The restaurant booking glossary
The floor's vocabulary, explained plainly and honestly. What a no-show really is and what it really costs, how a booking engine differs from a commission-based portal, or why a deposit is one of the most effective measures against no-shows. Clear definitions, backed by sourced Spanish market data, to help you run your restaurant better.
What this glossary is for
This glossary gathers the terms you actually use on the floor and at the door: the ones that show up in a booking, in a contract with a portal, or in the maitre d' conversation on a Friday at nine. Each definition gets straight to the point, starts with the term itself, and reads on its own, with no filler.
We write it ourselves, the team building Qomanda at Alture (Granada), working every week with restaurants across Granada and Andalusia. So whenever there's a figure -a commission, the cost of a no-show, a sector rate- we give it with its source or as a clearly labelled conservative range, rather than dropping a round number that just sounds good. If the market isn't clear on something, we say so.
A booking engine and a portal are not the same thing
The term that causes the most confusion is "commission", and it almost always comes from mixing up two different things. A booking engine is the system that manages your availability and confirms tables on your own website; a portal or marketplace is, on top of that, a directory that can bring you new diners from its site in exchange for a fee on each booking.
Here it's worth being honest: a portal like TheFork can indeed bring you customers who didn't know you, something an in-house engine doesn't do. In return, it charges on every booking that comes through its portal (its published Spanish pricing is 0.95% + EUR0.50 per booking plus a monthly plan fee). Qomanda is your own booking engine, not a portal: it won't send you traffic from a directory, but it won't charge you per guest or per booking either; just a flat EUR49/month. Choosing well means knowing exactly what you're buying in each case.
The terms, made clear.
- No-show
- A no-show is a booking that never turns up and never cancels: the table stays blocked, no one else can take it, and the restaurant loses that revenue. In Spain the average no-show rate was 3.3% in 2025, down from 3.6% in 2024, and re-confirmations and card guarantees are among the levers that most help cut it.
- Overbooking
- Overbooking means accepting more bookings than the dining room can seat, betting that a share of guests won't show. It's a risky tactic: if more people turn up than expected you get waits, tables turned away at the door and bad reviews, so it's usually better to fine-tune real capacities and seatings than to oversell the room.
- Seating capacity (aforo)
- Seating capacity (aforo) is the maximum number of guests a restaurant can seat at once, capped by available tables, regulations and what the kitchen and floor can handle. Managing capacity per seating prevents overwhelming the pass and lets tables turn without creating queues.
- Seating / turn (turno)
- A seating, or turn (turno), is each time slot in which the restaurant seats a wave of guests; for example a first lunch seating at 1:30pm and a second at 3:00pm. Defining seatings and their average length lets you work out how many times a table can turn and how many bookings fit without swamping the kitchen.
- Waitlist
- A waitlist is the ordered queue of guests who want a table when there's no availability, whether they book online or arrive as walk-ins. A good system notifies the guest automatically the moment a table frees up, so a gap from a last-minute cancellation doesn't go to waste.
- Booking engine
- A booking engine is the system that manages availability and confirms bookings in real time, usually embedded in the restaurant's own website so guests book without calling. Unlike a portal or marketplace, an in-house engine -like Qomanda's- charges no per-guest commission, and the bookings and customer data belong to the restaurant, not to a middleman.
- Booking deposit (guarantee)
- A booking deposit or guarantee is an amount the restaurant holds or charges to the guest's card when they book, deducted from the bill or refunded if they turn up, and forfeited only on a no-show. It's among the most effective measures against no-shows, and its use is growing: in Spain, 21% of restaurants already required a card guarantee in 2025, double the 2023 figure. In Qomanda, deposits are charged on the restaurant's own Stripe account.
- Per-cover commission
- A per-cover commission is the fee some booking portals charge the restaurant for each guest or booking that comes through their platform. The exact model varies: TheFork, for instance, publishes a Spanish fee of 0.95% + EUR0.50 per booking plus a monthly plan. Qomanda charges no per-guest or per-booking commission, only a flat monthly fee of EUR49.
- Walk-in
- A walk-in is a guest who arrives without a booking and asks for a table on the spot. Handling them well -slotting them into the free gaps on the floor plan without jeopardising confirmed bookings- is key to filling the room in off-peak hours without creating waits.
- Cover
- A cover is each guest seated at a table; it's the unit used to measure occupancy, average spend and, on some portals, commission. Don't confuse it with a booking: a single booking of a table for four equals four covers.
Before you make the move.
What restaurants thinking about switching usually ask us. No fine print.
A booking engine manages availability and confirms tables on the restaurant's own website, with no per-guest charge. A portal like TheFork adds a marketplace that can bring in new diners from its site, in exchange for a fee on each booking from its portal (in Spain, its published rate is 0.95% + EUR0.50 per booking plus a monthly plan). Qomanda is an in-house engine: it won't send you directory traffic, but it charges no commissions either; just a flat EUR49/month.
Fill your room.
We handle the rest.
We migrate your restaurant with you and stay through the launch. You run the service; the software is on us.
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