Cloud restaurant POS and billing for South Africa — VAT-inclusive rand pricing done properly, PayFast and Paystack built in, and a POS that keeps taking orders when the lights go out.
| Bunny Chow (Mutton) | R 145.00 |
| Boerewors Roll | R 75.00 |
| Bobotie | R 165.00 |
| Rooibos × 2 | R 60.00 |
| Subtotal | R 445.00 |
| Incl. VAT 15% | R 58.04 |
| Total | R 445.00 |
The things that actually differ market to market — tax, currency, language and how people pay — handled rather than worked around.
SA menus quote VAT-inclusive prices. MealNix calculates the 15% back out of the inclusive price rather than bolting it on, so the guest pays the menu price and your VAT201 still reconciles.
Not workarounds. Cards, Instant EFT and local payment methods, settled in rand to your local bank account.
Runs on any Android phone or tablet, so a charged device keeps you billing through a slot when a mains-powered terminal would not.
Guests scan to browse, order and pay without waiting for a server — useful on a full Friday night with a short-staffed floor.
Stock deducts as you sell, with low-stock alerts and recipe-level costing so your food cost percentage is visible daily, not monthly.
Run outlets in different provinces from one dashboard with per-branch pricing and group-level reporting.
Every payment type lands in the same day-end report, so cash, card, gateway and delivery money reconcile together instead of in four places.
Built in, and it is the South African gateway. Cards, Instant EFT, Masterpass and more, settled in rand to your local account.
Also built in, covering cards and local payment methods for South African customers.
International cards for the tourist trade in Cape Town and the Winelands, and for corporate catering.
Keep your existing card machine or QR standee and record the payment type in MealNix so the day-end still balances.
What MealNix does, stated plainly.
One system that adapts to how your outlet actually runs.
Table plans, course-wise kitchen tickets, split bills and tip handling for the Joburg and Cape Town dining rooms.
Weight-based items, fast parcel billing and kitchen tickets routed to the grill separately from the pass.
Modifier-heavy drink menus, loyalty for regulars and counter-speed billing for the Woodstock and Braamfontein scene.
Stellenbosch and Franschhoek trade seasonally. International card acceptance and no minimum usage on the free plan.
Several delivery-only brands out of one kitchen, each with its own menu, pricing and reporting.
Advance bookings with part payments, bulk orders and ingredient planning against confirmed covers.
MealNix is cloud software with remote onboarding, so there is no install visit to wait for — wherever you are in South Africa, you can be billing today.
Bill from a phone on the floor, a tablet at the table or a full terminal at the counter.
English ships as the interface language, and the Language Pack module lets you add and edit others — including Afrikaans or isiZulu — if you need them.
Where a POS built for somewhere else tends to fall down.
| Capability | MealNix | Generic imported POS |
|---|---|---|
| Local tax handling | Vat at 15%, with per-item overrides | Often a single hard-coded rate, or none |
| South african rand formatting | Correct symbol, placement and decimal precision | Frequently forces two decimals and a foreign symbol |
| Interface language | English | Usually English only |
| Local payment rails | PayFast, Paystack | International cards only, if that |
| QR menu & table ordering | Included on paid plans | Usually a paid add-on |
| Runs on a phone or tablet | Yes — Android, iOS and web | Often needs proprietary hardware |
| Free plan | Free Starter plan, no time limit | Rarely offered |
Remote onboarding, so there is no waiting for an engineer to be in your city.
Create your restaurant, set your South African rand and your VAT rate. Takes a few minutes.
Import your existing menu rather than retyping it, then set modifiers, kitchen routing and pricing.
Link PayFast or another supported gateway, or keep your existing terminal and record payment types.
Train your staff on the terminal, phone or tablet you already have, and start billing. Support is available while you settle in.
Straight answers, including the ones that are not a simple yes.
MealNix is a cloud restaurant POS that runs in South Africa: it handles 15% VAT-inclusive rand pricing the way SA menus are actually priced, has PayFast and Paystack built in, and covers QR table ordering, kitchen displays, inventory and multi-branch reporting from Johannesburg to Cape Town. There is a free Starter plan and a 30-day free trial of the paid plans.
South African menu prices are quoted VAT-inclusive, so MealNix runs in tax-inclusive mode: the price on the menu is exactly what the guest pays. The 15% VAT is calculated back out of that inclusive price rather than added on top, and it is still broken out correctly on the tax invoice and in your VAT summary, so your VAT201 return reconciles against what you actually charged.
Yes, PayFast is a built-in integration rather than a workaround. It covers cards, Instant EFT and other local South African payment methods with settlement in rand to your local bank account. Paystack is also built in, and Stripe and PayPal are available for international cards, which helps with the Cape Town and Winelands tourist trade.
MealNix runs on any Android phone or tablet as well as a desktop browser, so a charged device keeps you taking orders and printing through a slot when a mains-powered terminal would be dead. You will still need connectivity for cloud sync, but a phone on mobile data covers that in most cases.
Yes. Run outlets in Gauteng, the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal from one dashboard with centralised menus, per-branch pricing and branch-level settings, while each location keeps its own POS terminals, kitchens and staff logins. Group reporting rolls everything together and branch reporting drills into one.
English ships as the built-in interface language. Afrikaans and isiZulu are not among the bundled translations, but the Language Pack module lets you add and edit your own language, so you can translate the interface yourself if your team would prefer it.
Yes. Paid plans come with a 30-day free trial, and the free Starter plan has no time limit, no per-user fee and no setup fee. You can import your existing menu rather than retyping it.
Running outlets in more than one country? Each market has its own page.
Free Starter plan with no time limit, or a 30-day free trial of the paid plans. No setup fee, no per-user fee.
Start Free Trial See PricingCloud-hosted • Remote onboarding • Menu import • Vat-ready invoicing