Referrals and Commission Payouts

Referrals and Commission Payouts

MerchantFlow pays a recurring commission for merchants you refer. The person you refer gets a discount, you earn a share of what they pay, and both run for a year.

The terms

Commission is calculated on the net amount the referred merchant actually pays -- after their referral discount, not on list price.

Who can refer

Three kinds of account can own a referral code:

• Merchants -- any MerchantFlow merchant, from Settings → Billing
• Partners -- the formal partner program for coaches, 3PLs, and consultants, joined at signup
• Agencies -- an agency earns the standard referral commission when a client it covers moves to its own paid billing

How a referral is credited

Most referrals are credited at checkout: the merchant enters your code during Stripe or Shopify checkout, gets their 10% off, and you start accruing. Your code also comes with a share link (merchantflow.ai/?ref=YOURCODE) that takes whoever follows it straight to the signup page and pre-fills the code for them at checkout.

Referrals can also be credited manually by MerchantFlow, to account for off-platform referrals where a partner sent the merchant but no code was entered. In that case the merchant receives no discount -- they already subscribed at full price -- and the partner accrues commission from that point forward.

Referral codes

A code carries the terms it was issued with:

Pausing a code stops new redemptions without affecting merchants who already used it -- their discount and your commission continue. Archiving retires it permanently.

When commission becomes payable

Commission is recorded per settled payment and moves through these states:

The hold window

Commission is held before it becomes withdrawable:

• 45 days after each monthly charge settles
• 90 days after an annual charge settles

The hold protects against refunds. Annual plans get a longer hold because one annual charge accrues a full year of commission in a single lump, where a monthly plan accrues a small slice at a time.

Refunds

If the referred merchant is refunded, commission is clawed back only before it is paid out. Entries that are still pending or available are reversed. Entries already reserved for a payout or paid are left alone -- the hold window is the protection, and once it has passed the commission is yours.

Viewing your earnings

Dashboard → Payouts shows four balances:

• Lifetime earned -- everything accrued and not reversed, including what has already been paid
• Pending (maturing) -- still in the hold window
• Available to withdraw -- ready now
• Paid out

Reversed commission is not included in lifetime earned. Reserved and reversed entries are visible in the ledger rather than as their own balance tiles.

Below the balances, a Commission ledger lists every entry -- referred merchant, cycle, merchant paid, commission, settled date, matures-on, and status. Below that, Payout history lists each withdrawal with its amount, status, request and completion dates, and Wise reference.

Getting paid

Payouts run through Wise. Set up your payout details at Dashboard → Settings → Payouts before your first withdrawal.

You will provide:

• Payout currency -- chosen from the currencies Wise supports for payouts
• Account holder name
• Account holder type -- Personal or Business
• Bank details -- the exact fields depend on your payout currency and country, and are requested by Wise for that combination. When Wise offers more than one account type for that currency, you pick one first

Your bank details go to Wise rather than being stored on MerchantFlow's servers. Once saved, the page shows a masked summary of the account -- account holder, currency, and masked account number.

Commission accrues in USD. Wise deducts its transfer fee from the payout and converts the remainder into your payout currency, so the currency you choose does not change what you earn -- only what lands.

You can withdraw once your available balance reaches the minimum payout amount shown on the Payouts page ($50 by default). Below that, the Withdraw button stays disabled and tells you the threshold.

Common questions

Does the referred merchant have to stay subscribed for me to get paid? You earn on payments they actually make. If they cancel in month three, you earned three months of commission and no more.

What happens after 12 months? Both the merchant's discount and your commission end. They move to standard pricing.

Can I refer someone who already has an account? The code is entered at checkout, so it works for anyone who has not subscribed yet -- including someone who already signed up and is still on trial. It is not applied retroactively to a subscription that is already running. For an off-platform referral that never got a code, MerchantFlow can link the merchant to your code manually.

Can I use my own referral code? No -- codes cannot be redeemed by the account that owns them.

Why is my available balance lower than lifetime earned? Lifetime earned includes commission still inside its hold window, commission reserved for a payout in progress, and anything already paid. Only available is withdrawable now. Reversed commission is excluded from lifetime earned entirely.

Do referrals affect my own bill? No. Commission is paid out to you separately; it is not credited against your subscription.