All Guides

Dinevate Reservations

Take table bookings directly from your restaurant website. Set your party-size limits, slot intervals, and confirmations, and manage every reservation from one dashboard with charts, filters, and one-click status updates.

What Reservations Does

Dinevate Reservations turns your website into a real booking system. Customers pick a date, time, and party size right on your site — no third-party app required, no commission per booking.

You get:

  • A /reservations page on your website with a clean booking widget.
  • A management dashboard where you see every reservation, with charts and filters.
  • One-click actions to confirm, mark seated, mark no-show, complete, or cancel.
  • Automatic emails and SMS to customers — confirmations, reminders before their visit, and a feedback request after.
  • Notifications to your staff every time a new booking comes in.

A Quick Note on Pricing

Dinevate Reservations is a paid add-on at $99/month. If you do not have it yet, your Reservations page in the dashboard shows a "Get Started with Reservations" button — clicking it walks you through subscribing in a few minutes.

You can manage your subscription anytime from the same page once you are signed up.

Getting to the Reservations Dashboard

  1. Open a browser and go to dinevate.com
  2. Log in with your restaurant account.
  3. Go to your Merchant Dashboard.
  4. In the sidebar on the left, click "Reservations".

You land on the Dinevate Reservations dashboard.

Multi-location: Reservation settings are managed from your main location only. Each location can have its own set of reservations once enabled.

Step 1 — Configure Your Reservation Settings

Scroll down on the Reservations page and expand "Reservation Settings". This is where you tell Dinevate how your reservations should work.

Turn Reservations On

  • Enable Reservations — Switch on to start accepting bookings on your website. When off, the public page returns 404 and the booking widget disappears.

Capacity and Timing

  • Max Party Size — The largest party you accept online (e.g., 8). Larger groups should call you directly.
  • Slot Interval (minutes) — How often a new time slot opens. Pick 15, 30, or 60. Most full-service restaurants use 30.
  • Reservation Duration (minutes) — How long each booking blocks a slot. Set this to your typical turn time (e.g., 90 for casual, 120 for fine dining). It also prevents bookings too close to closing time.
  • Max Reservations Per Slot — How many parties can book the same time. This is a clock-time capacity, not table count. If you can comfortably seat three new parties at 7:00 PM, set it to 3.

Note: Slot times are based on your restaurant's regular Opening Hours (set in Restaurant Settings). The reservation page does not have a separate hours editor — keep your hours up to date there.

Lead Time

  • Min Advance Booking (hours) — How far in advance customers must book (e.g., 2 hours). Prevents same-second bookings.
  • Max Advance Booking (days) — How far ahead customers can book (e.g., 60 days). Prevents people booking a year out.

Confirmation Behavior

  • Auto-Confirm Reservations — When on, every booking is automatically confirmed. When off, new bookings come in as PENDING and you have to manually confirm them.

Tip: Most restaurants leave Auto-Confirm on. Turn it off only if you need to review every booking (limited seating, special menus, etc.).

Customer Information

  • Require Phone Number — Recommended on. A phone number helps you confirm and track no-shows.

Reminders

  • Reminder (hours before) — How many hours before the reservation to send the customer a reminder. Common values: 24 or 2 hours. Reminders are sent automatically and only go out for CONFIRMED reservations.

Notifications to Your Staff

  • Email Notifications — Switch on, then add the email addresses that should receive new-reservation alerts. Click "Add email" to add more recipients.
  • SMS Notifications — Switch on and add phone numbers for text alerts. Click "Add phone number" to add more recipients.

Reservation Policy

  • Reservation Policy — Optional text shown to customers during booking. Use this for cancellation rules, deposit policies, dress code, late-arrival grace period, etc.

When you are done, click "Save Settings".

Step 2 — Watch Your Reservations Roll In

Once enabled, the top of the Reservations page becomes your control center.

Stat Cards

Four cards at the top show:

  • Total Reservations — All time
  • Upcoming — Confirmed and pending bookings still ahead
  • Completed — Reservations that finished successfully
  • No-Show Rate — Percent of confirmed bookings where guests did not show up

Each card is clickable and acts as a quick filter for the table below.

Charts

Once you have a few bookings, charts appear: Reservations Over Time, Status Breakdown, Average Party Size, and Peak Hours. Great for spotting patterns (e.g., that Tuesday night is always your slowest, or you are booked solid every Saturday at 7).

Calendar

A monthly calendar lets you click a date to filter, or click two dates to set a range. Use the chevron arrows to switch months.

Reservations Table

Below the calendar is your reservations table. The title changes based on your filters (All / Upcoming / Completed / No-Show Reservations, or a date range).

  • Search by customer name or confirmation code.
  • Click "Filters" to open Advanced Filters: status chips, Source, Party Size (min/max), From Date / To Date.
  • Click "Reset" or "Clear all filters" to start over.

Managing a Reservation

In the table, click the ⋯ (more) menu on any row to take action. The available actions depend on the reservation's current status.

  • View Details — Open the full booking details (any time).
  • Edit Notes — Add or update internal notes for your team (any time).
  • Confirm — Available when status is PENDING. Marks the booking confirmed and triggers the customer's confirmation email.
  • Mark Seated — Available when CONFIRMED. Use when the guest arrives and is seated.
  • Mark No-Show — Available when CONFIRMED. Use when the guest does not show. This counts toward your no-show rate.
  • Mark Completed — Available when SEATED. Use when the meal is finished. The next day, customers receive a feedback request email.
  • Cancel Reservation — Available when PENDING or CONFIRMED. A dialog asks for an optional Reason and shows "Keep Reservation" or "Cancel Reservation" buttons. The customer is emailed (and texted) about the cancellation.

Tip: Get into the habit of marking Seated → Completed as service flows. Your stats and charts get a lot more useful when the data is up to date, and the post-visit feedback emails only go out to completed reservations.

What Customers See

Your public Reservations page lives at yourdomain.com/reservations (or /restaurants/{your-restaurant-id}/reservations).

The booking flow is 3 quick steps:

  1. How many guests? — Pick party size; click Continue. (There is also an optional "Looking to change an existing reservation?" lookup using a confirmation code like AB12CD34.)
  2. Pick a date and time — Available slots are calculated from your hours, slot interval, duration, and max-per-slot setting.
  3. Complete your reservation — Enter name, phone (if required), email, and any special requests. Click Confirm Reservation.

After booking, customers see a success page:

  • "Reservation Confirmed!" if Auto-Confirm is on, or
  • "Reservation Received!" if it is pending your manual confirmation.

They get a confirmation email with a unique confirmation code and a link to manage their reservation.

Customer Self-Service (Manage Page)

Customers can use their confirmation code to view, edit, or cancel their reservation at /reservations/manage/{code}.

  • View — See date, time, party size, and any policy info.
  • Edit Reservation — Change date, time, or party size — only if the reservation is PENDING or CONFIRMED and the visit is still in the future.
  • Cancel Reservation — A dialog asks "Yes, Cancel" or "Keep Reservation".

You and the customer are both notified by email any time something changes.

Email and SMS Notifications

Dinevate handles all the messaging automatically:

  • New reservation created
    • Customer: confirmation or "received" email + SMS
    • You / staff: new-reservation email + SMS
  • Customer edits booking
    • Customer: updated confirmation email
    • You / staff: edit notification email
  • Customer cancels
    • Customer: (none — they did it themselves)
    • You / staff: cancellation notification email
  • You cancel
    • Customer: cancellation email + SMS
    • You / staff: (none — you did it)
  • Reminder hours before visit (CONFIRMED only)
    • Customer: reminder email + SMS
    • You / staff: (none)
  • Day after a completed visit
    • Customer: feedback request email
    • You / staff: (none)

Heads up: Reminder emails and SMS go out only for CONFIRMED reservations. If you turn off Auto-Confirm and forget to confirm a booking, the customer will not receive their reminder.

Quick Tips and Best Practices

  • Set your hours first. Reservations are built on top of your Restaurant Settings → Opening Hours, so make sure those are accurate before enabling reservations.
  • Use Auto-Confirm. Most restaurants benefit from instant confirmations. Turn it off only when you really need to gate every booking.
  • Set Reservation Duration honestly. If you say 60 minutes but parties really stay 90, you will overbook. Use your real average turn time.
  • Send a 2-hour reminder. This dramatically cuts no-shows. You can also set a 24-hour reminder if your customers tend to plan ahead.
  • Use Reservation Policy to communicate cancellation windows, deposit rules, large-party policies, etc.
  • Keep your statuses updated. Mark Seated → Completed as service flows so your stats, no-show tracking, and customer feedback emails all work properly.

Need Help?

If something is not working or you have a question, head to your Support Center in the dashboard sidebar and create a new case. Our team will get back to you fast. The full process is covered at the bottom of the Getting Started guide.