Affiliates help generate revenue by referring customers to your business. WHMCS includes a comprehensive affiliate system with support for one-time and recurring commissions, either in percentages or fixed values. It also includes payout delays, minimum withdrawal limits, and live statistics and information for affiliates in the Client Area.

You can view and manage individual affiliates in the WHMCS Admin Area at Clients > Manage Affiliates.

Affiliate List #

The list of affiliates includes each affiliate, the number of visitors who have accessed their affiliate link, the number of those visitors who became new users, and their earned and withdrawn balances.

• To view the details for an affiliate, click either their ID number or the Edit () icon.
• To delete an affiliate, go to Clients > Manage Affiliates and click the corresponding red Delete icon.
  Deleting an affiliate does not remove the associated client account. However, it does remove all affiliate-related data (for example, referrals and commissions). Reactivating the client as an affiliate will not recover any prior affiliate data.

Assigning Affiliates to Orders #

To assign an affiliate to an existing referral-free order that contains a service:

1. Go to Orders > List.
2. Locate the order you want to assign to the affiliate.
3. Click the Order ID number to open the details for that order.
4. Click Manual Assign in the Affiliate section.
5. From the menu that appears, select the affiliate to assign to the order. Alternately, start typing the name of the desired affiliate.
6. Click Save.

To unassign an affiliate from an order:

1. From Clients > Manage Affiliates, select the order’s assigned affiliate.
2. Select the Referred Signups tab.
3. Click the red icon on the right side of the list to delete the relevant signup.

Affiliate Details #

From the affiliate’s details page, you can view details about commissions and configure affiliate-specific settings.

You can also access this from the client’s profile’s Summary tab by clicking View Affiliate Details in the Actions panel.

Affiliate Settings #

The settings available in the affiliate details allow you to override any product settings and the settings in the Affiliates tab at Configuration () > System Settings > General Settings.

You can configure the following settings:

• Commission Type — Select whether to provide a percentage of the price or provide a fixed amount per sale.
• Commission Amount — If you selected Fixed Amount for Custom Affiliate Payout, enter a monetary value to pay.
  • Check One Time Payout to prevent subsequent commission payments when the product renews. If you do not check this, the affiliate will receive a commission every time that the product renews.
  • If you did not select Fixed Amount, set Affiliate Pay Amount to 0.00.
• Visitors Referred — Enter a number to manually adjust the number of visitors who have visited the affiliate’s affiliate link.
• Available to Withdraw Balance — Enter a number to manually adjust the affiliate’s balance.
• Withdrawn Amount — Enter a number to manually adjust the amount that the affiliate has already withdrawn.

Referrals #

This tab displays a graph of visitors to the affiliate’s referral link and a list of the number of hits per referral URL.

To assign commission for an already-paid order to an affiliate, you can click Manual Payout for that order here. For more information and full instructions, see Affiliates.

Referred Signups #

This tab displays a list of clients who purchased products using the referral link and its associated cookies.

This tab shows the normal commission to pay on renewals. If the client used a one-time promotion code, the tab will not reflect the discounted amount. However, the Pending Commission or Commission History tabs will display it, as applicable.

For example:

• If the referred client uses a promotional code and the affiliate will receive a percentage commission, the system will reduce the value of the commission.
• If the referred client uses a promotional code and the affiliate will receive a fixed commission, they will still receive the full value.
• If someone uses an affiliate’s three months free promotional code, the affiliate gets the commission based on the first payment amount and then receives recurring amounts according to the product’s settings. The user would get a percentage of zero and therefore zero for the first three months.

Pending Commissions #

This tab displays a list of pending commissions and associated information. You can also manually delete pending commissions in this tab.

Commissions History #

This tab displays a list of paid commissions and associated information, and it allows you to add manual commission entries. Manual commission entries allow you to add an amount to the affiliate’s commission balance for any reason.

To manually add a commission entry:

1. Under Add Manual Commission Entry, enter the desired date for the entry.
2. Select the referral to associate with the commission entry or choose None.
3. Optionally, enter a description for the commission entry.
4. Enter the commission amount.
5. Click Submit.

WHMCS will immediately add the entered amount to the Available to Withdraw Balance total.

Paying Commission for a Paid Order #

You may wish to apply an affiliate to an order after it is paid, in which case the affiliate has missed the initial commission for that order.

To correct this:

1. Use the steps above to assign the affiliate to the order.
2. Go to Clients > Manage Affiliates.
3. In the Referrals tab, click Manual Payout for that order.

WHMCS will perform the necessary steps to credit the affiliate.

Withdrawals History #

This tab displays a list of withdrawals that the affiliate has made. You can also add a withdrawal manually. When you do this, WHMCS will immediately deduct the entered amount from the Available to Withdraw Balance total and add it to the Withdrawn Amount total.

When you do this, you can select from the following payout types:

• Create Transaction to Client — This automatically creates an expenditure transaction for the client’s account, reducing your profit figures for that client. You must still make the payment manually (for example, using a check or paying through PayPal®).
• Add Amount to Credit Balance — This automatically creates a credit on the client’s account that is equal to the value of the withdrawal amount to apply to the future invoices that they receive from you.
• Record in Withdrawals Only — This makes a record of the withdrawal in the affiliates area and doesn’t create any transaction or credit.

Last modified: October 30, 2024