Taking orders and order lookups

Your assistant can take orders for pickup, delivery or dine-in, on calls and in text conversations. It sells only what is on your menu, at your prices, and it prices every order with your fees and rules before the customer confirms. Orders land on a live board for your kitchen or shop, and can be sent to your till, online shop or receipt printer. Callers can also ask where their order is.

Ordering works on every plan.

Before you start

The ordering pages are Orders and Menu & products in the Operations part of the sidebar. They show by default when Industry under Company → Profile is Restaurant or Retail / e-commerce, and for any workspace that already has products or orders. If you do not see them, click Arrange this menu next to Operations and switch them on.

Step 1: Add your menu

Open Menu & products. On the Products tab, click Add product and fill in:

• Name, Price, Category and Description. The assistant uses the description to answer questions such as "is it spicy?".
• Options: groups of choices such as sizes or extras. For each group, choose Must choose (the caller has to pick one) or Several allowed. Each choice can have an Extra price.
• SKU / POS code, if your till needs one.
• Available. Sold-out products are not offered to callers. You can also click a product's Available or Sold out badge in the list to switch it.

You can also import your menu on the Import tab:

• From your shop or POS: connect Square, Clover, HubRise, Shopify or WooCommerce under Integrations, then click Import menu. Products, prices, sizes and modifiers come across. Run it again any time to pick up changes. Nothing is deleted.
• From a spreadsheet: upload a CSV file whose first row names the columns, with at least name and price. Optional columns are category, description, options and sku. Rows with the same name and category update the existing product.

In the options column, a * after a group name means the caller must pick one, a + means any number, and +2 after a choice adds 2.00 to the price. For example: Size*: Small, Medium +2, Large +4; Extras+: Cheese +1.5, Olives +1.

Step 2: Set your ordering rules

On the Pickup & delivery tab:

Click Save settings.

Step 3: Switch on ordering for the assistant

1. Open Assistants, then the assistant, then the Abilities tab.
2. Turn on Take orders and save.

The tab then confirms how many products the assistant is taking orders from, or warns you that your menu is empty.

How the assistant takes an order

1. It takes the order item by item and asks only for the required choices, such as the size, and the quantity.
2. It prices the order with your menu, fees and minimums. It never works out totals itself. If something is off, such as an unknown item, a missing size or a closed kitchen, it sorts that out with the caller.
3. It asks about pickup or delivery (only what you offer) and takes the full address for delivery.
4. It gets the caller's name. The number they are calling from is saved automatically.
5. It reads the order and total back and places it only after the caller says yes.

The customer then gets a confirmation. By text, it reads for example "Northside Pizza: order #1042 received, total $24.50." By email, they get the full order if they gave an address. If you set up a payment link for orders, it is included. See Payment links.

The Orders board

Orders → Board shows open orders in columns: New, Confirmed, Preparing, Ready, and Out for delivery if you deliver. Orders for more than 12 hours ahead wait under Scheduled for later. History lists every order, with search by order number, name or phone, and Export CSV.

Each order moves forward with one click: Accept, Start preparing, Mark ready, Out for delivery (delivery orders only), then Complete order. The customer is told when the order is confirmed, ready, on its way or cancelled. You can also Cancel order, with an optional reason that is sent to the customer, and Mark as paid.

To add an order by hand, click New order. Prices come from your menu, and your ordering rules are not checked.

Team members with Orders switched on under Settings → Notifications are told about new and cancelled orders.

Sending orders to your other tools

Connect these under Integrations, and new orders are sent there automatically:

When you cancel an order in Ringhum, it is cancelled in Square, HubRise, Shopify and WooCommerce too, and removed from Clover. Other status changes are managed in those apps. The order's Sent to line shows where it went. Use Recent deliveries on each app's card to check what was sent. See Recent deliveries.

Order lookups and cancellations

Callers can ask "where is my order?":

• Orders taken in Ringhum are found by the number the caller is calling from, or by an order number they give. For privacy, the assistant only finds the caller's own orders.
• Orders from a connected Shopify or WooCommerce store can also be found by the email used at checkout or the order number. The assistant reads out the status, the items, the total and any tracking details.

Callers can cancel their own order while it is New or Confirmed. Once preparation has started, the assistant offers to take a message for your team instead.

Troubleshooting

The assistant does not offer to take orders. Check that Take orders is on under the assistant's Abilities, and that at least one product is marked Available.

The assistant says you are closed. Take orders outside opening hours is off, and the order is for a time outside your opening hours. Callers can still order for a later time.

An order did not reach my POS. Open the app's card under Integrations and check Recent deliveries for the error.