Take payments online

Guests at a table can pay their bill from their phone instead of waiting for your staff. The money goes straight to your company's own account at Stripe: Table QR never holds it, and your payouts, refunds and disputes stay in your Stripe Dashboard.

Before you start

• Online payments are in your plan. On Pro and Ultimate.
• Your company is registered in a country where Stripe opens accounts for Table QR, and your venues sell in a currency Stripe charges. Settings›Payments says, for each venue, whether Stripe works there.
• Ordering is on — see Turn on guest ordering.

Set it up step by step

1. Connect your Stripe account

   Open Settings›Payments and choose to connect a Stripe account. Enter the Business name and the Country of the business — the country can't be changed later. The dialog also states what Table QR keeps of each payment and that Stripe charges its own processing fee (see Fees and refunds); continue once you agree. Stripe opens its own form: give it your company's details and the bank account for payouts, then come back. Table QR never sees those details.

2. Wait until the account is active

   The account shows its status. It reads Active once Stripe has checked your details, usually within minutes. If it reads Action needed, Stripe needs more information: select Update details to open its form again. Check status asks Stripe right away instead of waiting.

3. Switch Stripe on for your venues

   On the same page, switch on Use at every venue by default and choose the Default account. Every venue where Stripe works follows this, unless its own settings say otherwise. Where guests can pay online shows where each venue stands.

4. Let guests pay online

   Open Settings›Ordering. Under How guests pay, where the fee per payment is stated again, tick one or both online ways, and save:

   • Pay online before the order is sent: the guest pays when ordering, and the kitchen sees the order only once the payment went through. It works at the table and at the counter.
   • Pay online later, from the check: the order goes to the kitchen at once, and the guest pays their bill from their phone when they're ready. It works at the table.

   Keep paying at the venue on, so guests who prefer cash or your card terminal still can.

When it worked, a location's Ordering tab shows its payment account as done in the readiness checklist, and guests see Pay online on their bill.

A venue with its own account

A franchise or a group with several companies connects one Stripe account per company. On a location's Ordering tab, the Online payments card chooses for that venue alone: Like the organization, On or Off, and which Account it pays into. Stripe can't be switched on at a venue in a country or currency it doesn't serve.

What guests see

• At checkout, a guest chooses how to pay among the ways you offer: Pay online now, Pay online later (at a table) or paying your staff.
• Paying now, the guest pays on their order's page under Pay to send your order. Your staff see the order only once it is paid, marked paid; an order left unpaid for 30 minutes is cancelled, and the guest can cancel it before paying.
• Paying later, the order goes to the kitchen at once; your staff see how the guest means to pay.
• On their bill, Pay online pays exactly the total shown — their own orders, the tip they chose, and the bills of guests they pay for. While a change to a shared bill or the tip is on its way, the button waits for the new total.
• Guests pay in Stripe's form by card, Apple Pay or Google Pay — no other way of paying is offered online, and the guest never leaves the menu to pay.
• Once Stripe confirms the payment, the bill reads as paid and your staff see it settled online. Nobody needs to bring a terminal.
• If the guest presses pay again while an earlier payment of theirs is still being confirmed — on another tab, say — nothing new is charged: the page says the payment is being confirmed and waits for it. If confirming takes longer than a minute, the page tells the guest not to pay again: either your venue confirms the payment, or it goes back to their card.
• If the bill changes while the guest pays, the page says that payment goes back to their card and offers to pay the new total.

Apple Pay and Google Pay

Apple Pay and Google Pay switch on by themselves for each Stripe account once it is active: Table QR registers the menu's web address with Stripe for that account. Each account in Settings›Payments shows its Wallets: — on, unavailable, or still being set up. Until a wallet is on, guests pay by card. A guest sees a wallet only on a phone and browser that support it.

Fees and refunds

• Table QR keeps a share of each online payment, worked out on the amount less the tip: the tip carries no Table QR fee. The rate is shown on the Stripe card in Settings›Payments, in the dialog that connects an account, and next to the online ways of paying in Settings›Ordering.
• Stripe charges its own processing fee on each payment, tip included. You see it on each payment in your Stripe Dashboard; Stripe's rates are on Stripe's pricing page.
• A refund gives back Table QR's share: all of it for a full refund, the same part of it for a partial one. Stripe keeps its processing fee on a refund.
• If the bill changed after the guest paid — another round was added, or your staff took the money at the table meanwhile — the payment goes back to the guest in full, our share with it, and the bill stays open. The table panel shows your staff that the payment is going back.
• An order paid before it was sent can't lose single items. To take something off, reject the whole order: the guest gets the payment back in full. Once it is served, its bill closes as paid online.
• You refund a payment yourself in your Stripe Dashboard, in full or in part; Table QR's share comes back in proportion, as above. The table panel and the order then show how much was refunded.
• A refund can fail to reach the guest — their card expired or was lost, say. Stripe puts the money back in your balance, the table panel and the order say the refund didn't reach the guest, and you get an email and a notification in the bell. Give the money back another way, or refund it again in your Stripe Dashboard; once a later refund goes through, the warning goes away.

Disputes

A guest's bank can dispute a payment — the guest says they didn't make it, or didn't get what they paid for. Stripe holds the amount back while the bank decides.

• When a dispute opens, you get an email and a notification in the bell with the date to answer by. Answer it in your Stripe Dashboard: without an answer, the bank decides for the guest.
• The table panel and the order show the dispute while it is open, and then how it ended: the money stays with you, or it went back to the guest.
• When the bank decides for the guest, Table QR's share of that amount comes back to you, as for a refund.

Disconnect an account

Choose Disconnect in the account's menu. Venues stop using it, and it stays yours at Stripe with its payouts and history. An account a venue still uses can't be disconnected: choose another account for that venue first.