Tock is a restaurant management app with reservation, online ordering, and event management tools. With ticket-based reservations, deep customer analytics, email marketing tools, and an integrated ordering site, Tock is an excellent fit for independent restaurants that struggle with no-shows or third-party platform fees. It also supports dynamic pricing, a potential revenue lifeline in the age of inflation and rising costs.
Tock at a glance
Pros
Cons
Tock is great for independent restaurants that struggle with no-shows with its unique ticket-based reservation setting, which lets you require pre-payment for meals and charge higher prices for premium tables or reservations at a premium time. This dynamic pricing can help you offset rising operational costs without raising prices across the board.
Tock has excellent tools for meal kit sales in particular. In addition to reservations and online ordering, Tock offers ticketed event sales tools that you can use for one-time special events like themed dinners or to support a completely ticketed business. Tock’s tools are great for wineries that host tastings and non-traditional food businesses like culinary tours, cooking classes, or pop-up restaurants.
Tock is not the best when you want to integrate with a point-of-sale (POS) system other than Toast or Lightspeed. And if you do a high volume of online orders, you’ll find Tock’s tools a bit limiting. If you don’t need ticket-based reservations or event sales tools, then you can likely find a less expensive reservation system. If you want to increase your restaurant’s online visibility
Tock alternatives
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| Best for | POS-built reservations and waitlist managemen | Increased online visibility and dining room management | Pay-as-you-go online ordering |
| Monthly fees | $0–$69 | $149-$499 | $1.75 per order, plus processing fees (2.75%+$0.30) |
| Learn more | Visit Toast | Visit OpenTable | Visit Menufy |
Tock pricing: 2.25/5
Tock offers two main products: reservations and event booking. Each module has its own pricing structure. Of the two, Tock’s reservations module is the only one that requires monthly fees.
Tock events pricing
Subscription
Monthly fees
Intro
- $0
- 3% fee on prepaid reservations
Plus
- $199
- 2% fee on prepaid reservations
Pro
- $699
- 0% reservation fees
Tock has three event subscription levels: Intro, Plus, and Pro. Both Plus and Pro support unlimited users and devices. Only the Plus and Pro plans support free reservations, but all plans support ticketed events.
The biggest differences are in the commission fees, prepaid reservations, table management features, which the intro plan doesn’t include, and support. The Intro plan only comes with email support, while Plus and Pro include email and 24/7 phone support.
You can secure event tickets with pre-payments (which are subject to standard processing fees) or choose not to, though most Tock users opt for this system so they can “sell” their available tables in a ticket model and avoid the cost of no-show reservations.
Tock reservation pricing
Subscription
Monthly fees
Base
- $99/month
- 3% fee on prepayments
Essential
- $269/month
- 3% fee on prepayments
Premium
- $339/month
- 2% fee on prepayments
Premium Unlimited
- $899/month
- No prepayment fees
Many Tock users start with Tock’s base plan and expand into event ticket sales or online ordering as their business grows.
For example, you might begin with Tock’s base package but decide to turn your New Year’s Eve dinner into a ticketed event, offer tickets to a wine dinner with a popular winemaker, or test drive a new menu by creating a VIP online ordering experience for investors or friends of the restaurant.
Pre-payment fees go down with higher tiers. But keep in mind that reservation tools begin in the Essential plan, with the Base plan only including tools for wait-listing walk-ins, table and guest management, event management, and marketing tools. POS integrations and chargeback support begin in the Premium plan.
Tock payment fees
Tock supports online payments via Braintree and Stripe. At the time of this writing, Braintree lists its online payment processing rates as 2.59% plus 49 cents, and Stripe lists 2.9% plus 30 cents, though rates may change at any time at Braintree’s and Stripe’s sole discretion.
If you process a high volume of transactions or high-ticket transactions, you can request a custom rate quote by contacting Stripe’s or Braintree’s sales departments directly.
Stripe and Braintree are both fine payment processors, but if you already have one attached to your POS system, it can be a pain to add a completely new processor just for your Tock transactions.
Tock also sells its own line of gift cards that all Tock customers can accept for payments. If you want to create and accept custom-branded gift cards, you can do so via Tock’s integration with The Customer Connection. However, if you want to accept cash payments for customer orders, the system doesn’t easily support this payment method.
Tock guest experience: 4.81/5
- Multi-channel booking: Allow booking from the Tock website, the Tock app, the restaurant website, social media, or Google searches.
- Social media integrations: Customers can sign in with Facebook, Google, or Apple credentials.
- Book locations: Book specific dining areas (indoors, patio, etc.) if available.
- Messaging & feedback: Send automated confirmation SMS text messages and customer feedback forms.
Tock is incredibly user-friendly for your guests. It allows your customers to reserve tables, place online orders, or purchase tickets from your restaurant website, the Tock platform website, the Tock smartphone app, your social media accounts, or directly from a Google search.
Customers can even find your restaurant by name on the Tock app or discover your business via a location-based search.
Tock sends automated confirmation text and email messages and accepts prepayments for a deposit or an entire meal, including tax and gratuity (depending on your account settings). Tock also sends an automated customer pre-booking survey so customers can communicate dietary restrictions, food allergies, or other special requests.
Additionally, the system sends a post-reservation customer feedback survey, prompting customers to give you feedback directly, rather than on Yelp or Google.
Tock operations: 5/5
Tock is a unique restaurant management tool that offers a combination of prepaid reservations, ticketed event booking, customer analytics, online ordering, and delivery tools. Tock’s greatest innovation is that it allows restaurants to sell table reservations the same way concert venues sell tickets.
You can require customers to pay for their meals 100% upfront, including tax and gratuity, and charge a higher price for premium seats. This dynamic pricing virtually eliminates no-shows, which can be a business killer for small restaurants.
- Reporting and analytics: Tock reports range from high-level monthly sales overviews to detailed daily line-item reports that track comps, discounts, and individual item sales. You can access reports from any web-enabled device.
- Platform website: Tock lists all Tock restaurants on its searchable website. Customers in your city can search the Tock website for pickup and delivery options at their preferred mealtimes and discover your restaurant. This is a good option in competitive city locations or tourist destinations where travelers often search for new restaurants.
- Customizable user permissionsand settings: Choose what information various team members can access. Limit access to customer information or check modification functions. You can also allow team members to configure their preferred display settings so that they see their Tock dashboard in a way that makes the most sense to them.
- Multichannel reservations: Customers can book through your website, the Tock website, or the Tock app.
- Browser-based: You can access your Tock reservations on a tablet, computer, or smartphone, anywhere in your restaurant.
- Timed table release: Choose when to release tables for new bookings.
- Ticketed seating: You can require pre-payment for reservations, similar to a ticket model.
- Waitlist tools: You can allow customers to add themselves to an online waitlist and alert them with automated SMS text alerts when a table is available.
- Concierge support: Special portals for hotel concierges support referral bookings.
With Tock, you can offer traditional reservations for a single party at a specific time, with no money changing hands. You can also sell your available tables using Tock’s dynamic ticket model by requiring a deposit applied to the final bill or requiring guests to order and pay for all of their food, beverages, and tips in advance.
Tock allows you to feature what makes your restaurant special and make these experiences bookable on your website, the Tock app, or the Tock website. You can include special experiences for customers to reserve, like tasting menus, chef’s tables, wine tastings, mixology experiences, and more. For example, restaurants with popular patios can create separate reservation categories (and prices) for those coveted tables.
Tock’s reservation optimization tools will show you where you can squeeze in more reservations. Popular restaurants can also control exactly when each table becomes available for booking.
This increases the buzz around your restaurant and levels the playing field for customers trying to secure a reservation at a specific time. It will also save you labor hours when booking popular dining-out dates like Valentine’s Day, Mother’s Day, and New Year’s Eve.
Beyond reservations, Tock includes a couple of options for waitlist management. You can have your staff manage an in-house waitlist of customers who arrive in person at your restaurant. You can also offer an online waitlist that customers can add themselves to before they arrive. Either waitlist option includes SMS texting tools so your team can send text messages to alert waiting customers when their tables are ready.
- Tock-hosted ordering site: Build your online ordering site using Tock’s guided setup wizard.
- Slot-based ordering: Each order is tied to a specific time slot.
- Order limits: You can set order limits by time slot to control the flow of orders.
- Print to kitchen: Set your online order tickets to print directly on kitchen printers to speed service.
- In-house driver option: Assign delivery orders to a team of in-house drivers.
- Third-party driver option: Hail on-demand drivers from Uber or DoorDash.
- Private ordering link: Create an online ordering experience for a private group of customers without making your menu available to the general public.
- Age verification: Alert your drivers and to-go staff to check IDs on pick-up and delivery orders that include alcohol.
Tock features a highly controllable online ordering system; all orders are timeslot-based. You can customize virtually every aspect of your ordering program, from the minimum and maximum order amount to the time between orders and the automated messages customers receive. You can also add age verification for age-restricted items like alcohol.
All this customization may sound like it will take a lot of administrative time, but once you set your parameters, you can feel confident that online order surprises won’t disrupt your in-house operation.
Tock organizes your orders by pick-up time. This allows you to control how many orders your kitchen receives at a specific time. It also encourages customers to place orders in available time slots, keeping your staff busy and engaged throughout the shift rather than getting slammed with orders at 7 p.m. and then hearing crickets the rest of the night.
Its ordering site supports several order types, from individual menu items to wine bottles and merchandise such as tote bags and groceries. However, it excels with family-style meals, special occasion meals, and meal kits.
You can let orders print directly to your kitchen printers without additional approvals in the front of the house. You can also print order slips from a standard desktop computer, which works especially well for restaurants that only accept orders with 24-hour advance notice.
If you want to offer delivery, Tock supports both in-house driver management and third-party drivers. You can easily assign deliveries to on-staff drivers via the Tock dashboard, or you can route deliveries to third-party drivers via DoorDash or Uber Eats for flat-rate, per-delivery prices.
You can also offer curated experiences to a select group of loyal customers or friends of the restaurant by creating custom order links for offerings that are not available to the general public. This is an excellent fit for managing pop-up restaurants, testing new menu items, or running a “soft-opening” of your online ordering operation.
- Private event settings: Include a private event inquiry form on your main Tock page.
- Ticketed events: Create ticketed special events that are open to multiple customers.
- Add-on options: Let guests customize their event experience with add-ons like reserved tables, included valet charges, or food and beverage packages.
- Optional image gallery: Include up to 20 images to show your customers what to expect from your event.
- Restricted visibility: Limit event page visibility to specific customer groups.
- QR code ticketing: Issue tickets via QR code for easy check-in.
Restaurants that have private dining rooms (PDRs) or book their whole restaurant space for weddings and other events can manage private event inquiries through Tock. You can include a private event inquiry form on your main Tock page so you never miss a chance to book a large party.
If your restaurant plans special events open to the public, Tock also has tools for you. You can create individual event pages for popular events like wine dinners, cooking classes, themed parties, concerts, or other special happenings.
Customers can buy tickets directly through your event page and make additional purchases for food, beverages, tables, or other available options. You can add (and charge for) anything customers would like, from bottles of reserve wine to meet-and-greets with your chef.
Tickets to Tock events are issued via QR code, allowing your team to check in guests when they arrive easily. Scanning a customer’s ticket shows their customer information, so your staff can quickly identify VIPs or guests with special needs. Alternatively, you can view your event guest list from your reservation dashboard and check in guests manually.
- Detailed customer profiles: Know what your customers look like, what they do, what they like, and what they’re allergic to.
- Filtered customer lists: Create lists of any customers valuable to you, from VIPs to red wine lovers.
- Customer surveys: Create pre- and post-event surveys to collect customer preferences or feedback.
- Targeted discounts and campaigns: Create discounts, events, and private ordering experiences tailored to the tastes of a specific customer group.
- Social media integration: Add “Book Now” buttons to your restaurant’s Facebook and Instagram pages.
Tock tracks detailed customer information across all three of its modules. You can include basics like customer contact information alongside details like occupation, industry affiliation, dining preferences, allergies, and even profile photos.
If you’ve been using a different reservation platform, like Resy or OpenTable, you can easily import your existing customer list into Tock using Tock’s import tools.
Tock’s tagging feature lets you create categories to filter customers by whatever information you like. You can identify investors, local food personalities, vendors, wine lovers, regulars, or VIPs of any stripe. You can use these tags to segment customers into groups for targeted emails or offer access to exclusive menus and events.
Tock ease of use: 4.75/5
Tock is an incredibly easy-to-use system. Once you sign up for the service, the Tock Team will set up your business account and import your menus or other information. This process typically takes at least two days, depending on the modules you need. For example, the setup for a reservation system tends to be more in-depth than an events-only subscription.
Regardless of your Tock services, your account comes with US-based customer support. Every Tock customer service representative I have interacted with is highly knowledgeable about both Tock’s capabilities and restaurants’ needs.
Tock’s sales team is one of the most knowledgeable restaurant software teams I have ever spoken to. They seem laser-focused on getting you the tools you need to solve your pain point, not trying to sell you functions you don’t need.
In addition to setup support and ongoing customer support, Tock also hosts an online knowledge base with training videos that walk you through creating online ordering menus, event pages, and more. Included articles cover everything from chargeback processing to managing drivers and configuring email and text notifications.
Tock directly integrates with restaurant POS systems like Toast and Lightspeed Restaurant. Supported third-party delivery options are Uber and DoorDash. These popular platforms are great for restaurants that use them, but it would be nice to see additional integrations, especially with more restaurant POS systems.
Tock expert score: 3.75/5
Tock provides small independent restaurants with streamlined, user-friendly software solutions that meet their specific needs. It’s not a system designed for enterprise-level businesses with a lower-functioning subscription for “small guys.” I’ve followed this software since it was developed in 2014 and have personally recommended it to countless small restaurants, wineries, and event businesses.
Tock’s score in the category is a little low here, though, because I take user reviews into account. Tock’s average across popular review sites is 4.2, mostly due to some lower scores in 2018 to 2019. I unpack Tock user reviews in the next section, so read on if you want more nuance.
Overall, Tock has great industry karma; the online ordering functions were developed at lightning speed when the COVID-19 pandemic forced restaurant closures. This brand continually creates insightful solutions for independent restaurants, offering them at a price that small restaurants can afford. If Tock has tools you will use — admittedly, they are not a fit for every restaurant — it’s worth checking out.
Tock reviews: What actual users say
Users like
Users dislike
Restaurant users generally have a favorable opinion of Tock, though the system has far fewer user reviews than larger systems like OpenTable or Resy. Tock’s reviews are further complicated because, as with most reservation system reviews, you’re as likely to find reviews of the platform from customers as from restaurant owners. This can skew Tock’s overall rating.
- Capterra: Tock earns a 3.4 out of 5 based on 17 reviews, though some of these reviews are from consumers, who criticize the Tock platform for the business practices of restaurants that use Tock.
- G2: Tock receives a 4.2 out of 5 based on 96 reviews.
- Hotel Tech Reviews: Tock earns a 5 out of 5 based on 10 reviews from verified hotel users. Tock is also ranked as the site’s sixth-best overall restaurant management software.
Positive reviews mention the robust customer database tools and how the prepaid reservations reduce the pain of no-shows. Negative reviews note that Tock lacks the reach of reservations behemoth OpenTable, and mention that the web-based system can sometimes lag if the internet connection is weak.
Some restaurant customers gave Tock a negative rating because they couldn’t get a refund from one of Tock’s client restaurants, which is completely out of Tock’s hands.
How I evaluated Tock
I compared several popular restaurant reservation systems against the same restaurant-focused criteria. I looked at the overall price, guest experience, operations tools, and ease of use. Finally, I gave my expert score based on my experience testing and using the software.
Pricing: 15% of overall score
I considered each system’s monthly fee and whether it imposes volume limits or charges extra for SMS messaging or integrations. I also looked at contract terms, free trials, and overall value.
Guest experience: 25% of overall score
For this section, I considered whether the system had tools for guest metrics and analytics, social media integrations, and the app’s overall popularity. I also considered automated confirmations, two-way SMS messaging, and post-dining questionnaires
Operations: 25% of overall score
Operational tools are key to managing restaurant reservations, and I highlighted some basic yet key features I believe each software should have. I considered seating capacity and table optimization, waitlist management, and the ability to pre-assign servers, manage server sections, and charge no-show fees. I also looked for POS integration abilities.
Ease of use: 20% of overall score
I looked at the software interface for guests and operators, assessing how easy it was for both user types to access key information and features. I also reviwed ratings on the App Store, useful integrations, and customization options.
Expert score: 15% of overall score
Finally, I considered each system’s standout features and how the software compared against the price. I also used sites like Capterra to see what real-world operators thought of each system. Then, I awarded points based on my experience interacting with the software and the company’s customer support.
The last bite
Tock is a cost-effective platform that helps small independent restaurants manage reservations, event sales, and online orders. Expanded customer profiles support tailored marketing campaigns and allow you to offer perks and special events to select customer groups.
This platform works best for restaurants that have a high profile or loyal customer base, as it does not yet have the reach of discovery platforms like OpenTable or Resy. But if you want dynamic pricing to reduce the pain and cost of no-shows, you won’t find a better reservation system.
