App

Commission and compensation

How Owneli calculates staff commission — rules, tiers, sale vs redemption recognition, and where every dollar is explained in the ledger.

Updated Aug 14, 2026

Commission is computed automatically from the rules on each team member's Compensation tab. Every earned amount is written to a commission ledger with a full trace of the rule, base, and math that produced it — so a disputed number is always explainable, never a mystery.

Compensation and banking need the team-management permission; they're not visible to regular staff.

How is commission calculated?

When a sale closes, each line finds the most specific rule that covers it, in this order:

item → employee → role → level → location → organization

A rule set on a specific service beats the member's personal rule, which beats their role's rule, and so on down to an org-wide default. The winning rule then applies its math:

Rule elementWhat it does
Applies toWhich line types the rule covers: services, add-ons, products, packages, memberships, gift cards, late fees
RateA fixed percentage, or tiered bands based on the provider's period-to-date sales
Tier styleProgressive (each band's rate applies to sales within that band) or retroactive (crossing a threshold re-rates the whole period)
BaseWhether the base is before or after discounts and tax, and whether product or service costs are deducted first

Configured deductions (backbar, consumables, flat or percentage) can reduce the base before commission or the amount after it, always clamped so a line never goes negative.

Packages and memberships: who earns, and when

Selling a package or membership and redeeming it are different events, and your recognition policy decides which one pays:

PolicyWho earns
On sale (default)The seller earns the full commission when the cart closes
On redemptionThe sale pays nothing; the provider who performs each redeemed service earns then
SplitA configured share at sale, the remainder at redemption
Changing the recognition policy applies going forward only — it never silently restates past periods. Historical figures change only through an explicit recompute.

Worker classification gates commission

Each member's classification (on the wage side of Compensation) controls whether the commission engine pays them at all — employees and contractors earn commission; a booth renter does not. The engine always reads the member's current classification: if you change someone's classification and then recompute past periods, the recomputation uses today's classification, not the one they held at the time.

Setting it up

Open the member's Compensation tab

Team → click the member → Compensation. You'll see their live rules, expired rules, and their level assignment.

Add a rule

Use the add-commission wizard: choose what it applies to, the rate or tier bands, and the base options. You can also copy rules from another member to keep a team consistent.

Assign a level (optional)

Levels are org-wide commission defaults ("Senior stylist", "Junior"). A member with no personal rule falls back to their level's rule.

Where to see the results

  • Growth → Reports → Commission statement — per-provider commission with a drill into every line's rule, base, and band math.
  • Growth → Reports → Payroll & commission — hours, tips, and commission folded into total payable.
  • Staff see their own trailing commission and tips on My hours — see See your own hours.

Common questions

Why is a team member's commission zero?

Check, in order: their classification earns commission (not booth renter), a rule actually covers the line type sold, and the sale's recognition event matches the policy (an "on redemption" package sale pays nothing at sale time).

Two rules could apply — which wins?

The more specific scope always wins; ties never split. An item-level rule beats everything below it.

Can a staff member challenge a commission line?

Yes — commission disputes are tracked per line so a question lands on the exact ledger row, with its rule trace as the evidence.

Keep reading

Related

3
Prepare payroll for your accountantEmail a pay-period payroll summary — hours, tips split by card and cash, and commission — straight to your accountant as PDF and CSV.See your own hoursCheck your own worked hours, breaks, and recent commission and tips on the My hours page — available to every staff member.Which report answers my question?A directory of Owneli's 60+ reports grouped by the question you're asking — sales, money, team, clients, appointments, and stock.