Payments

This page is about money from your guests. It goes to your own Stripe or Square account, not to us — what you pay us is on Billing & Subscription.

What "Pay on Order" means

Pay on Order is a single switch on the Settings page that decides when your customers pay.

Turn it on if you don't want to chase payment after the food is eaten — takeaway counters, food trucks and busy dining rooms usually do. Leave it off for classic table service where guests settle up at the end.

With it on, an order that's started but not paid within your Time to pay — the customer closed the payment page or walked away — is cancelled. Nothing is charged, it never reaches the kitchen and it never appears in your Orders list, so unpaid attempts don't clutter your day.

Two kinds of order ignore the switch. Orders placed on a MenuBaton Station at a counter are always paid first, so a counter needs a connected payment account even with Pay on Order off. Orders your staff take in the staff display are never paid online, even with it on: they are created unpaid, for the cashier to collect.

Set your receiving account

Your customers' money goes to your own Stripe or Square account — we never hold it. You connect it, and choose which of the two takes the payments, on the Receive Account page in the portal's left menu. Under Who takes customer payments, pick Stripe or Square; a provider can only be chosen once its account is connected. Your own subscription is billed through Stripe whichever you pick.

Stripe

1. On Receive Account, click Connect with Stripe. You're taken to Stripe.
2. Sign in to your existing Stripe account and pick it from the list, or create one if you don't have one yet. Signing in to an account you already use is important — skipping past the form creates an empty new account that can't receive payouts.
3. Approve the connection. You come back to the portal with "Stripe account connected successfully!", and the page now shows the connected account ID and its email with a green tick.

If the tick is replaced by "Invalid — please check", the connection is no longer usable — reconnect with Change Stripe Account. The same button switches to a different account; you'll be sent back to Stripe to authorise the new one. New customer payments then go to the new account. The old account stays connected, so a payment already under way on it still goes through and its order reaches the kitchen, and orders paid into it can still be refunded from their order page. To cut the old account off as well, disconnect it in its own Stripe Dashboard — Stripe may then never let that account connect to any app again, and orders paid into it can then only be refunded there.

Square

1. On Receive Account, click Connect with Square. You're taken to Square.
2. Sign in to your Square account and approve the connection. You come back to the portal with "Square account connected successfully!", and the page shows the connected Square account.
3. Under Location, pick the Square location that should take the payments. Each one shows its currency, which must be the currency your menu is priced in.
4. Under Who takes customer payments, choose Square.

Square can only charge in its location's currency, so choosing Square is refused while the two differ — the message names both currencies. Change the menu currency, or pick a location that uses it. Payments settle into your own Square balance. Disputes and payouts for them are handled in your Square dashboard; refunds can be made there too, or from an order's page.

Change Square Account switches to a different Square account. New customer payments then go to the new account. The old account stays connected, so a payment already under way on it still goes through and its order reaches the kitchen, and orders paid into it can still be refunded from their order page. A Square Terminal takes payments for the account it was paired with only: after a change, the Receive Account page says how many card machines are still paired with an old account until you pair them again on their MenuBaton Stations.

Disconnect Square stops customer payments going through Square, but not while Square is taking them with Pay on Order on: switch to Stripe or turn Pay on Order off first. The app keeps its access to the account, so a payment already under way still goes through, and orders paid through Square can still be refunded from their order page.

Two of your restaurants can use the same Square account: connect it from each one.

To cut the app off from a Square account completely, remove it under My Applications in that account's Square Dashboard. Orders paid into the account can then only be refunded there.

Square Terminal on MenuBaton Station (optional). Pair it with MenuBaton Station: on the Station's first screen, under Card machine, open Square Terminal, press Pair, and sign the Terminal in with the code the Station shows. The terminal then belongs to that Station: customers who order on the Station tap their card on its terminal, at whichever table or counter the Station is set to. Two Stations at one table each use their own terminal. A terminal waits at most 5 minutes for the card. Customers who order on their own phone, from a table's QR code, pay on the phone as usual. A Station without a terminal takes the card on its screen.

Turn Pay on Order on

1. Connect the account that will take your payments first — Stripe or Square — and choose it under Who takes customer payments, as above.
2. Open Settings and click Edit.
3. In the Order Settings card, switch Pay on Order on. The line underneath changes to "Customers must pay before their order is sent to the kitchen."
4. Click Save Changes.

Without a usable connected account the switch refuses to move and shows "Connect a Stripe account before turning on Pay on Order." — or, when Square takes your payments, "Connect a Square account before turning on Pay on Order." — with a shortcut to the Receive Account page. This is deliberate: it stops customers hitting a dead checkout page.

Time to pay

Time to pay (minutes), in the Order Settings card of Settings, is how long a customer has to pay for an order that must be paid first — any order while Pay on Order is on, and every counter order on a MenuBaton Station. It can be from 1 to 35 minutes, and is 5 unless you change it. A Square Terminal waits at most 5 minutes, whatever you choose.

• Customers are told the time before they confirm — "After you confirm, you have 5 min to pay." — and again while they pay.
• When it runs out, the order is cancelled and nothing is charged. A customer who comes back later simply orders again.
• A takeaway order being paid for holds its place in its pickup slot until then, so the slot can't fill up under a customer who is typing in their card.

How an order total is built

1. The prices of the dishes in the cart are added up.
2. Each price add-on is applied in turn, in the order shown on the Settings page.
3. The tip, if the customer chose one, is calculated on that add-on-inclusive amount and added last.

The customer sees the same breakdown in the cart before confirming, and the whole amount — dishes, add-ons and tip — goes to your Stripe or Square account when Pay on Order is on.

Cancelled dishes and refunds

Cancelling a dish works the total out again

When you cancel a dish on an order's page, the order is charged again without it, by the same rules as above:

• a percentage add-on is taken again, at the rate it had when the order was placed, on the new amount;
• a fee add-on stays, as long as any dish is left;
• a percentage tip is taken again on the new amount, and a tip the customer typed as an amount keeps its share of the bill;
• cancel every dish, and the total comes to 0.

If the order was already paid, the difference shows as Refund Due under the total — on the order's page and on its receipt — so you know what to give back. Refund Due is only a note: no money moves until you refund it.

The Refund button

On a paid order's page, Refund gives money back to the card the customer paid with. It is there for you, the manager — on the web, in the desktop app and in the phone app — and not for cashiers.

1. Open the order and press Refund.
2. The Amount starts at the order's Refund Due (0 if there is none). Change it to anything up to what is left of the payment, which the box shows as Up to … — less, or more as a goodwill refund on an order that owes nothing.
3. Press Confirm. The page says "Refund sent. The money is on its way back to the card.", and the order shows the amount under Refunded. A refund pays off Refund Due first.

• Which orders. Orders paid by card through MenuBaton: through Stripe — a payment page, a card reader or the Station's card form — or through Square — a payment page, a Square Terminal or the card form. The refund comes out of the account the order was paid into, even if you have since changed accounts on the Receive Account page.
• Paid at the cashier? An order marked paid has no Refund button: its page says to give the money back the way it was paid, in cash or on your own card machine.
• Paid into a Square account the app can no longer reach? Its page says so — refund it in that account's Square Dashboard.
• No answer yet? If Stripe or Square is slow to reply, the page says "No answer yet. The refund is kept and will be tried again in a few minutes." Check Refunded before you refund the same order again.
• Refunds made in your own dashboard aren't counted by the app; Stripe and Square still never refund more than was paid.

The smallest amount a card can pay

With Pay on Order on, the customer pays by card before the kitchen sees the order. Card payment providers won't take payments below a minimum, and the minimum depends on which provider your restaurant uses.

Stripe

Stripe won't charge less than the amounts below, so that its fee can never be more than the payment itself:

Other currencies are in Stripe's full list. If a payment has to be converted into another currency, it must still be worth at least that currency's minimum after conversion.

An order below the minimum isn't placed. The customer is told "This order is below the smallest amount that can be paid by card. Please add something to it." Nothing reaches the kitchen, and they can add to the order and confirm again.

Square

If your restaurant takes payments through Square, there is no minimum to plan around: Square takes card payments down to a single cent, or the smallest unit of your currency.

Free orders

No card payment can be for nothing, so an order that comes to 0 — free items only, and no tip — never goes to a payment page. It's marked paid and goes straight to the kitchen, with either provider.