Online ordering system for a takeaway with no commission: what it really means (2026 guide)
Every ordering provider now says 'no commission'. Some mean it, some charge a flat fee instead, and some move the fee onto your customer. Here are the three pricing models on real numbers, where your own website fits next to the marketplaces, and what a good ordering flow needs.
- The three pricing models worked on 400 orders a month
- Why regulars should order on your site, not a marketplace
- Posso hosting free; store pays only card processing
Written by the Posso team in Leicester · Reviewed by Paul Robinson, Managing Director · Last reviewed
Short answer
A no-commission online ordering system lets customers order from your own website or app without a percentage of each order going to the provider. In practice there are three pricing models: a percentage commission (typically 0–15% on own-site platforms, 14–30% on marketplaces), a flat monthly fee (typically £20–£60), or a small service fee paid by the customer on each order. On 400 orders a month at £20, those models cost the store roughly £1,120 at 14%, £20–£60 flat, or nothing beyond card processing when the customer pays the fee. Posso's model is the third: hosting is free, the customer pays a 60p service fee per order, and the store pays only card processing from 1% + 10p.
Key takeaways
- Commission-free means the store does not pay a percentage; it does not always mean the service is free.
- On 400 orders a month at £20, a 14% commission costs £1,120 against a £20–£60 flat fee.
- Marketplaces are for finding new customers; your own website is where regulars should reorder.
- Posso hosts your ordering site free; the customer pays 60p per order and the store pays only card processing.
Takeaway: Work out what each model costs on your real order count, then move your regulars to your own site and keep the marketplaces for new customers.
Why 'no commission' needs a second look
A takeaway doing 400 online orders a month at £20 each turns over £8,000 a month online. If all of that comes through a marketplace at 14% to 30% commission, somewhere between £1,120 and £2,400 of it leaves before the food is cooked. On a takeaway margin, that can be the whole profit on those orders. So the phrase 'no commission' lands hard, and providers know it.
The phrase describes one line of a price list, not the whole bill. A platform can charge no percentage and still take £49 a month plus a per-order fee plus a payment rate above the market. Another can charge nothing monthly and recover the cost through a service fee the customer pays at checkout. Both say 'commission-free' and cost the store different amounts.
What people get wrong is comparing the headline instead of the total. Take your real monthly order count and average basket, work out what each model costs the store and the customer, and compare those. The rest of this guide does that arithmetic.
What a no-commission ordering system must get right
Six principles, each one a thing an operator notices in the first month.
Price the model on your own numbers, not the brochure's
Take last month's order count and average basket from your till report. At 400 orders and £20, a 14% marketplace commission is £1,120 a month; a 10% own-site platform is £800; a £49 flat fee is £49; a 60p customer-paid service fee costs the store nothing beyond card processing, which at 1% + 10p on £8,000 across 400 orders is £80 + £40 = £120. Redo it at 150 orders: the ranking changes with volume.
Send regulars to your site and let marketplaces find strangers
A marketplace earns its commission the first time a customer finds you on it. It does not earn it the eleventh time the same customer in the same postcode orders the same chicken shawarma on a Friday. The job of your own ordering site is to be where that eleventh order happens. Put the web address on the bag, the receipt and the menu card, offer a reorder button and a small loyalty reward, and the regulars move. The guide to reducing Just Eat commission sets out how to run the two side by side.
Let the customer choose a time, not a queue position
An order placed at 6.05pm on a Friday with 'ready in 25 minutes' is a promise the kitchen cannot keep at 6.30pm when 38 orders are open. Time slots fix it: the customer picks 7.15pm collection or 7.30pm to 8.00pm delivery, the slot closes when it is full, and the kitchen cooks to a timeline instead of a pile. Pre-orders for later in the evening also smooth the 6pm spike, because a slot booked at 4pm for 8pm is already in the queue before service starts.
Draw delivery zones that charge the far postcodes properly
A single flat delivery fee subsidises the house three miles out with the one round the corner. Zones drawn on a map with their own fee and minimum order let you charge £1.50 inside a mile, £2.95 to two miles and £4.50 beyond, and refuse the address that is twelve minutes each way on a Friday. The system should check the address at checkout, apply the right fee automatically and pass the zone to the driver app so dispatch knows which orders bundle together.
Take the payment in one tap
A customer on a phone at 7pm who has to type a sixteen-digit card number, an expiry date and a CVV abandons the basket more often than one who taps Apple Pay or Google Pay. Both should be live from day one, with saved cards for returning customers and a card-only option for the customer who prefers it. The payment rate on those orders is the cost that remains in every commission-free model, so get it quoted on your turnover before you sign. The guide to card machine fees explains what the quote should contain.
Print it in the kitchen, do not read it off a tablet
An online order that arrives on a tablet by the counter has to be read, re-keyed into the till and shouted through. That is where the wrong sauce, the missed 'no onions' and the lost order come from. The order should land on the kitchen printer or kitchen display with the same ticket format as a counter order, marked with its slot time and whether it is collection or delivery, and it should appear in the same sales report as everything else so the night reconciles in one place.
The three pricing models on 400 orders a month at £20
Monthly online turnover of £8,000. Card processing is shown separately because it applies to every model.
| Model | Typical UK pricing | Store pays on 400 × £20 | Customer pays |
|---|---|---|---|
| Marketplace commission | Typically 14–30% of each order | £1,120–£2,400 plus the marketplace's payment terms | Usually a service or delivery fee set by the marketplace |
| Own-site percentage commission | Typically 0–15% of each order | £0–£1,200 plus card processing | Nothing extra |
| Flat monthly fee | Typically £20–£60 a month | £20–£60 plus card processing, regardless of volume | Nothing extra |
| Customer-paid service fee | Pence per order added at checkout | Card processing only | A fixed fee per order |
| Posso | Hosting free; 60p service fee per web or app order paid by the customer | Card processing only: Posso Pay from 1% + 10p, about £120 on £8,000 across 400 orders | 60p per order |
Ranges are typical UK figures at October 2026; Posso prices are published on EPOS pricing.
What to ask a provider before you sign
What does the store pay in a month with 400 orders, all in?
Ask for one number: monthly fee, per-order fee, payment processing and any charge for the website, the app, SMS notifications or the driver app, worked on 400 orders at £20. Then ask for the same number at 150 orders. A provider that will not write both down is hiding a line. Compare the totals with the marketplace commission you pay today and the figures in the EPOS cost hub.
Who owns the customer data and the domain?
If the ordering site sits on the provider's domain and the customer list lives in their database, you are renting your own regulars and you lose them when you leave. The site should be on your domain, or at least a domain you control, and the customer list with names, emails and order history should be exportable at any time and usable for your own marketing. Ask what happens to the data on the day you cancel.
Where does the order appear in my kitchen?
The right answer is on the same kitchen printer or screen as counter and phone orders, with the slot time and order type, and in the same end-of-day report. The wrong answer is a separate tablet and a re-key. Ask to see a live order travel from a phone to the kitchen printer during the demo, and ask whether a marketplace order and a web order can be sequenced together on the same screen.
The Posso approach to commission-free online ordering
Posso's online ordering uses the customer-paid model. Hosting is free. There is no monthly fee for the ordering site and no percentage taken from the store. The customer pays a 60p service fee on each web or app order, and the store pays only card processing through Posso Pay, Posso's own merchant service, with rates from 1% + 10p quoted on your card turnover and the same rate online and in store. On 400 orders a month at £20 that is roughly £120 in card processing against £1,120 at a 14% commission. Teya and Dojo terminals are also supported in store if you already have a contract.
The ordering site is built for you. A standard website build is £450, or £750 for the Next.js SEO build, which is the version to pick if you want the site to rank in search for your town. Both come with time slots for collection and delivery, delivery zones drawn on a map with their own fees and minimums, Apple Pay and Google Pay, saved cards, a reorder button, the 14 EU allergens on every item and five languages. Orders print on the same kitchen printer, or the £399 kitchen display, as counter and phone orders, with the slot time on the ticket.
The customer list is yours, and the marketing suite is included with 2,000 emails a month for a Tuesday offer to regulars. If you keep Just Eat, Uber Eats or Deliveroo for new customers, those orders arrive on the same kitchen screen for £45 a month per platform with unlimited orders, and Posso Dispatch runs your own drivers at 30p a delivery. AI phone ordering answers the phone 24/7 for £1 an order.
The till behind it is £499 + VAT with software from £25 + VAT a month, and finance is available from £24.92 a week, subject to status. Support is UK-based, Monday to Friday, 9am–9:30pm, with an urgent out-of-hours line, and the hardware carries a two-year warranty. Setup (menu build + configuration) is free; on-site installation for larger sites is priced on application. Systems are preconfigured and shipped plug-and-play.
Where to look elsewhere
If online orders are a handful a week and the whole business runs on a card reader and a phone, a marketplace listing alone is a reasonable place to start. Your own site earns its keep once you have regulars worth moving, which in practice means somewhere past a couple of hundred orders a month.
If the customer-paid service fee does not sit well with your positioning, a fine-dining restaurant taking occasional high-value collection orders for example, a flat monthly fee from an ordering-only platform may suit you better. And if you need retail stock control or an iPad-native app, Posso runs on Windows and Android and is built for hospitality, so look elsewhere.
Related guides
Related guides
Online ordering
The product page: free hosting, time slots, delivery zones, Apple Pay and Google Pay.
Read the guideHow to reduce Just Eat commission
Running a marketplace for new customers while moving regulars to your own site.
Read the guideWhat owners say about restaurant online ordering
Operators on what changed when orders moved from marketplaces to their own website.
Read the guideMissed phone orders in a takeaway
What an unanswered phone on a Friday costs and how to stop losing those orders.
Read the guideEPOS system cost for a takeaway
The full takeaway kit list priced, from the till to the driver app.
Read the guideThis is one part of the Posso EPOS system — the same till, kitchen display, ordering and card payments, set up for your type of venue. Every one-off and monthly cost is on the EPOS pricing page.
No-commission online ordering — frequently asked questions
What does a commission-free online ordering system mean?
It means the provider does not take a percentage of each order from the store. It does not always mean the service is free: some providers charge a flat monthly fee instead, some add a small service fee that the customer pays at checkout, and all of them still involve card processing. Compare the total the store pays on your real monthly order count rather than the headline.
How much does a no-commission online ordering system cost in the UK?
Flat-fee platforms typically charge £20–£60 a month, own-site platforms that take a percentage typically charge 0–15%, and customer-paid models cost the store only card processing. With Posso, hosting is free, the customer pays 60p per order and the store pays Posso Pay from 1% + 10p on card turnover. The website build is £450, or £750 for the Next.js SEO build, and the till behind it is £499 + VAT including the kitchen printer, receipt printer, cash drawer, menu build and training.
Is a 60p service fee going to put customers off?
Customers already pay service and delivery fees on every marketplace, usually larger ones, so a fixed 60p on their own favourite takeaway's website is familiar. It is shown clearly at checkout before payment. The thing that moves orders is convenience: a reorder button, Apple Pay and a slot time they chose. If it still concerns you, put the saving against a marketplace order in plain words on the checkout page.
Should I leave Just Eat and Deliveroo if I have my own ordering website?
Usually not. Marketplaces find new customers in postcodes who have never heard of you, and that is worth a commission the first time. The aim is to stop paying it the tenth time the same customer orders, by moving regulars to your own site with the web address on every bag and receipt. Many takeaways keep a marketplace for discovery and run the majority of repeat orders through their own site.
What does a good takeaway ordering website need?
Time slots for collection and delivery that close when full, delivery zones drawn on a map with their own fees and minimum orders, Apple Pay and Google Pay alongside card, saved details and a reorder button for regulars, allergen information on every item, and orders that print straight onto the kitchen printer or screen with the slot time, in the same queue as counter orders. It should also sit on a domain you control with a customer list you can export.
How much does a takeaway lose to marketplace commission in a year?
On 400 orders a month at £20, a 14% commission is £1,120 a month or £13,440 a year, and at 30% it is £2,400 a month or £28,800 a year. Move half of those orders to your own site on a customer-paid model and the store pays only card processing on that half: at 1% + 10p on 200 orders worth £4,000, about £60 a month.
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