What is an EPOS system? A guide for UK restaurants and bars

An EPOS system (electronic point of sale) is the software and hardware a restaurant or bar uses to take orders, send them to the kitchen or bar, take payment and record each sale. In the UK the terms EPOS and POS are used interchangeably. A modern EPOS system runs on tablets, phones or payment terminals connected to a cloud back office, where you manage menus, prices, staff permissions and reports.

For a restaurant or bar, the EPOS sits in the middle of service. Front-of-house staff open tables and tabs on it, the kitchen receives tickets from it and the finance team reconciles card payments against it. Choosing one comes down to how well it handles those connections on a busy night, and what it costs to run.

What does an EPOS system do in a restaurant or bar?

Most restaurant EPOS systems cover the same core jobs. The differences show up in how quickly staff can do them during service:

• Taking orders at a till, on a handheld device or from a guest's phone, with modifiers, kitchen notes and allergy information
• Holding open tables and bar tabs until the bill is settled, including moving and splitting them
• Sending items to kitchen printers or kitchen display screens, often course by course
• Taking payment by card, phone wallet or cash, or a split across several methods
• Recording each sale with its VAT, discounts, service charge and any refund for reporting
• Deducting stock as items sell and recording wastage

Traditional systems ran on fixed tills, often with a server in the back office. A cloud EPOS keeps the data online, so a manager can change a price or check takings from home and every device picks up the change. The trade-off is a dependence on the internet, which makes offline behaviour one of the first things to test.

What is the difference between EPOS, POS and a card machine?

The E in EPOS stands for electronic. A card machine only takes the payment. If it is standalone, staff key the amount from the till into the machine by hand. That invites keying errors, and at the end of the day someone has to match two sets of figures that know nothing about each other.

An integrated EPOS sends the amount to the terminal and records the result against the order, so the payment, the receipt and the sale share one record. Some venues now take part of their payments on a phone with Tap to Pay on iPhone, which removes the separate terminal for those payments.

What hardware does a restaurant EPOS system need?

The kit depends on how you serve. A café counter might run on one iPad, a card reader and a receipt printer. A 120-cover restaurant with a terrace needs handheld devices for table service, a till at the bar, card terminals that staff can carry, and kitchen printers or screens for each section. A typical setup draws on this list:

• Tablets on stands or docks at the bar and the pass
• Handheld devices or phones for taking orders at the table
• Card terminals, either countertop or handheld
• Receipt printers and kitchen printers, or kitchen display screens
• Cash drawers, if you take cash
• QR or barcode scanners for tickets, vouchers or membership cards

Check which devices the software supports before buying anything, and whether it can use hardware you already own. Tiquo's POS runs on supported iPhone and iPad devices and on S700 and S710 payment terminals, and Tiquo supports the T600 as a customer-facing display at the counter. Its hardware range also covers QR scanners, receipt printers, tablet docks and cash drawers.

Which EPOS features matter most for restaurants and bars?

Feature lists look alike, so test the parts of service that cause trouble. Bills are the usual one: a table of eight who want to split by item, a party that starts at the bar and moves to a table, a tab that another member of staff needs to take over. Ask the vendor to show those on the device your staff will use.

Kitchen communication comes next. Look at how items reach each section, whether courses can be held and fired, and whether you want screens or printers in the kitchen.

Then payments and reporting. If card payments run through the EPOS, each payment should be tied to its order, refunds should follow the original sale, and the figures in your sales report should match what arrives in the bank once fees are taken into account. Staff permissions matter too: who can give a discount, void an item or issue a refund, and whether a manager can approve those on the spot.

How does Tiquo work as an EPOS for restaurants and bars?

Tiquo's Restaurant Mode runs on supported iPad, iPhone and S700 and S710 payment terminals. Staff work with tables and open tabs, assign items to seats, send rounds to the kitchen and take payment from the device they are holding. Each service area can be set up as a restaurant, which starts from the POS home, or as a bar, which opens a fresh order with the same table-service tools.

Kitchen messages stay with each round, whether staff pick a preset or type a specific request, and Tiquo can route kitchen tickets to registered printers or kitchen display screens. From the live floor plan, staff can seat a walk-in, open an order for a table, move a tab or settle a booking's unpaid orders, and numbered seats let them assign items to individual guests. Guests can also order from a QR code at the table or for collection, and those orders land in the same POS.

Payments run through Tiquo Payments on Stripe and stay linked to the order. Tiquo's mesh network lets supported devices on the same local network keep sharing order and tab state during an internet outage and resynchronise when the connection returns, although offline card payments remain subject to Stripe Terminal, device and risk eligibility. Roles and permissions can limit access by entity, location or team, and a service area can require administrator approval before wastage is finalised.

What should you check before choosing an EPOS system?

• Run a trial of your busiest scenario with the staff who will use it. A prepared demo rarely includes a table of eight splitting the bill.
• Find out who processes card payments, what the published rates are for premium, business and international cards, and whether you can use another provider.
• Ask what keeps working without the internet and what happens to card payments during an outage.
• List the hardware you must buy from the vendor and what you can reuse.
• Check how sales, refunds and fees reach your accounting software.
• Read the contract length, notice period and any price review terms.