Diner FAQ

Everything on the diner's side of AskFoodie, in one page: the restaurant page a QR code opens, the cards you fill by turning up, and what happens to the rewards you earn. No app to download, and no sign-up until you want one.

I scanned a QR code — what am I looking at?

The restaurant's own page. What's on is the first tab (their updates and offers), Menu is one tap away, and the check-in card at the top is how you earn a punch on their loyalty card.

The menu shows what they're serving right now — if a place runs a breakfast menu, you won't be shown it at dinner.

Can I order from it?

No. Ordering is with the staff, as usual — nothing here reaches the kitchen, and payment stays exactly as it always was. The page is for reading the menu and for loyalty.

Do I need an account?

Not to read a menu, and not to start collecting at a place with a tap tag. You need one to use a reward, because rewards live in your account.

Getting one is an email code — no password.

Where do my cards live?

Your punch-cards from every restaurant are in one wallet at /me/punch-cards, the stamps you collect across restaurants fill your Foodie Passport, and everything you've earned is at /me/rewards.

What's the 4-digit code for?

It's how a restaurant knows you're actually there. Scan their QR code, open the 4-digit code on the check-in card at the top of their page, and show it to staff — that one step punches every card you're collecting. Codes last an hour and belong to one restaurant.

It's for collecting, not for spending. You don't need a check-in to use a reward.

There's a tap tag on the counter — what happens if I tap it?

Your stamp lands straight away. Wake your phone, hold it near the tag, and a page opens showing the stamp you just earned. No app, no code to read out, and nobody on the restaurant's side has to do anything.

You don't need an account for this. If you're not signed in, the visit is saved on the phone you tapped with, and the page offers to move it onto a real card — that's the Save these to my card button. Take it or ignore it; the stamp is already yours either way.

I tapped without signing in. Where did my visits go?

They're held on that phone, waiting for you. You can collect up to 3 visits at each restaurant this way. On the fourth, the page asks you to sign in before it'll keep going.

When you do sign in — with an email code, wherever you happen to be — every visit you've banked moves onto your cards at once, across all the restaurants you tapped at. Tap at four different cafés over a month, sign in once, and all four are waiting for you.

Two things worth knowing:

• Visits held on a phone can be lost. They live in your browser, so clearing your browsing data or switching phones loses the ones you haven't saved yet. Signing in is what makes them permanent.
• You need an account to use a reward. Collecting works signed out; spending doesn't, because your rewards live in your account at /me/rewards. If a tap fills a card, sign in and it's there.

Where do my rewards go?

To /me/rewards — everything you've earned, from any restaurant and any programme, in one list. Nothing is applied automatically, and nothing expires quietly: each one shows the date it runs out.

How do I use a reward?

At the table, when you order — not at the till, and with no check-in needed.

1. Tap Show staff on the reward. If it's a Foodie Passport reward, pick which of your stamped places you're at first; you'll see what that place gives.
2. Hold your phone up to staff. The screen names the reward and any fine print. Nothing has been spent yet — if they can't honour it right now, just close it and it's still yours for next time.
3. Tap Use it now once they've said yes. That's the one step you can't take back, and it's after they've agreed.

If something goes wrong after that, staff can hand the reward back to you rather than burning it.

How many rewards can I use in one visit?

One per restaurant per 3 hours, whichever programme it came from. Use a punch-card reward at a place and your Foodie Passport reward is dimmed there for 3 hours, and the other way round — you're one bill to them either way.

A dimmed reward always says why, and when you can use another. It's never lost: a reward you don't use is there next visit.

Where is a reward valid?

• A punch-card reward works only at the restaurant that gave it to you. That's fixed when you earn it.
• A Foodie Passport reward works at any of the places you stamped on the page that minted it — your choice which. Not at partners you never visited: whoever honours it pays for it themselves, so it's always somewhere you actually ate.

What does Follow do?

It's how you hear what's on at a place you like. Tap Follow on a restaurant's page (or on a deal card, or after tapping their counter tag) and their updates — a new dish, an event, a change of hours, an offer — start showing up on your home feed.

By default that's it: a feed, and one email on Thursday covering everywhere you follow. No notifications unless you ask for them.

Can I get notified instead?

Yes, and on your terms. On a place you already follow, open Following and pick Weekly email + alerts. Then two rules protect you:

• Everything arrives bundled. Follow twenty restaurants and you still get at most one notification per window — never twenty.
• You choose the windows. 10am, 4pm, both, or neither. Neither means no notifications at all, and you keep the weekly email.

A restaurant can only put something in that bundle once a day, twice a week — and if nothing is waiting, nothing arrives.

Tapping a notification opens your home feed at /me, where the new items are grouped at the top under New.

So I'll get a notification at 10am and 4pm every day?

Almost never. Those are the only times you can be interrupted — not a schedule. A window only fires if something is actually waiting for you, and on most days nothing is.

Following something and being notified about it are two different things:

A restaurant can only mark something once a day and twice a week, so most of what they post reaches you quietly, in your feed, and never buzzes at all.

Your feed is trimmed, not filtered: a place that posts constantly shows you its latest couple rather than all of it, and undated posts drop off after about a month. Anything still running stays. A restaurant's own page always has everything.

Follow twenty places and you still get at most two notifications a day, and usually none.

If I unfollow, do I lose my punches?

No. Never. Unfollowing stops the email and the notifications and nothing else — every punch, every card and every reward you've earned stays exactly as it is. Those were the restaurant's promise to you, not the newsletter's.

The menu looks shorter than the printed one

You're seeing what's being served at this hour. Restaurants can put items on a breakfast, lunch or happy-hour menu, and anything not currently being served drops off the page rather than sitting there unavailable. Come back at another time and the rest is there.