Pizza online ordering for UK pizza shops

A pizza order is a set of choices: size, base, extra toppings, dips, and the deal it belongs to. All of them have to reach the oven in the right order. A checkout that squeezes those choices into a free-text note leaves the person on the pass guessing on your busiest night.

Chefzi is the ordering page and kitchen app for independent pizza shops. If you need the whole site, see takeaway websites. Customers build the pizza on their phone. The ticket names every choice. The app rings until someone accepts with a prep time or rejects with a reason. It is £39 a month per location billed annually (£49 if billed monthly), excluding VAT, with everything included and 0% commission ever.

Setting up a pizza menu that the kitchen can read

Sizes are prices. A 10-inch and a 14-inch are size options on the same pizza, each at the price on your board. Don't create separate items for each size unless that's how your board is laid out.

Bases and crusts are modifiers. A stuffed crust that costs extra, a thin base, a deep pan: each one is a choice with its own price, including £0 where there's no charge. Make the base a required choice if you need one picked on every pizza.

Extra toppings follow the size. An extra topping on a 14-inch usually costs more than on a 10-inch. Put the topping list on each size with that size's price. The basket total updates as the customer adds toppings, and the ticket lists every topping by name.

There is no half-and-half builder. Sizes are options on the pizza, each with its own price. Toppings are a modifier group, which can be required and can allow more than one choice. You can name a group "left half" and another "right half", but that is two ordinary lists, not a separate half-and-half mode. Test the ticket before you rely on it.

Removals are options too. "No onion" and "no cheese" belong on the ticket as options, not in the notes. A free-text note is still there for anything unusual.

Deals are one item with choices. A "2 large pizzas, garlic bread and a bottle" deal should be one item where the customer picks each pizza and the drink. That way the pass isn't rebuilding the deal from three separate lines. Keep deal prices the same on your own page and on any marketplace you use (see below).

Dips and sides are quick add-ons. Garlic and herb, BBQ and chilli dips, chips, wedges and wings: put them as add-ons on the pizza or in their own category, whichever matches how people order at the counter.

Sold out means sold out. If a pizza sells out, mark that dish sold out. A topping has no sold-out switch. Remove it from the modifier group to stop selling it.

Handling Friday and Saturday night

• Accept with a real prep time. When the oven is full, a 45-minute estimate the customer agreed to is better than a 25-minute promise you miss. The customer sees the time you set.
• Reject with a reason when you must. Too busy or out of stock is a reason the kitchen can give. A manual reject does not refund the card.
• Use pre-orders for planned nights. Match-day evenings and Friday family orders can be booked for a requested collection or delivery time, which spreads the load across the evening. You set how many minutes ahead an order must be placed, and how many days ahead it can be booked. Closing time is the cut-off. There is no separate cut-off and no cap on how many orders a time can take.
• Trim the menu on peak nights. Mark the slow dishes sold out. There is no switch to hide a category, and deleting a category removes its dishes.

Delivery and collection

Pizza delivery profit depends on distance. Chefzi lets you set delivery zones by drawn area, radius or postcode, each with its own delivery fee, minimum order and delivery time. Typical set-ups:

• A close zone with a lower minimum and a short delivery time.
• A further zone with a higher fee or minimum that covers the longer drive.

There is no switch to pause one zone. Take that zone off the list you save, or turn delivery off for the restaurant and leave collection on. For working out fees and minimums, read delivery zones, fees and your own drivers.

UK rules every pizza shop's online menu has to follow

Allergens on online and phone orders. The Food Standards Agency says that when food is sold by distance selling (online or by phone), allergen information must be available before the purchase is completed (in writing on the website or menu, or verbally by phone) and when the food is delivered (for example allergen stickers or an enclosed menu). Pizza commonly involves several of the 14 regulated allergens: cereals containing gluten (wheat in the dough), milk (cheese), and often others in sauces, toppings and dips. Check every recipe and supplier specification, and update the information whenever a supplier changes.

Natasha's Law (PPDS) is about pre-packed food, not online orders. PPDS labelling applies to food packed on your premises before it's ordered, such as pre-wrapped items in a chiller. The FSA says the PPDS labelling change does not apply to food sold by distance selling. Online and phone orders follow the two-stage allergen rule above instead.

"Gluten-free" is a legal term. You can only call a pizza gluten-free if it contains no more than 20mg/kg of gluten as sold. That applies to restaurant and takeaway food as well, and it means strict controls against cross-contamination from flour in the kitchen. If you can't guarantee it, don't use the term. Describe the base accurately instead and point customers with coeliac disease to a conversation with staff.

Food hygiene rating. In Wales and Northern Ireland you're legally required to display your rating at or near each customer entrance. In Wales, takeaway menus and leaflets that show prices and a way of ordering without visiting must also carry a bilingual statement directing customers to the ratings website. In England, display is voluntary but encouraged, including online. Scotland uses the Food Hygiene Information Scheme (Pass or Improvement Required). Just Eat requires partners to have a rating of 3 or above (Pass in Scotland).

Late-night delivery. In England and Wales, supplying hot food between 11pm and 5am is late night refreshment under the Licensing Act 2003 and needs a premises licence that covers it. Check your licence if you deliver late.

Calorie labelling on menus, including online menus, is required in England only for businesses with 250 or more employees. Most independent pizza shops are below that.

Your own page next to the apps

Many pizza shops keep Just Eat, Uber Eats or Deliveroo for new customers and use their own page for regulars. If you're on Just Eat, its UK terms include a price promise (clause 7.18): prices, offers, delivery charges and minimum orders on Just Eat must be no less favourable than on your own online channels unless agreed otherwise. Keep them aligned, and win direct orders through convenience: your link on Google, a requested time, and a menu that gets the order right.

Use the commission calculator to see what a month of app orders costs.

What you get

• An ordering page for collection, delivery and pre-orders, with sizes, modifiers and deals
• A website generated from your menu, or an embed for your existing site
• Delivery zones by area, radius or postcode, each with its own fee, minimum and time
• The menu move, included, from GloriaFood or anything else