If you're a Creator and have questions about how you get paid when a viewer purchases an item from your StreamElements Merch Store, this article should help you answer those questions.
HOW DO I GET PAID?
Getting paid is easy - Navigate to the payments tab on your SE.Merch dashboard and click the withdrawal button. The withdrawal button remains grayed out until at least $20 is available for transfer. While we do not charge you for these transactions, we set a $20 threshold in order to prevent excessive processing fees. If you'd like to withdraw amounts less than $20, please contact Support here to have the limit temporarily removed.
If this is your first time withdrawing money from your SE.Merch account, you will first need to set up an account with Tipalti, our payment partner.
HOW DO I GET SET UP WITH TIPALTI?
In order to withdraw your profits, you must have an account set up with Tipalti. If you don’t have an existing account based off your account ID, you will automatically receive an invitation email when you make your first withdrawal. This email will come from payments@streamelements.com with information on how to complete your Tipalti setup. Or use this link to get the account set up right now.
This setup is only necessary on the first withdrawal.
SOMEONE BOUGHT SOMETHING BUT IT HASN'T SHOWN UP IN MY PROFIT YET...
No need to worry, we do not show profit for any orders on your dashboard until they enter production with our vendor. We do this for a couple of reasons:
- We hold orders for up to 18 hours before sending to our vendors to allow for cancellations or corrections to orders.
- We wait until the vendor updates the status on their end to “In Production” in case there are other issues that would affect the order being complete (like out of stock items).
If an order does not show up on your dashboard after 3 business days, feel free to reach out to our Support team and we will check into it for you!
WHAT IS TIPALTI?
Tipalti is our payment partner and is the same partner that Twitch uses. If this is your first payout through Tipalti, you will receive a notification email from payments@streamelements.com with a link to help you set up your account. If you did not receive this, check your spam folder. During this setup, you will provide any needed tax information based on your physical location and set up the payout method of your choice. Please note that any transaction costs shown at this time are fees charged and collected by your selected payment processor (i.e. PayPal, your bank etc) and are not charged by StreamElements.
I REQUESTED A PAYOUT. WHY HAVEN'T I RECEIVED MY MONEY YET?
Withdrawals can take up to 14 days.
After clicking the withdrawal button, your balance is manually reviewed to make sure the data is correct and any adjustments (refunds, cancellations, etc) are applied. You will be emailed by a member of our support team within 7 days notifying you of any changes to your balance.
Once the review is complete, the payment details get sent over to our partner, Tipalti and you will receive a notice email from payments@streamelements.com to let you know that the payment has reached the final stage and funds will be transferred within the week.
WHAT HAPPENS IF AN ORDER IS CANCELED/REFUNDED?
The end result will highly depend on the situation, typically a refund on an order can result in a reduction of your overall profit. These changes to your payout balance are usually reconciled when you are requesting a withdrawal of your profits and will not automatically update.
DO I HAVE TO PAY INCOME TAXES ON MY EARNINGS?
We do not take any income taxes out of your earnings but this does not mean that you do not owe taxes to your local government. We highly recommend reviewing local tax laws to make sure you are within compliance.
We are required to report to certain governments when payouts reach a certain threshold each year and not reporting these could cause additional headaches in the future. Please keep in mind that Sales Tax and VAT/GST/HST are different from Income taxes.
DO I HAVE TO REMIT SALES TAX/VAT?
Nope! Sales tax and VAT are a headache to handle, so we have taken care of that to the best of our ability for you. Please note that sales tax and income tax are two separate things
WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO "REMIT" SALES TAX AND VAT?
Remitting sales taxes is just another way to say sending money to pay a bill. Sales tax is money owed to the government for conducting a sale, much like a bill. In most cases, small businesses have to calculate and remit their own sales taxes but, for SE.Merch store sales, we do that for you!