Platform Settlement

Sometimes Fiscal Hosts need to pay Open Collective their share of tips and host fees. Read on to learn about how Open Collective handles the settlement process.

The settlement process is only triggered after the cumulative amount of money owed passes $10.

For example, if in January your Fiscal Host owes $5 and in February your collective owes $6, in February you will be charged $11.

A special type of expense is created when you owe Open Collective money from Platform Tips or Host Fees.

Platform Tips are an optional fee that contributors can add on top of contributions and added funds to support the Open Collective platform. If a tip is made with a bank transfer transaction, the money—including the tip—will arrive in your bank account. Similarly, if you give a tip when adding funds manually, it represents money sitting in your bank account already.

When a payment with a tip goes through Stripe, the tip is automatically diverted to Open Collective and you don't need to do anything.

Host Fee Share is the 15% that a Fiscal Host pays to Open Collective when they charge their hosted Collectives a Host Fee.

Every month, the total amount of money owed from platform tips that were sent to the Fiscal Host through manual bank transfers and host fee share is calculated, and submitted to the Fiscal Host as an expense. We refer to this total figure as the Platform Settlement.

Platform Settlement Expenses will automatically appear once per month if any tips or host fee shares are due to be transferred to Open Collective. You can proceed to approve and pay it like any other expense.