Glossary
Self-service kiosk
self-order kiosk · ordering kiosk · kiosk POS
A self-service kiosk is a touch screen in a venue where guests browse what the venue sells, build their own order and confirm it without a cashier, and receive an order number to collect the food by.
Ordering and paying are two halves
A kiosk does two jobs that can be separated. Taking the order needs only the venue's catalog and a way to hand the order to the kitchen. Taking the money needs a card terminal the kiosk can drive on its own, because nobody stands behind it to see the card go through. Many venues run the first half alone: the guest orders at the kiosk and pays at the counter by the number.
What a kiosk must not do
A screen that faces the public should hold nothing a thief could use: no staff PINs, no customer records, no costs. It cannot check anyone's age, so age-restricted items stay at the counter; it offers no discounts; and a guest who walks away before confirming leaves nothing behind, because the cart is not an order until it is confirmed.
Kiosk, guest display and QR ordering
A customer-facing display mirrors an order a cashier is taking and takes none itself. QR ordering puts the menu on the guest's own phone through a hosted page, which needs the internet. A kiosk is the venue's own screen on the venue's own network, opening orders the way a terminal does.
How Brindola does it
Brindola's kiosk is a paired device with its own role on the venue's network, and it needs no internet. The guest picks a language, eat in or take away, and builds the order from the catalog with photos, allergens and options; Confirm gives an order number, printed on a slip where the kiosk has a printer, and the guest pays at the counter by that number. The kitchen screen and the pickup board treat it as any counter order. If the main device is unreachable, the kiosk asks guests to order at the counter rather than take orders it cannot hand over, and a cap limits the unpaid orders one kiosk can hold. Paying by card at the kiosk itself is planned; it waits on the card-terminal integration.