You probably already know the 14% headline commission — Just Eat's website mentions it on every page. What most UK takeaway owners only work out after a year on the platform is that 14% is rarely the real cost. Once you factor in the promotions Just Eat steers you towards, the sponsored placement fees, refunds, and card processing, the all-in cost typically lands around 25–31% of gross delivery revenue.
This guide walks through six practical tactics UK takeaways use to bring that number down without leaving the platform. It's the rebalancing playbook — based on what we see working when we audit independent takeaway P&Ls. We covered the "should I leave entirely" question in should I leave Just Eat and go direct; this post is the answer if your decision is "stay but stop bleeding."
The honest one-line answer
You can't negotiate the base commission down (Just Eat doesn't budge below 11–13% even for high-volume merchants). What you can do is restructure how you use the platform to reduce the all-in cost from ~31% to ~18–22% of gross delivery revenue. Six tactics, ordered by impact for most UK takeaways.
The real all-in cost — what 14% actually means
Before the tactics, a clear breakdown of what a typical UK takeaway pays Just Eat on £15,000 monthly delivery revenue:
| Line item | Typical cost | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Base commission (Delivery service) | £2,700 (18%) | Or £2,100 (14%) on Order & Pay |
| Promotional discount cost | £1,500–£2,500 | If running 15% off offers continuously |
| Sponsored placement | £200–£400 | If paying for prime listing position |
| Refund cost | £150–£400 | Refunds usually paid by you, not Just Eat |
| Card processing | £225 (~1.5%) | Often bundled into commission |
| Total all-in monthly cost | £4,775–£6,225 | ~32–42% of gross delivery revenue |
The base commission is the floor. Every other line is something you have at least some control over. That's where the tactics work.
Tactic 1: Switch to Order & Pay if you have your own drivers (saves ~4%)
Just Eat offers two main commission tiers in the UK:[1]
- Delivery service — Just Eat's drivers deliver. 18% commission.
- Order & Pay — You deliver with your own drivers. 14% commission.
A 4-percentage-point gap on £15,000 monthly revenue is £600/month — £7,200 a year. The trade-off is you have to handle your own drivers, insurance, no-shows, and the operational overhead.
When this tactic is worth it:
- You already employ drivers for in-shop or telephone orders
- Your delivery radius is small enough to absorb without Just Eat's network
- You can hire a Friday/Saturday-only driver for £80–£120/night and still be ahead
When it isn't:
- You'd need to hire drivers specifically for Just Eat orders — the saving evaporates against driver wages
- Your radius extends past 3 miles and Just Eat's drivers are doing the long runs
- You can't absorb the legal/insurance complexity (your business insurance needs to explicitly cover delivery)
Most independents we audit doing £8,000+/month delivery have at least one in-house driver already. Switching them onto Order & Pay is the single biggest commission saving available.
Tactic 2: Cut the discounts and promotional spend
Just Eat heavily encourages running constant promotions — "15% off your first order", "20% off when you spend over £25", "free side with orders over £20". These are seductive because they drive volume; they're expensive because the discount cost comes out of your margin, not Just Eat's.
A typical UK takeaway running a perpetual 15% discount on Just Eat is paying:
- £1,500–£2,500/month in discount cost on £15,000 gross revenue
- A further psychological problem: customers anchor to the discounted price and won't pay full
The honest move: review every active promotion every 30 days. Pause anything that isn't measurably bringing in net-new customers (Just Eat's analytics dashboard shows this — "new vs returning" breakdown per promotion).
The promotions worth keeping:
- A first-order discount (acquires new customers cheaper than ads do)
- A short-term seasonal promo (Eid, Diwali, World Cup, Christmas) for visibility lift
- A specific quiet-day promotion (Tue/Wed lunch) that fills capacity rather than discounting peak
The promotions to drop:
- Everyday "20% off" that's just become how customers see your menu
- "Stamp card"-style promos that compound (10 stamps = free meal) — they cap your AOV
- Promotions stacked on top of each other ("15% off + free delivery") that aren't measured
Cutting from "continuous promo running" to "one promo at a time, measured monthly" typically saves a takeaway 5–10% of gross revenue. That's £750–£1,500/month on a £15,000 site.
Tactic 3: Stop or test-pause sponsored placement
Sponsored placement (sometimes called Premium Placement or Top Listing) is Just Eat's pay-to-rank feature — typically £50–£300/week to appear at the top of the search results in your area.
The honest test: pause it for a fortnight and watch the order volume. About 60% of takeaways we work with see no measurable drop. About 30% see a small drop (5–10%) that doesn't justify the spend. About 10% see a real drop (15%+) where it's worth keeping.
What this tells you:
- If you have strong organic ranking on Just Eat (good reviews, fast prep time, high acceptance rate), you don't need sponsored placement
- If your listing is new or has a low review count, sponsored placement is plugging that gap — but fixing the underlying issues (more reviews, faster prep) is a better use of the spend long-term
If you can't or won't pause it, at minimum change your spend tier monthly — Just Eat lets you adjust spend on a weekly basis. £80/week for four weeks beats £200/week sometimes, especially in quieter weeks.
Tactic 4: Renegotiate at contract renewal — only if you have real volume
Just Eat will negotiate on commission if (and almost only if) you're one of the following:
- A multi-location group (5+ shops)
- A top-3 shop by revenue in your postcode
- A new partner being onboarded in a competitive area where Just Eat needs supply
For everyone else, the "negotiation" is theatre — your account manager will say no.
If you genuinely fit one of the three: at renewal, request a rate review with specific comparison data (your monthly volume, your competitor count, what Deliveroo or Uber Eats has offered). Reasonable wins:
- 0.5–2 percentage points off commission for 6 months
- Free sponsored placement for 4–8 weeks
- A waived promo-spend commitment
Don't expect more than that without serious volume. And don't make a renegotiation request your only lever — the other five tactics move the dial much further for most independents.
Tactic 5: Rebalance — shift discount-sensitive volume direct
This is the long-game tactic. Most UK takeaways don't realise that their Just Eat customer base is roughly half loyal, half discount-shoppers.
The discount-shoppers will reorder from any platform showing them an offer. They're cheap to acquire and expensive to keep — they'll switch to Deliveroo the moment your offer disappears.
The loyal half ordered from you because they like your food. They'd happily order direct if you gave them a reason.
The rebalance:
- Print a "10% off your next direct order" flyer in every Just Eat bag
- Train staff to mention the direct ordering site to in-shop customers
- Run a small Google Ads test (covered in how much Google Ads cost for a UK restaurant) targeting your existing brand searches
The maths: every order shifted from Just Eat to direct saves you 25–31% commission. At a £25 average order value, that's £6–£8 per order. 100 orders/month shifted direct saves £600–£800 — roughly the same as switching to Order & Pay, and additive.
This is the slow tactic. Plan 12–18 months to materially shift the customer mix. But it compounds — once a customer is ordering direct, they don't go back.
Tactic 6: Re-price the menu for Just Eat reality
The tactic most owners are uncomfortable with: pricing your Just Eat menu higher than your direct menu.
Just Eat's terms allow this — you can have different prices on different sales channels. Most major chains (Pizza Hut, Wagamama, KFC) do it openly. Independents often don't because they fear customer backlash. The reality is that customers expect platform prices to be higher — they know the platform takes a cut.
A typical re-pricing strategy:
- 8–12% mark-up on every menu item for Just Eat / Deliveroo / Uber Eats
- Same prices on your direct site as in-shop
- A small note on the direct site: "Same prices as in-shop. No platform mark-up."
The maths: on £15,000 gross monthly revenue, a 10% mark-up at unchanged volume gets you £1,500 in margin back — enough to fully offset the base commission. Some customers will price-shop and notice. Most won't.
Common worry: "won't they switch to a competitor?" In practice, your platform competitors are doing the same thing. The competitor without the mark-up is the outlier — and is usually the one struggling financially.
What you can't do (the myths)
Things owners ask about that don't work:
- "Can I message customers and ask them to order direct next time?" — No. Just Eat's terms ban direct solicitation through the platform messaging system. They will suspend you. Use the bag-flyer and in-shop conversation routes instead.
- "Can I refuse certain orders to game my acceptance rate?" — Technically, but it'll drop your ranking on the platform. Don't.
- "Can I report a fake bad review for a fake refund to recover the cost?" — No. False reporting is grounds for suspension and isn't worth the £8–£15 refund recovery.
- "Will Just Eat give me a lower rate if I leave Deliveroo?" — Almost never. The exclusive-deal era ended around 2020.[2] Sometimes they'll throw in extra sponsored placement weeks, not commission reduction.
- "Can I pass the commission cost to the customer as a service charge?" — Technically yes if disclosed, but it backfires — Just Eat's algorithm penalises listings with high prices relative to local average.
FAQ
What's the actual minimum commission Just Eat will accept? For independents, around 13–14% on Order & Pay. Multi-location groups can sometimes negotiate to 11–12%. Below that is reserved for national chains. The official starting rate of 14% is the floor for ~90% of UK shops.
Does Order & Pay actually cost less than Delivery service after I factor in driver costs? Depends on volume. For a shop doing 200+ delivery orders/month, yes — driver fixed cost is amortised. For under 100 orders/month, the maths is borderline.
Will Just Eat punish me for cutting sponsored placement? No — they may show you fewer "premium opportunities" in your dashboard, but your organic ranking is unaffected. The pause-and-test approach is risk-free.
Should I renegotiate at every annual renewal? Worth asking, but unless you fit one of the three high-volume profiles (multi-location, top-3 in area, new partner being onboarded in a hot area), expect a no. Don't burn relationship capital on it.
Can I run a different menu on Just Eat vs my direct site? Yes. Some takeaways run a "Just Eat only" menu with simpler dishes that travel better, and a fuller menu on direct/in-shop. This also helps with re-pricing — different items can't be directly compared.
What about leaving entirely? Different decision. We cover the maths in detail in should I leave Just Eat and go direct. Short version: most owners are better off rebalancing first, then deciding at the 12-month mark.
The honest summary
You can't negotiate Just Eat's base rate. You can restructure how you use the platform.
The six tactics, in roughly the order of impact for most UK independents:
- Switch to Order & Pay if you have drivers (saves ~4 percentage points)
- Cut the perpetual promos — review every 30 days (saves 5–10%)
- Pause sponsored placement for a fortnight to test impact (saves 1–3%)
- Renegotiate at renewal if you have real volume to bargain with (saves 0.5–2%)
- Rebalance to direct — long-game customer shift (compounds over 12–18 months)
- Re-price the Just Eat menu by 8–12% (recovers 6–10% margin instantly)
What to do this week:
- Pull your last 3 Just Eat invoices and calculate your actual all-in percentage
- Pause one promotion and watch the order count for 14 days
- Lower your sponsored placement spend by 50% for the next 4 weeks
- Add 10% to your three highest-margin Just Eat menu items and watch reviews
If you're in London or another high-cost area, the platform maths is even harsher — sponsored placement and discount costs both run higher. Tightening all six tactics there typically delivers a bigger absolute saving than in a market town.
The bigger move — building a direct-ordering website and pairing it with more orders on Just Eat for the next 12 months — is the path that consistently turns delivery from a margin-killer back into the profit engine it should be. If you decide that's the route, our website design service covers the build side. But it starts with knowing what you're actually paying. Run the calculation this week.
Sources & further reading
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