Running a restaurant or café on Ryde

From the printed menu to the kitchen screen, tables, delivery orders, receipts and getting paid — everything a restaurant, café or food stall needs, step by step.

Who this guide is for

This guide is for anyone who cooks and serves: a restaurant, a café, a bar, a food stall. From one app you sell three ways: delivery and pickup orders from the Ryde app, checks at your tables, and counter sales at the till. Your app has five tabs: Home, Orders, Tables, Kitchen and Menu. Tables only appears once table service is switched on in Settings. Before approval you see only Home and Menu.

Setting up your restaurant

1. Fill in Store profileLogo, cover photo, name, and the address pin exactly on your door.
2. Set Opening hoursCustomers can only order while you are open.
3. Build your menu in Products & ServicesEvery dish needs a name, a price and a photo.
4. Add Payout detailsThe bank account where Ryde sends your money.

Do all of this before you are approved. Your menu goes live the moment you are approved.

Your menu

You do not have to type your menu in by hand. "Build menu with AI" reads it from photos of the printed menu, your menu web page, a CSV or Excel file, or pasted rows, and gives you a draft. Nothing is published until you have checked it.

1. Open Menu and tap "Build menu with AI"It is also behind the "Build your menu" tile on Home.
2. Pick a sourcePhotograph each page of the menu, paste a link, upload a spreadsheet, or paste rows.
3. Review the draftCheck every name, price and category.
4. Add it to your menuThen give each dish a photo.

For one new special, tap "Add product". When the kitchen runs out of something, switch off "In stock" and the dish disappears from the app until you switch it back on. Every item has a "Kitchen station": Kitchen, Bar, or No preparation. Tap "Auto-assign stations": the app reads your whole menu, shows what it would move, and changes nothing until you tap "Apply".

Tables and checks

Switch on table service in Settings, then lay out your floor once in "Tables & floor plan" on the web. Every table on the Tables tab is then a tappable check.

1. Open a free tableTap it. The app asks which waiter has it; that name follows the table onto the check.
2. Add a round and tap "Send to kitchen"The dishes appear on the kitchen screen. Tap more products later for another round.
3. Tap "Send to cashier"When the guests ask for the bill. "Print" brings the check to the table.
4. The cashier charges from the tillTables, the table, then "Charge": Cash, Card, Wallet, or "Charge in app" (the guest pays by QR on their own phone).

A take-out check works the same way without a table: it sits under "Waiting" until the cashier charges it. To void a check, tap "Void check" and pick a reason — you cannot void without one, and a cashier also needs a manager's PIN. More in POS and staff PINs.

The kitchen screen

The Kitchen tab shows every ticket from tables, take-out checks and app orders, oldest first. For the line, use a tablet: in Devices, set its role to "Kitchen station" and restart the app on it. It then signs itself in and shows only the kitchen screen and never asks for a PIN — it cannot touch money, so that is safe.

1. Tap "Start"When a cook picks up the ticket.
2. Tap "Ready"When the food is plated.
3. Tap "Hand over"When the plate leaves the pass. The ticket clears.

Each ticket has a timer; one that waits too long turns red and shows "LATE". Drinks never reach the kitchen: bar items land in the Bar list on the cashier's till with a single soft chime.

Delivery and pickup orders

Your phone rings when someone orders from the Ryde app. Move the order along with one tap at each step.

1. Tap "Accept order"The customer is told you are on it.
2. Tap "Mark preparing"The ticket goes to the kitchen screen.
3. Tap "Ready — dispatch courier"A courier is sent to you. On a pickup order the button reads "Mark ready" instead.
4. Read the PICKUP CODE to the courierIt is on the order screen. It confirms they have the right bag.
5. Tap "Hand over"The order leaves your board.

Tap "Reject order" only when you truly cannot make it; the customer is told and a paid order is refunded to their wallet. The app coaches you: a delivery not ready after about 30 minutes gets a "speed it up" nudge, and at about 45 minutes it asks you to call the courier. Have your own riders? Add them under "My couriers" and choose "Using only my own couriers" or "Using my couriers, then the platform".

Receipts and printing

Printers live in Devices. The most reliable connection is "Printer collects its own jobs": paste a link into the printer's own settings and it fetches its work over the internet. A kitchen printer prints each round; a receipt printer prints checks and receipts at the till; a bar printer prints drink tickets. The cash drawer opens through the receipt printer — if the receipt prints but the drawer stays shut, set that printer's drawer pin to 5. Buy the Ethernet or Wi-Fi model, never the Bluetooth one.

Electronic invoices and taxes

In the Dominican Republic your till can issue e-CF: a Factura de Consumo for walk-in guests or a Factura de Crédito Fiscal for a company. Tap "Activar factura electrónica" in your menu (or type "factura" in "Search menu"), then finish in the web portal: register your RNC and upload your certificate. The till then issues e-CF through a DGII-authorised provider.

Under Taxes, tap "Add tax" and enter a name and a rate. If your prices already have tax built in, switch on "My menu prices already include tax". Delivery and pickup orders placed through Ryde are taxed and remitted by Ryde, so these rates apply to your till only.

Your staff

Your team does not need Ryde accounts. In "Team & PINs", add each person with a role — waiter, cashier, kitchen or manager — and a 4-digit PIN, unique in your store. The role decides what they see: a waiter opens tables, a cashier holds the drawer, kitchen staff never see money, a manager approves voids. On a shared device they tap "Employee sign in" and key their PIN.

A cashier starts with "Open till" and ends with "Close till" and "Count the drawer". "Shift & drawer" shows the open till; "Day close" shows the whole restaurant for one day — every register, expected against counted, and anything still open.

Getting paid

Every order and check shows its earnings math in Earnings: gross sales, commission, net earnings. Commission is tiered by ticket size, set by Ryde for your market, and shown on every order. The payment-processing fee on a card, wallet or PayPal payment is paid by the customer on top of the price and printed on their receipt — never taken from you.

Add "Payout details" once. When funds are available, tap "Request payout" — owner or manager only; an admin reviews it and the status moves from Pending to Paid. Cash is different: you keep it, and Ryde's share builds up as a balance you owe. Deposit it at the bank and upload the receipt in "Deposit cash".

Ryde's commission on till sales is due 7 days after the oldest unpaid one. After that the till freezes: no new sales, tables or shifts until a deposit is verified. Open checks can still be settled and staff can still sign in. Deposit before the week is up.

Cancellations

There is no cancellation fee. If you cancel an app order, the customer is told and a paid order is refunded to their wallet. An open check is never cancelled — it is voided, with a reason. A Ryde One member's free delivery is paid by Ryde, never by you.

Invite and earn: share your referral code from the menu → Invite and earn. A rider you invite gets a welcome bonus, and your bonus lands in your wallet after their first ride. Rewards & tier and Grow are in your menu too — more in Culture and perks.