How do affiliate payouts work?

An affiliate payout is the payment that sends an affiliate the commission they have earned: the money a store owes them for the sales they referred. Most programs pay on a schedule, such as once a month, or once an affiliate's earnings reach a set amount, called a payout threshold. The store chooses how to pay, for example automatically to a bank account, through PayPal, or as store credit.

What you will learn

• How payout thresholds and schedules decide when affiliates get paid
• The common ways to pay affiliates: automatic payouts, PayPal, store credit, and manual payments
• Who pays payout processing fees

When affiliates get paid

Payout thresholds

A payout threshold is the minimum amount an affiliate must earn before a payout is sent. For example, with a $50 threshold, an affiliate who has earned $30 waits until later sales bring their balance to $50. Thresholds avoid sending many very small payments.

Payout schedules

A payout schedule sets the dates when payouts go out, such as the end of each month. Many programs combine the two: on each payout date, every affiliate whose balance has reached the threshold gets paid.

In Simple Affiliate, Autopay, the automatic payout option, can combine the two. With its monthly schedule turned on, at the end of each month it creates a payout for every affiliate whose earned commission has reached the payout threshold you set, and a smaller balance rolls over to the next month. You can also require your confirmation before the money is sent. Explain your threshold and schedule to affiliates so payouts do not surprise anyone.

Ways to pay affiliates

Simple Affiliate supports these payout methods:

• Autopay: pays affiliates automatically through Stripe, a payment processor. You connect a bank account, debit card, or credit card through Stripe to fund payouts, and Simple Affiliate sends each eligible affiliate the full amount they are owed, with no fee taken out. Affiliates connect their own bank account through Stripe in their affiliate dashboard, the page where they see their referrals and earnings, to receive it.
• PayPal: pays affiliates from your PayPal Business account. You can turn on a monthly schedule that creates payout batches, groups of payouts sent together, at the end of each month.
• Store credit: pays affiliates with Shopify store credit, a balance added to the affiliate's customer account on your store that they can spend at checkout.
• Manual payments: on the Premium plan, Simple Affiliate tracks commission earnings and payout history while you send the actual payments yourself, for example by bank transfer. Completing those payments is your job.

Who pays processing fees?

A processing fee is the charge for moving money from the store to the affiliate. In some programs the fee comes out of the affiliate's earnings. In Simple Affiliate, fees never come out of an affiliate's commission: Autopay processing fees are charged to you, the merchant, on top of the commission. They are separate from your Simple Affiliate subscription, and they depend on your plan and the payment method you connect. The Simple Affiliate pricing page lists the fees for each plan and payout method.

To see how to turn on Autopay and set your payout schedule, read How to set up autopay in the help center.