotion, ask:
- Who funds the discount: restaurant, platform or both?
- Is the cost deducted from payment or invoiced separately?
- How long does it run, and can you stop it at any time?
A promotion that doubles orders but uses up the margin is not a success. Add discount costs to each dish calculation, just like ingredients and packaging. With our brands, we cover marketing costs, so this expense does not fall on your kitchen.
What happens at the collection counter
Each platform often means another device, notification sound and method of confirming orders. One is easy enough. With several apps, your team's attention can become the bigger cost.
At peak time, the person packing bags answers tablets instead. An overlooked order or late acceptance can end in cancellation, a lost customer and a worse impression in the app. Couriers from different services wait at the same counter and ask about their bags.
Our article Five tablets on the counter explains what changes when every order reaches one screen.
Profiles, photos and menus
Each app has its own dashboard, photo requirements and dish descriptions. Changing a price or switching off a sold-out item becomes a separate task in every dashboard. Missing one lets a customer order unavailable food and creates a complaint.
Compare the work of maintaining a profile as well as the cost of selling:
- current menu and item availability,
- opening hours and breaks,
- promotions and their settlement,
- replies to reviews and comments.
Someone in your venue must find this time, usually at the expense of another task. In Rebel APP, switching off a sold-out item once removes it from every app. We prepare profiles, photos and descriptions.
One platform or several
There is no answer for every venue. One app is simpler to manage, but misses customers using others. Several apps expand reach but mean multiple dashboards, devices and settlements without a shared system.
An extra platform makes sense when it brings orders you would not receive elsewhere and its administration leaves enough time for cooking. See calculating virtual restaurant earnings to work out what each order leaves.
In our models, brands appear on Glovo, Uber Eats, Wolt, Bolt Food, SocialFood and Pyszne.pl, with orders arriving on one device. If you want delivery for your own brand without managing multiple dashboards, see brand management. To use spare capacity, see the kitchen model.
Where to start
Answer three questions before choosing platforms:
- When does your kitchen have spare capacity?
- How many extra orders can the collection counter handle without slowing dining-room service?
- Who will manage the apps each day?
If the third answer is nobody, consider handing this work to a team that does it every day.
Discuss it with us during a free consultation. Leave your phone number in the form; we call back within 24 hours on working days. We ask about equipment, menu and hours. If delivery does not make sense for your venue, we will tell you.
