What software does a new restaurant need?

A new restaurant needs software for taking orders and payments (a POS and a card payment provider), for bookings if you take them, for getting orders to the kitchen, for stock and recipe costs, for staff rotas and payroll, for accounting and VAT, and for keeping in touch with guests. You can buy each of these separately or run several on one platform. The bigger decision is how many systems you are prepared to connect and look after.

Not everything has to be live on day one. The POS, card payments and kitchen tickets do, because service depends on them. Payroll needs to be ready before the first pay run, and accounting before your first VAT return if you are VAT registered. Marketing tools can follow once guests start coming back.

What should a restaurant POS system do?

The POS is where orders, tables, tabs and payments meet. At minimum it should handle table and bar service, modifiers and allergy notes, bill splitting, discounts, service charge and end-of-day reports. Check what it runs on, how it behaves when the internet drops, and whether it sends orders to the kitchen without a separate integration. Our guide to EPOS systems for restaurants and bars covers the options in more detail.

Tiquo's Restaurant Mode brings table service, rounds and kitchen controls to supported iPad, iPhone and S700/S710 terminals. On supported devices sharing a local network, an encrypted mesh keeps supported order and tab workflows running during an internet outage and resynchronises when the connection returns. Offline payments remain subject to Stripe Terminal, device and risk eligibility.

How should a new restaurant take card payments?

You need a payment provider, card terminals, and a way to take deposits or prepayments online if you accept bookings. Card pricing is often quoted as a percentage plus a fixed fee per transaction, and the rate depends on card mix and volume, so model it on your expected sales. Ask how quickly payouts reach your bank and how easily each payout can be matched to the day's sales.

Tiquo payments are built on Stripe. Terminal, online and Tap to Pay on iPhone payments stay linked to the order or booking they belong to, and Tap to Pay availability depends on the iPhone model, operating system, country and connected Stripe account. Payout reconciliation matches supported Stripe payouts to their balance transactions and Tiquo orders, showing gross amounts, fees and net values side by side.

Do you need reservation software from day one?

If you plan to take bookings, yes. A paper diary can't take online bookings, deposits or card guarantees, and switching later means moving future bookings from one system to another. Look for booking on your own website, table and floor plan management, a waitlist for full nights and some protection against no-shows. A walk-in-only cafe can usually leave this until later.

Compare the cost models as well as the features. Some reservation platforms charge per cover for certain bookings, while others charge a flat subscription. In Tiquo, bookings sit on the same platform as the POS, with live floor plans, waitlists that offer freed-up capacity to waiting guests, and card guarantees in Simple Mode booking flows, where the agreed no-show fee is charged only when staff confirm a no-show.

How do orders get from the POS to the kitchen?

Orders reach the kitchen as printed tickets or on a kitchen display system (KDS). Printers are cheap and familiar. Screens make it easier to time courses, see how long tickets have waited and bring each station's work together at the pass. Either way, check the routing: drinks to the bar, starters and mains to the right sections.

Tiquo supports both. Products are routed to KDS locations, such as the bar or a kitchen section, and each location can use a digital kitchen display or a supported ticket printer. Cloud printing sends tickets and receipts to registered printers anywhere in the venue, with default routing by setup, sublocation and order type.

Do you need stock and recipe software?

Stock software records what you buy, what each dish uses and what you throw away, which is how you find your real gross margin. Recipe costing matters most when the menu changes often. Recording waste from the first week gives you a baseline before habits set in; our guide on how to track food waste in a restaurant kitchen sets out a simple method. Tiquo's inventory covers low-stock alerts, sell-by and expiry dates, recipes and variant-level stock, with a wastage workflow that deducts tracked stock.

What about rotas, payroll and accounting?

These are usually specialist tools. HMRC says that if you run payroll yourself, you need payroll software that reports PAYE information online, unless you are exempt. If you are VAT registered, Making Tax Digital for VAT requires you to keep VAT records digitally in compatible software. The practical aim is to connect the POS to your accounting and rota tools, so sales and hours aren't typed in twice.

Tiquo doesn't include payroll or rotas, and accounting isn't one of the modules on its pricing page. For the accounts, Tiquo's help centre documents integrations with Xero and QuickBooks Online that can create invoices from eligible Tiquo orders and record payments and refunds against them. For now, integrations are connected and managed by Tiquo's team on your behalf. Rotas and payroll need separate tools.

Do you need marketing software at opening?

A guest database is worth starting early, because every booking and order adds to it. Marketing emails to individuals fall under UK GDPR and PECR, so record each guest's marketing choice, and how it was given, from the first booking; our guide to UK GDPR and PECR rules for hospitality email marketing explains when consent is needed. Tiquo keeps bookings, orders and payments on one customer profile and can trigger marketing automations from activity such as a completed booking or a period of inactivity.

Which restaurant software is essential, and what does Tiquo cover?

Should a new restaurant buy one platform or several tools?

Separate tools let you choose the product you like best in each category. Each connection then needs maintaining, and guest and sales records end up split between systems. One platform means fewer logins and one customer record, at the cost of depending more on a single supplier. Whichever you choose, check contract length, what you can export if you leave, and who supports each integration when something breaks.

Tiquo puts POS and orders, products and inventory, bookings, payments, CRM, memberships, forms and reporting on one platform, priced per product or service sublocation, and its Launch and Scale plans are month-to-month. Current prices are on the pricing page.