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How to Set Up and Manage Scheduled Orders
Let IdeFood customers order ahead for a future pickup or delivery time, and manage those orders on the POS.

Overview

A Scheduled Order lets an IdeFood customer place an order now for a future pickup or delivery time instead of ordering for right now. The order is paid up front and then held until your team is ready to prepare it, so you can plan ahead for busy periods and pre-orders.

This feature helps you:

  • Take pre-orders for a later time in the day or a future date
  • Smooth out kitchen workload by knowing orders in advance
  • Keep taking orders even while the store is temporarily closed
  • Give customers a clear pickup or delivery time they chose themselves

Scheduling is available for Takeaway (pickup) and Delivery only. Dine-in cannot be scheduled.

Before You Start

Scheduled order time slots are generated from your store hours. Set these up first, otherwise customers will see no times to choose from:

  • Configure day-by-day operating hours under Settings → Operational for Takeaway.
  • If you offer Delivery, make sure your delivery hours are set too.

Note  If a service mode’s hours are incomplete, that mode stays disabled for scheduling and the Portal will prompt you to finish setting up your hours.

Set Up Scheduled Orders in the Portal

Where to Configure

Go to Settings → Scheduled Order. Settings are applied per store, so select the store you want to configure at the top of the page.

Enable Scheduled Orders

Turn on the Enable scheduled orders toggle. When on, customers can schedule pickup or delivery, and those orders sync to the POS automatically.

Service Modes

Choose which modes accept scheduled orders — Takeaway, Delivery, or both. A mode can only be enabled once its store hours are set.

Preparation Time

Set how many hours before the scheduled time an order must be placed. This is the earliest a customer can schedule — for example, with a 1-hour preparation time, the soonest slot a customer can pick is 1 hour from now. You can set between 1 and 24 hours.

Advance Order Limit

Set how many days ahead a customer can schedule. You can set between 1 and 30 days (default is 7).

Auto-Accept Orders (Optional)

By default, scheduled orders wait for a staff member to accept them on the POS. If you turn on Auto-accept orders, an order is accepted automatically after the duration you set (minimum 30 minutes), removing the manual accept step.



How Customers Place a Scheduled Order (IdeFood)

Once enabled, customers ordering on IdeFood see an Order for option with two choices:

  • Now — order for immediate preparation. This appears only for pickup while the store is open.
  • Select Date & Time — pick a future date and a time slot.

When the customer chooses Select Date & Time, they see a strip of upcoming dates (limited by your Advance Order Limit) and a list of available time slots. Slots are drawn from your store’s operating hours for pickup, or delivery hours for delivery, and same-day slots that fall inside the Preparation Time window are hidden. Days with no hours are marked as unavailable.

If the store is currently closed or on a holiday, customers are offered a Schedule Order prompt (“We’re closed right now, you can schedule an order for later”) so they can still order ahead. After checkout, the chosen date and time are shown on their order.


Note Customers must be signed in to place a scheduled Takeaway order — when a pickup time is selected, a guest is prompted to log in before continuing to payment. Delivery orders always require sign-in (scheduled or not), while dine-in and immediate ("Now") pickup can be placed as a guest.

Managing Scheduled Orders on the POS

The Scheduled Order Tab

On the POS Online Order screen there are three tabs: Idefood, Online, and Scheduled Order. Every order with a scheduled time appears in the Scheduled Order tab — not in the Idefood tab — so it stays out of your live queue until it is time to prepare it.


The Scheduled-Time Countdown

Each order shows its scheduled date and time. As that time approaches, the time changes color to help you prioritize:

  • Normal color — more than 1 hour away.
  • Yellow — 1 hour or less until the scheduled time.
  • Red — 30 minutes or less until the scheduled time.

Processing an Order

A scheduled order arrives already paid and moves through these steps:

  1. Accept or Reject — review the new order and accept it (or reject it). If Auto-accept is enabled in the Portal, this step happens automatically after the set duration.
  2. Print to Kitchen — when you are ready to start preparing, tap this to send the order to the kitchen printer / KDS. This is the staff-controlled way to hand a scheduled order to the kitchen.
  3. Ready to Pick Up — mark the order ready once it is prepared.
  4. Complete — close out the order when it is handed over or dispatched.



Caution If a scheduled order is still in the Unpaid status, the Action column shows no buttons — Accept/Reject only appear once the order is Paid.

How Scheduled Orders Appear on the KDS

If you use a Kitchen Display System, scheduled orders can reach it two ways:

  • When a staff member accepts the order and taps Print to Kitchen on the POS.
  • Automatically, as the scheduled time approaches (by default about 60 minutes before), so the kitchen can see upcoming work without waiting for the POS action.

On the KDS, a scheduled order is shown with a “SCHEDULED ORDER” label and its pickup time, in a distinct color so kitchen staff can tell it apart from live orders. As the scheduled time gets close (about 30 minutes before), the order moves to the front of the board; orders further out stay toward the back until their time approaches.

Note  If your kitchen device is set to paid orders only, scheduled orders still qualify because they are paid up front. Use the POS countdown colors and the KDS label to decide when to start based on your preparation time.

Limitations & Considerations

  • Scheduling is available for Takeaway and Delivery only — not Dine-in.
  • Settings are per store; configure each store separately.
  • Available times depend on your store / delivery hours, Preparation Time, and Advance Order Limit.
  • Scheduled orders stay in the Scheduled Order tab and use the same IdeFood invoice identity (INVQ) — there is no separate scheduled-order invoice type.
  • The customer’s scheduled time is read-only on the POS — staff cannot change it.
  • The KDS shows the scheduled time and highlights imminent orders, but it does not hide upcoming ones — they remain visible toward the back of the board.

Best Practices

  • Set complete day-by-day store (and delivery) hours before enabling, so customers always see valid slots.
  • Set Preparation Time to match your real kitchen lead time so you are never scheduled tighter than you can cook.
  • Use Auto-accept during busy periods to reduce manual steps; keep it off when you want to review each order first.
  • Watch the yellow and red countdown colors on the POS, and the KDS label, to start preparation on time.
  • Place one test scheduled order before going live to confirm slots, the POS flow, and the KDS display behave as expected.