Affiliate program

The affiliate program pays a partner a share of what a customer they refer goes on to pay, for a set period. Owners and admins configure and run the program from Affiliates (Configuration); an affiliate follows their own referrals, earnings and payouts from the Affiliate dashboard. Everyone joins under one agreement, and the deal a referral was made under never changes underneath it later.

• Joining: an affiliate applies free from the public affiliate page, or an admin adds them directly with an email and a referral code. Joining means accepting the affiliate agreement: a real, dated document, readable in full on its own page, not a checkbox with nothing behind it. Once approved, the affiliate gets a personal link and can see everything from their own dashboard.
• What they earn, and for how long: the program pays a percentage of what a referred customer pays (WorkBOS’s own program today: 30% of everything they pay, for their first 24 months) or, for some programs, a flat amount instead. The exact rate, whether it repeats or is one-off, and for how long, are set on the program’s offer and shown on the programme page and the affiliate’s own dashboard, never buried in fine print. A built-in catalogue of real terms other companies actually publish is available to start a new program from, instead of guessing.
• How credit is decided: whoever’s link a new signup came through, within the tracking window (90 days on WorkBOS’s own program), gets the credit for that referral, even if they don’t buy right away. Referring yourself, or a workspace you already belong to, does not count.
• Pending, available, paid, and why money waits: a commission starts pending while the customer’s refund window is still open (currently 30 days). It isn’t promised yet in case that payment is refunded. A nightly check moves it to available the moment that window closes. Asking to withdraw marks it reserved until the request is decided, then paid once it’s sent. A refund inside the clawback window reverses a commission that is still pending or available; one already paid out is never clawed back from future earnings: we absorb it.
• Getting paid: an affiliate requests a withdrawal once their available balance clears the minimum (currently $50, shown on the programme page). A person reviews and pays each request: there is no automatic monthly run; we aim for the cadence stated on the programme page, not a guaranteed date. Nothing can be paid until the affiliate has told us where to send it (bank transfer, PayPal or Wise) and given us the tax information we’re required to collect; their dashboard shows exactly which of those is still missing.
• Tiers: an affiliate who brings in enough referrals or revenue moves up to a higher tier, which adds a bonus on top of the standard rate. Tiers, their thresholds, and how close an affiliate is to the next one are shown on their dashboard, and every commission records which tier it was actually paid at.
• Conversions: recorded automatically when a referred customer pays an invoice (verified by the payment provider, never by the browser). Approve pending conversions to make them payable; refunds inside the clawback window reverse the commission automatically.
• Performance: the Performance tab shows program totals (clicks, signups, conversions, commission pending/available/paid) plus per-policy and per-affiliate breakdowns, and a queue of payout and payment-detail approvals waiting on a decision.
• Per-offer links: each active policy has its own link (Affiliate dashboard ▸ Per-offer links, or the &pol= suffix shown on each policy card). A signup through one is LOCKED to that policy: the tracking window is that policy’s, and every conversion is paid at its rate, not the current default. If the policy is archived before the payment arrives, the partner is still paid at the rate they would have had without the link.
• Self-referral is blocked by default: a partner cannot earn commission on a workspace they are a member of. It is a per-policy setting, so an internal or staff referral programme can turn it off deliberately. The same invoice can never pay out twice.

1. 1

   Launch your program

   Open Affiliates ▸ Policies, create a policy (start from the built-in catalogue of real published terms if you’d rather not guess) and Activate it. Add your first affiliate under the Affiliates tab with a memorable code, or point people at the public affiliate page to apply.

2. 2

   Share the link

   Give the partner their link: your signup page plus ?ref=THEIRCODE. Their clicks, signups and earnings appear on their Affiliate dashboard automatically. To run more than one offer at a time, use the per-offer links instead: same code, plus &pol=<policy>, and every sign-up through that link is paid at that policy’s rate.

3. 3

   Pay commissions

   Conversions clear to available on their own once the refund window passes. When an affiliate requests a withdrawal, review it and mark it paid with a reference, quickest when their payment method and tax information are already on file. Every step is on the record, and the affiliate sees it reflected in their own dashboard.