Once you are enrolled in the affiliate program, your dashboard becomes the single place where referrals turn into money. This guide explains every number on it: how a commission is born when a referred business pays, why it sits in a pending state before becoming payable, what can reverse it, and how to actually withdraw your balance. If you have not joined yet, start with joining the affiliate program.
Remember that your commission terms — the percentages, the hold lengths, and your minimum payout amount — are configured individually for your account by the TrustRating team, and your dashboard always shows your exact terms.
Reading your dashboard
The top of the dashboard shows your referral link and a row of live counters:
- Clicks — how many times your referral link has been opened.
- Signups — visitors who created an account with your attribution active. Each one is a permanent referral.
- Customers — referrals that have gone on to make at least one plan purchase.
- Pending — commissions recorded but still inside their holding period.
- Payable — matured commissions you can withdraw.
- Paid out — everything already sent to you.
Below the counters, the commissions list shows each individual commission with its kind (first sale or recurring), the rate applied, the date it was earned, and — for pending ones — the date it matures. The payouts list keeps a history of your withdrawals with the method used and a payment reference.
The commission lifecycle
Every commission moves through a defined lifecycle, and understanding it removes most of the confusion about "where is my money":
- Pending. The moment a referred company's plan payment settles, a commission is recorded at your rate and enters a holding period. The hold exists because subscription money is not final money: payments can be refunded and brand-new subscribers sometimes cancel immediately. Your first-sale commissions and recurring commissions can have different hold lengths — both are part of your personal terms.
- Approved (payable). When the hold passes and the underlying payment is still good — no refund, and for a first sale, the subscriber is still subscribed — the commission matures automatically and joins your payable balance. You receive a notification when commissions mature.
- Paid. When a payout you requested is approved and sent, the commissions it covered are marked paid and move into your lifetime paid total.
- Reversed. If the underlying payment falls through, the commission is cancelled instead of maturing — the next section explains when that happens.
Two kinds of commission exist. A first-sale commission is earned on a referral's very first plan purchase, at your first-sale rate. Recurring commissions are earned on that customer's subsequent payments — renewals and upgrades — at your recurring rate, for as long as your recurring window lasts (a number of months counted from their first sale, defined in your terms). After the window closes, later renewals no longer generate commissions.
One more detail worth knowing: commissions are calculated on the net amount of a payment — after tax and after any account credit the customer applied — not on the sticker price. This keeps the number honest on both sides.
Why a commission may be reversed or reduced
A pending commission is a projection, not a promise. These are the situations that change it:
- The payment was refunded. A fully refunded payment reverses its commission entirely. If the refund happens to be partial, your commission is reduced proportionally to the money the platform actually kept, rather than being wiped out.
- The subscriber churned during the hold. First-sale commissions mature only if the referred customer is still subscribed when the hold ends. If they cancel or let the subscription expire during that period, the commission is reversed. The silver lining: a reversed first sale does not burn your first-sale deal — if that customer comes back and subscribes again later, their new purchase counts as a fresh first sale for you.
- A refund arrived after you were already paid. Occasionally a payment is refunded after its commission has been paid out to you. In that case the amount is recorded as a clawback balance on your account and is simply deducted from your next payout — you are never asked to send money back.
- Fraud review. Commissions flagged by integrity checks (for example, suspicious signup patterns) can be voided after human review. Genuine referrals are unaffected.
Reversed commissions stay visible in your history with the reason recorded, so your books and ours always match.
Earnings in multiple currencies
TrustRating customers pay in different currencies, and your commissions keep the currency of the payment that generated them. Your dashboard displays each balance per currency rather than converting everything into one number at an arbitrary exchange rate. When you request a payout, each request covers a single currency — if you have payable balances in more than one, withdraw them through separate consecutive requests.
Setting up your payout method
Before you can withdraw anything, save your payout details in the Payout method panel on the dashboard. Supported methods include:
- Bank transfer (IBAN) — enter your IBAN and the account holder's name. The form validates the IBAN checksum instantly, which catches virtually every typo before it can delay a payout.
- PayPal — the email address of your PayPal account.
- Stripe — the email your Stripe account is registered under.
- Crypto — a wallet address, with an optional note for the network or coin, either via the NOWPayments processor or as a manual transfer.
Double-check whatever you enter. The details you save are exactly what the team uses to send your money, and a wrong account is the most common cause of payout delays.
Requesting a payout
When your payable balance reaches your minimum payout threshold — shown right on the withdraw panel — the Request withdrawal button becomes available. Payouts are request-based and human-reviewed: nothing moves automatically. Here is the flow:
- You submit a withdrawal request. The amount is your payable balance in the relevant currency, minus any outstanding clawback.
- The request lands in the admin queue. You can have one open request at a time, and you can cancel it yourself any time before it is processed.
- An admin verifies the balance and your payout details, then approves and sends the money — or rejects the request with a reason, which appears on your dashboard so you can fix the issue and try again.
- Completed payouts appear in your history with the method and a payment reference.
How long does it take? Requests are reviewed by real people, so allow a few business days rather than expecting an instant transfer; bank and crypto rails then add their own settlement time. If a request seems stuck well beyond that, contact support with your affiliate code.
Taxes
Affiliate commissions are income, and you are responsible for declaring and paying any taxes that apply to you in your country. TrustRating pays out the amounts shown on your dashboard and does not withhold tax on your behalf. If you operate as a business, keep the payout references from your history for your records — they map one-to-one to bank or processor transactions.
Frequently asked questions
"A referral subscribed — why is my balance still zero?" Check the Pending counter. The commission exists but is inside its holding period; the maturity date is shown next to it in the commissions list.
"Why is my payable balance lower than the sum of my commissions?" Either some commissions are still pending, a reversal occurred, or a clawback from a refunded payment is being netted off. The commission list and its status labels tell the full story.
"Can I change my commission rates?" Terms are set by the TrustRating team per affiliate. If your reach has grown substantially, open a support ticket and make the case — terms can be revisited.
"My affiliate status says paused — do I lose my earnings?" No. A paused link stops attributing new signups, but customers you already referred keep generating commissions under your existing terms. Termination is the only status that stops accrual entirely, and even then your history and payable balance remain visible.