What is Dispatch?

Dispatch is ezCater’s third‑party delivery solution for catering partners

Gives you access to professional catering drivers when you don’t have your own drivers or they’re at capacity
Available in all 50 states and covers about 97% of active locations on the ezCater Marketplace.
Managed by our Delivery team, who work with vetted delivery companies across the United States
Available for qualified orders that meet certain distance and timing requirements

Dispatch will provide delivery tracking for customers - helping you to automatically meet your delivery tracking requirements on these orders

Dispatch options:

On-Demand: request a driver up to 90 minutes before an order is due
Automatic: let us handle all of your deliveries
Configured: configure settings to have orders within certain parameters automatically routed to our drivers

How Dispatch works at a high level

Customer places a delivery order
- Order comes through the ezCater Marketplace or Online Ordering
You accept the order in the Partner Portal
- Confirm that you can prepare the food by the event time
You request Dispatch for delivery (On-Demand only)
- In the order’s delivery section, you select request Dispatch
- ezCater matches the order with the best available delivery partner in your area
You prepare the order for pickup
- Have the food packed and ready at the scheduled pickup time
Dispatch driver picks up and delivers
- The driver uses ezCater tools for navigation, communication, and tracking
- Delivery status is visible to you and the customer
Order completes and fees appear on your payment report
- Dispatch charges show up under Misc. Fees on your payment breakdown

Driver expectations

Dispatch drivers are expected to

Arrive at the restaurant at the scheduled pickup time
Have at least two insulated bags for keeping food at temperature
Handle food carefully in transit
Act professionally at pickup and drop‑off
Follow delivery instructions on the order
Provide basic setup at the drop‑off when noted in the order

What we expect from your restaurant

To make Dispatch successful, we ask that you

Have orders packed and fully ready at the listed pickup time
Follow ezCater’s packaging guidelines so food travels safely
Provide pickup instructions in your Settings to help ensure a smooth hand-off process
Ensure the driver has all food and beverage items before they leave

If the order is not ready on time, the driver may arrive late to the customer, which can hurt the customer experience and your Operational Metrics

Cost and how Dispatch fees work

How Dispatch fees are structured

For Marketplace and Online Ordering orders:

Customers pay you a delivery fee on every order (learn more about Delivery Settings here)
You pay a separate Dispatch fee when Dispatch handles delivery (see below)
Dispatch charges show up under Misc. Fees in your payment breakdown

Standard Dispatch pricing:

$30 minimum for orders up to $300
10% of the order subtotal for orders over $300

Tips left by customers for Dispatch deliveries are passed on to the delivery partner, not kept by the restaurant

On-Demand & Configured

If there's any difference between the delivery fee paid to you, and the Dispatch fee we charge you, you are responsible for paying that difference.

To avoid having a discrepancy between these fees, you can match the customer-facing delivery fee to the Dispatch fee

Automatic

When utilizing Dispatch automatically for all of your deliveries:

We will set the customer-facing delivery fee to match the Dispatch fee
The customer pays you for delivery, and we charge you the same amount to utilize Dispatch
In essence, you are passing the customer delivery fee to ezCater to have the delivery handled for you

Delivery commission

Our commission rate applies to both the subtotal and the delivery fee (paid by the customer) on all In-house deliveries and Dispatch On-Demand deliveries.

Automatic & Configured

For Automatic and Configured Dispatch we charge delivery commission as a flat fee instead of a percentage of the customer-facing delivery fee:

Orders less than $500 = $3 fee
Orders greater than or equal to $500 = $5 fee

This pricing structure helps reduce the cost of Dispatch delivery when using our delivery solution automatically or with configured settings.

This flat fee will be calculated as part of the commission line item shown on your weekly payments

Example Automatic Dispatch Order:

Subtotal: $700
Delivery fee: $70
Dispatch fee: $-70
Delivery commission: $5

The effective cost for using Dispatch delivery on this order is $5

Where you see Dispatch fees

In the Financials tab of the Partner Portal, each payout includes a breakdown that includes:

Miscellaneous fees – this is where Dispatch charges appear
Commission – delivery commission is included in the commission calculation (read more here)

You can download a payment order report to see Dispatch fees at the order level for reconciliation

Signup and setup

On-Demand

There is no signup or setup process for Dispatch On-Demand. If you are set to self-delivery, you'll have the ability to request Dispatch for orders that you can't deliver yourself.

Drivers can be requested up to 90 minutes before the delivery time

Configured

To configure settings that route certain orders automatically to Dispatch, go to Delivery → Dispatch. Read more about Configured Dispatch

Automatic Dispatch

To sign up for Automatic Dispatch:

Fill out this form

Email [email protected]

Partner Success will

Confirm coverage in your area
Review your current delivery settings and Operational Metrics
Coordinate any necessary configuration changes and confirm once changes are live

For some of our partners, Dispatch may be enabled by default to align with settings established at the brand level

Availability and order requirements

Dispatch is available in all 50 states and covers 97% of active locations on our platform. To confirm availability in your area you can email our Delivery team via [email protected]

Distance limits

Dispatch drivers can deliver orders up to 20 miles away from most restaurants
In some metropolitan areas (i.e. New York City) there may be restrictions or limitations on delivery distance
- Please email our Delivery Team for any metro-specific questions

Timing requirements

You will have the ability to request Dispatch On-Demand up to 90 minutes before the delivery time, given that there is an available partner in your area.
The Partner Portal will disable Request Dispatch as an option when an order does not meet these basic criteria.