Common Questions We Get

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.

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.

The standard price is €49 a month per location plus 0.39% of sales above €10 000 a month, at the till and online alike. The first €10 000 of sales each month carries no commission. It covers Fiest's connected core: POS, kitchen, direct ordering, menus, analytics, reports, AI and MCP. Prices exclude VAT, and your payment provider bills card processing separately. Higher-volume, multi-location and larger rollouts can get a price for the whole operation. 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. For card payments and printed receipts, the card terminals and POS hardware that work with Fiest have a page of their own.

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. It also works with ChatGPT, Claude and other assistants through Fiest's integrations.

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 works online and offline. If your internet drops, service keeps going, and sales sync when the connection comes back. See what the offline POS keeps doing and what waits for the connection.

Yes. We offer live demos where we walk you through the platform for your specific restaurant type. Contact us to schedule one, or create an account and see how it fits your service.

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. Browse our restaurant directory or see restaurants using Fiest in Helsinki.

If you already know what you need, sign up directly in the Dashboard and start using Fiest right away. If you're not sure what fits your business, book a demo on our website. We'll help you find the right setup for your service.

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 an iPhone or Android phone with SumUp, Viva or Stripe, 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 card terminals and POS hardware as a package for restaurants that need them, quoted separately based on your configuration.

Yes, and the AI does the typing. Upload your current menu as a PDF, spreadsheet, CSV, text file or a photo of the printed one, and Fiest reads it into items, categories, prices, sizes, option groups and dietary tags. If you already use Claude or ChatGPT, you can connect them to Fiest and ask your own assistant to run the import instead. And if you'd rather not do either, our team will do the menu with you during onboarding. Every route ends the same way: in a review screen where you correct anything that came in wrong, with nothing reaching a live menu until you confirm it. Menu import is part of the platform, not a paid migration service. Historical sales are a different matter: those stay in your old system, so export what your accountant needs before you switch.

You don't, and you don't have to do the setup yourself either. Our team builds your menu, configures your settings and hardware and trains your staff before you open, so nobody is learning a new system alone on a busy night. If you would rather do it yourself, 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.

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. See the card terminals and POS hardware that do, or 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, and it is the normal way in. Our team sets up your menu, configures your hardware and trains your staff, and we stay with you through your first service. Fiest is built for self-service setup too, so if you would rather do it yourself, nothing stops you.

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. Online ordering is built into the platform, not bolted on. Guests can browse your digital menu and order for pickup or dine-in by scanning a QR code at the table. Orders drop straight into the POS and Kitchen View. Because it's your own ordering channel, you keep the customer relationship and avoid the 15–30% commissions that third-party ordering platforms charge.

Yes. Fiest works with network and USB receipt printers that use the standard ESC/POS commands, including Epson and Star Micronics, and with Star Micronics CloudPRNT for cloud printing. Each printer gets a kitchen or receipt role and its own receipt language, so orders go wirelessly to the right place. 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 create multiple menus, like lunch, dinner, brunch, or seasonal specials, and switch between them easily. You can also set specific menus for online ordering.

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. Everyone gets a role: Owner, Admin, Manager, Staff or Accountant, and each role sees only its own pages. Staff can switch to their own PIN profile on a shared till or log in with their own email, and your accountant gets read-only access to orders, analytics and exports.

Yes. Print the receipt, send it by email, or show a QR code the customer scans for a digital receipt, on the till or on the customer display after payment.

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's standard price is €49 a month per location plus 0.39% of till and online sales above €10 000 a month. Card payment processing is separate from that and comes from your payment provider at its own rate, which you keep visibility into. All prices exclude VAT (25.5%). Supported processor setups include Stripe, SumUp, and Viva.

Yes. We support Stripe, SumUp, and Viva, including Viva payment terminal setups where relevant, and tap to pay through SumUp, Viva or Stripe on Android phones and iPhones. 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 at the same 0.39% rate as sales at the till, charged only on sales above €10 000 a month, 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. Urgent problems during service are our number one priority, and we handle them before anything else. Most other messages get an answer the same working day, and we aim to reply within 24 hours. Non-urgent messages that arrive overnight or at the weekend are 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. If a specific platform matters for your restaurant, tell us and we'll go through how it fits your setup.

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. Bookkeepers working in Netvisor, Procountor or Fennoa handle these files 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.