The Real Cost of AI Phone Answering for Restaurants
Two plans. No monthly fee. No setup fee. Here is what restaurants actually pay at different order volumes — and how to figure out which plan is cheaper.
Most AI phone services quote a monthly fee, add per-call charges, and leave it to the restaurant to figure out what that actually costs. DineCall AI works differently: two flat-rate options, no monthly minimum, no setup fee. The math is simple enough to do on a napkin — but the numbers are worth spelling out clearly.
The two options, plainly
Option 1: DineCall takes 10% of every order. The commission is capped at $1,000 per month — so after roughly $10,000 in monthly orders, every additional order costs nothing in commission. Option 2: a flat $3 per order and $3 per reservation. No cap. No percentage.
Which plan is cheaper depends on volume
For phone orders alone, the crossover point is simple to calculate. At $3 per order, the 10% plan costs the same once monthly orders reach $3,000 — because 10% of $3,000 is $300, which is also 100 orders at $3 each. Above that volume, the 10% plan caps and saves money. Below it, the flat rate wins.
Where it gets more interesting is when reservations are included. A restaurant that takes 20 phone orders a day and books 5 tables a day pays $60 in flat fees per day under Option 2 — $3 times 20 orders plus $3 times 5 reservations. At 30 days, that is $1,800 per month, which is more than the $1,000 cap on Option 1 once monthly order revenue crosses $10,000.
What the numbers look like at real restaurants
King Do Seafood in Surrey, BC has taken over 100 phone orders through DineCall AI. At their average order size, the 10% plan caps well within a typical month for a busy Cantonese restaurant. Yuan's Garden in Richmond takes both phone orders and table reservations on the same call — every confirmed booking arrives on the reservation board instantly, with no staff time required for the intake call.
For Hao's Restaurant Group, three separate phone lines — Hao's Lamb Restaurant, Royal Beef, and Hao's Tapas Kitchen — all route through DineCall AI. Multi-location groups reach custom pricing by writing to hello@dinecall.ai.
What is included in both plans
The plan is all-inclusive by design. Both options cover: the AI voice host answering the phone 24/7 in English, Cantonese, and Mandarin; table reservations with real availability checks; online and QR code ordering; a restaurant website built and hosted by DineCall; the kitchen order board that consolidates phone, web, and QR orders in one view; and the customer CRM with order history. The restaurant does not pay extra for any of these as add-ons.
Setup cost and timeline
There is no setup fee. Configuration — menu digitization, bilingual translation verification, and routing tests — is typically completed in 2 to 3 business days. The restaurant keeps its existing phone number; call routing is set up through conditional call forwarding. The kitchen board starts showing orders as soon as the first call is routed.
What DineCall does not charge for
Payments are processed through Stripe, PCI-DSS compliant. Call recordings are encrypted at rest and in transit. The restaurant owns all its customer data and exports it from the dashboard. No setup fee. No monthly minimum. No per-location markup unless a custom multi-location agreement is signed.
FAQ
Q: Is there a minimum monthly commitment? A: No. There is no monthly subscription fee in either plan. You pay per order under Option 2, or per order under Option 1 with a monthly ceiling.
Q: If I am already taking 30 phone orders a day, does the 10% plan cap save me money? A: Likely yes. At 30 orders a day and a $40 average order value, monthly order revenue is roughly $36,000. Ten percent of that is $3,600, but the cap brings it back to $1,000. Compare that to $3 per order at 900 orders a month: $2,700 under Option 2.
Q: Does the 10% cap apply to reservations too? A: The cap applies to orders. Reservations are free under Option 1 and $3 each under Option 2.
Q: What if I run more than one location? A: Custom pricing is available for multi-location groups. Write to hello@dinecall.ai with your location count and approximate monthly order volume.