Paid out by request, calculated by hand
A vendor asks, someone checks a spreadsheet, and a transfer is sent whenever someone gets to it.
MARKETPLACES · MULTI-VENDOR PAYOUTS
Paid reliably, with a buffer for what goes wrong later
A payout is the amount a specific vendor is owed from a specific transaction, calculated after fees and any held-back reserve, moved on a defined schedule. A vendor who does not know when they get paid stops trusting the marketplace, no matter how well the storefront works.
THE RANGE OF PRACTICE
What manual payouts look like, and what a reserved schedule looks like
Described by behaviour, not by a score.
Automatic payouts, no protection against disputes
Money moves on a schedule, but a refund after payout comes straight out of the marketplace's own funds.
Automatic, with a held-back buffer for disputes
Vendors are paid reliably, and a reserve absorbs the refund or chargeback risk instead of the platform eating it unexpectedly.
WHERE WE SIT
Scheduled, with a reserve, tracked per vendor
Part of every marketplace build, priced per project.
Payouts run on a stated schedule with a held-back reserve sized to the platform's actual dispute and refund risk, tracked per vendor rather than reconciled from a lump sum. This sits alongside escrow and settlement as core infrastructure on every marketplace we build, not an afterthought added once vendors start asking when they get paid.
STRAIGHT ANSWERS
Questions about multi-vendor payouts
The ones that come up before anyone signs anything.
The amount a specific vendor is owed from a specific transaction, calculated after fees and any held-back reserve, and moved to that vendor on a defined schedule. It is the step after settlement decides who is owed what.
A vendor who does not know when they get paid stops trusting the marketplace, regardless of how well the storefront works. A stated schedule, daily, weekly or on a rolling basis, is part of what makes a vendor treat the platform as a real channel rather than a side experiment.
A portion of a payout withheld temporarily to cover the risk of a refund, chargeback or dispute after the fact. Without one, a marketplace can pay a vendor in full and then have no funds left to refund a buyer when something goes wrong days later.
Escrow and settlement covers holding a payment and calculating who is owed what. This page is specifically about the payout mechanics: schedule, reserves and how a vendor actually receives their share.
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