Here are some frequently asked questions about how our platform can enhance your restaurant experience.
Fiest is a faster, more intuitive all-in-one operating system for restaurants. POS, online ordering, kitchen display, payments, analytics, AI, and your website all run together on one platform. We build it in-house in Helsinki, for restaurants of all sizes.
Yes. Fiest AI is your restaurant's built-in assistant: ask about your business in plain language and get answers straight from your own data. Questions like "What sold best last week?", "When are we busiest?", "How does weather affect sales?", or "Am I ahead of yesterday?" get answered in seconds, with no dashboards to navigate and no technical skills needed. It can also forecast staffing needs from your own trading patterns. Fiest AI runs on your real-time sales data and comes included with the platform.
General POS systems are designed to sell anything: retail goods, services, products. Fiest is purpose-built for restaurants, with the things that actually matter on a shift: Kitchen View, tabs held against a table or a name, a menu editor built for dishes and dietary tags, and order flows designed for hospitality. You get tools that fit how restaurants operate, not a generic cash register adapted for food service.
Pay as you grow. The standard plan uses commission-based software pricing, and the fee covers Fiest's connected core: POS, kitchen, direct ordering, menus, analytics, reports, AI and MCP. It is charged separately from your payment processor's own fees. Published percentages are a starting point; higher-volume, multi-location and larger rollouts can use tailored commission rates or a platform fee. See our pricing page for current details. Hardware packages and a fully custom website are quoted separately.
Fiest works across mobile and desktop, adapting automatically to tablets, phones, and computers. Run it right in the browser, or install it as an app if you want a more native feel.
No installation is needed to get started. Fiest runs right in your browser. We also have an app if you'd prefer that.
Our Helsinki team develops the Fiest platform directly. That means we can iterate quickly, adapt the product to specific restaurant workflows, and ship updates without being boxed in by third-party product limitations.
Fiest runs on an internet connection, so it's worth keeping a backup like a mobile hotspot on hand. That way a dropped connection doesn't slow down service — you're back up and taking orders right away.
Yes. We offer live demos where we walk you through the platform for your specific restaurant type. Contact us to schedule one, or get started right away and see how it fits your service, paying as you grow.
Fiest works for all types of food service businesses: restaurants, cafés, bistros, bars, wineries, food trucks, and pop-up stands. Whether you're a small café or a multi-location restaurant, our platform scales with your needs. It's particularly ideal for businesses that want modern technology without the complexity and high costs of traditional POS systems.
Right now, Fiest serves restaurants in Helsinki and across Finland. We're expanding steadily, and can talk through support for other locations — contact us about your specific needs.
If you already know what you need, sign up directly at our Dashboard and start setting up your restaurant right away. If you're not sure what fits your business, visit our Get Started page: answer a few quick questions, and we'll help you find the right approach for your restaurant.
Basic setup takes minutes once your payment provider's checks are approved: that approval is the real variable, and its timing is theirs, not ours. Add your menu, connect payments, and you can start taking orders the same day. Larger menus, custom hardware, or multi-location setups take longer, and our team can help with the whole process.
Fiest runs on devices you likely already have: tablets, smartphones, or computers with a web browser. For card payments, you can take tap-to-pay directly on your phone, no terminal required, or add a compatible payment terminal if you prefer dedicated hardware. For printing receipts or kitchen tickets, we support most thermal printers, and Star Micronics for cloud printing. We can also provide hardware packages for restaurants that need them, quoted separately based on your configuration.
Not at all. Fiest is designed to feel familiar from the first tap. If you can use a smartphone or browse the web, you can set up the basics yourself. If you'd rather not, done-for-you onboarding is available on request: our team sets up your menu, configures settings, and trains your staff.
If you already use a Stripe or SumUp terminal, it can be connected to Fiest, and Viva terminal setups are supported too. A terminal from another provider won't work with Fiest: contact us and we'll look at what moving to one of the three would involve for you.
Most of the work is the menu, and the AI import handles that in minutes: upload a PDF, spreadsheet or photo, or let your own Claude or ChatGPT do it through the Fiest connection. Payments are connected during onboarding through Stripe, SumUp, or Viva, and how quickly that clears depends on their verification checks. Historical sales stay in your old system, so export the reports your accountant needs before you switch it off. Tell us what you're moving from and we'll go through the steps with you.
Yes. Fiest is designed for self-service setup, but done-for-you onboarding is available on request for restaurants that want a hand. Our team can set up your menu, configure hardware, and train your staff.
Yes. Kitchen View shows the work by Orders, Tables, or Items, and tickets move through Received, Preparing, and Ready so the line always knows what's next. Orders placed close together from the same table can be grouped with merge by table, and servers see the moment a dish is marked ready for pickup.
Yes. Fiest supports cloud printing with Star Micronics printers, so orders send wirelessly to your kitchen printers. You can set up different printers for different stations, like hot kitchen, cold station, or bar, so each one only gets what it needs.
Yes. You can set up options for menu items, like size choices, add-ons, cooking preferences, or dietary modifications, each with its own pricing. That gives customers flexibility while your kitchen still gets clear, accurate order details.
You can open a tab against a table or a customer's name, add items through the meal, and settle at the end. Tabs sync in real time across every device, and the bill can be split evenly, by item, or with a custom split.
Yes. Staff can split bills evenly, assign specific items, or use custom splitting. Payments can also be split across multiple methods such as card and cash.
Yes. The Past Orders view lets you search, filter, and open any order with its items, payment method, timestamp, and customer details. You can process full or partial refunds directly from the system, and every refund leaves an audit trail.
Yes. Stock is tracked per ingredient with its own unit and a low-stock threshold, and linking ingredients to menu items lets sales draw stock down as you trade. You get low and out-of-stock states, stock checks, supplier records, manual purchases, movement history, and inventory cost reporting excluding VAT. A weekly purchasing report can be emailed automatically for anything sitting below its threshold.
Yes. You can sell gift cards for a custom amount, delivered to the buyer by email, and redeem them at the till as a payment method like any other.
Analytics built for restaurants rather than retail: sales trends, VAT breakdown, most ordered items, peak times, payment method reports, dine-in versus takeaway, average order value, and end-of-day figures, all in real time. Export any period as an Excel workbook or a PDF summary, or download an accounting bundle that packages the sales summary, the daily sales workbook, and the transaction detail for the same period in one go.
Yes. A weekly sales report goes out every Monday and a monthly one on the 1st, each as a PDF summary plus an Excel workbook covering order and revenue totals, VAT and category summaries, and daily sales and payment breakdowns. The monthly report has an accountant version with extra financial detail. You choose the recipients per report, and you set the hour your business day starts so the figures group the way you actually trade rather than at midnight.
Yes. Orders sync between the POS and Kitchen View in real time, so your staff sees every status update instantly. Customers ordering online can follow their order from received to ready for pickup. Everything stays synchronized across all your devices.
Fiest supports card payments, cash, lunch benefits, and alternative payment methods including QR-code-based mobile payments. For in-person payments, we support terminals and setups through Stripe, SumUp, and Viva. For online orders, we support Apple Pay, Google Pay, and all major credit cards. You can also split payments across multiple methods. Orders settled somewhere else, like MobilePay, Wolt, or Wolt Catering, can be marked as paid by that method, so the revenue still shows up in your reports.
Yes. Fiest supports Finnish lunch benefits, including Epassi, Smartum, Edenred, and Zevoy, so your customers can pay with them at your restaurant.
Fiest charges a straightforward software fee on POS and online orders — separate from your payment processor's own rate, which you keep visibility into. All fees are exclusive of VAT (25.5%). Supported processor setups include Stripe, SumUp, and Viva. Pricing is agreed per restaurant — see our pricing page for current plan details.
Yes. We support Stripe, SumUp, and Viva, including Viva payment terminal setups where relevant. You can choose the provider that fits your business best, and we'll help you configure it during onboarding.
Unlike third-party ordering platforms that charge 15–30% commission, Fiest's online ordering is built into the platform: you pay our standard software fee plus payment processing fees. That means you keep significantly more of your revenue compared to using external ordering platforms.
Payout timing depends on your payment provider, such as Stripe, SumUp, or Viva. In most cases, card payments are transferred to your bank account within 1–2 business days. Your payment provider will show the exact reporting and payout schedule.
Yes. Apple Pay and Google Pay are supported through our processor integrations. Customers can pay with Apple Pay, Google Pay, and major credit cards both in person and online through your digital menu.
Email support@fiest.io or use the contact form on our website. We're a small Helsinki team, so you reach the people who build the product rather than a ticket queue.
We work Finnish business hours, Monday to Friday. Most messages get an answer the same working day, and we aim to reply within 24 hours. Anything that arrives overnight or at the weekend is picked up the next working morning.
Fiest is a Finnish company and processes personal data under the GDPR. We use service providers that may process data outside the EEA under applicable safeguards. Fiest does not store full payment-card numbers or card security codes. You can exercise your data-protection rights through the available account controls or by contacting us; some records may be retained where required or permitted by law. See our Privacy Policy for details.
We settle Wolt, Wolt Catering, and Uber Eats orders in Fiest as payment methods, so that revenue lands in your reports next to everything else. We don't yet have a live menu or order sync with Wolt or Uber Eats. If a specific platform matters for your restaurant, tell us and we'll be straight about where it stands.
Yes, and you don't need a connector for it to work. There's a direct integration with Last Accounting Company that you connect and disconnect yourself, per restaurant. If your bookkeeper uses something else, download an accounting bundle for any period: the sales summary, daily sales workbook, and transaction detail together. You can also set the monthly report to send its accountant version straight to your bookkeeper's inbox on a schedule, and give them a read-only login that sees orders, analytics, and exports and nothing else. Direct NoCFO setup is in development. For Netvisor, Procountor, or Fennoa there's no direct connector, but accountants working in those tools handle the files above without any trouble.
Often: updates ship roughly every week or two. Because we develop the platform in-house, we can act on customer feedback quickly. Updates apply automatically, so you're always on the latest version.
Yes, and we want to hear them: customer requests genuinely shape what we build next, which is the upside of developing the software ourselves. We won't promise a date for any particular request, but tell us the workflow you need and we'll be honest about whether and when it's likely.
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