Online bookings for small restaurants: a practical guide
By Steve Evans, founder of Table Harmony and restaurant owner in Alicante.
Published
Running a small restaurant means doing several jobs at once. During service, you might be greeting guests, helping your team and checking tables when the phone rings with another booking enquiry.
Phone calls, WhatsApp messages and a paper diary can work well. But as enquiries arrive through different channels, keeping everything together takes more attention.
An online restaurant booking system gives guests another way to book and helps you organise reservations around how your restaurant operates.
Let guests book when your restaurant is closed
Your guests do not always make their plans during your opening hours.
Someone at home in Norway may be coming to Alicante next week and want to reserve a table before travelling. A local customer might be arranging dinner in the morning, while your restaurant does not open until the evening.
Online booking lets them check available options and submit a reservation without waiting for you to open or answer the phone.
You decide how far ahead guests can book, which services are available and the largest party they can book online.
Reduce interruptions during service
A booking call often comes at an awkward moment. A member of staff has to stop, check availability, take the guest’s details and record the reservation.
Giving guests an online option can reduce those interruptions. It also lets them enter their own details and receive an email confirmation once their booking is confirmed.
You can still take reservations by phone or in person. Staff can add those bookings to the same system, keeping them alongside online reservations.
Choose how bookings are confirmed
Online booking does not have to mean accepting every reservation automatically.
There are two main approaches.
Booking requests
The guest submits a request, which the restaurant reviews before confirming.
This can suit owners who want to check each booking or whose availability needs a personal decision. The guest should understand that their table is only confirmed once the restaurant accepts the request.
Automatic confirmation
The system confirms a reservation when it meets the restaurant’s availability and booking rules.
This can suit restaurants that want guests to receive an immediate answer. To work well, the system needs accurate opening hours, table availability and booking limits.
Table Harmony supports both approaches, so you can choose the one that suits your restaurant.
Control when guests arrive
Having enough seats is only part of managing a service. You also need to consider how many guests arrive at the same time.
Several tables arriving together can put pressure on the kitchen and front-of-house team, even when the restaurant has space.
Look for a system that lets you control booking intervals and the number of guests accepted in each time slot. Booking durations also help you plan when tables are expected to become available again.
These settings should reflect what your team can comfortably manage.
Keep bookings together
When reservations are spread across a diary, phone messages and WhatsApp conversations, staff have several places to check.
Keeping bookings in one system makes it easier to see the evening’s reservations, guest notes and table assignments.
In Table Harmony, staff can also create a booking with just a guest’s name. Email and phone details are optional for bookings entered by the restaurant. When an email address is included, the guest receives a confirmation email.
Start with the essentials
You do not need to change everything at once.
Begin by setting up your opening hours, tables, booking durations and online party-size limit. Then choose whether to review requests or confirm suitable bookings automatically.
Add the booking link to your website and the places where guests already find you. Make sure your team knows how to enter phone bookings and update existing reservations.
The aim is to make everyday booking tasks easier for both your guests and your staff.
Online bookings that fit your restaurant
I created Table Harmony using my experience running restaurants in Alicante and my background in IT. I wanted a straightforward system that helps owners take bookings while keeping control of their service.
Table Harmony includes table management, booking requests and automatic confirmation, with no commission on bookings.