General Overview of How Commission Voiding Works
The standard practice is for affiliate managers to review commissions regularly (weekly, monthly, etc.). By default, a tracked conversion has a Pending status, and your affiliates are waiting for you to either approve or disapprove it.
There are several situations where it makes sense to disapprove a conversion, including:
Refunds or cancellations – the customer requested a refund or canceled their purchase
Returned orders – the product was returned
Fraudulent activity – suspicious or invalid traffic or orders
Self-referrals – affiliates purchasing through their own links
Duplicate conversions – the same purchase was tracked more than once
Violation of program terms – the affiliate did not follow your program rules
Test or internal orders – test purchases made by your team
Disapproving these conversions helps ensure your affiliate program stays fair and accurate for everyone involved.
You can approve or reject a conversion in the Conversion tab by clicking on the conversion and selecting a status from the dropdown menu:
Manual Processing (via the Interface)
In the case of a refund, return, or cancellation, locate the conversion and disapprove the commission.
Commissions have no cut-off date, so a refund on an old order is handled the same way as a refund on yesterday's order.
What happens next depends on the commission's state:
Pending: it never reaches the affiliate's balance.
Approved but not paid out yet: its amount comes off the affiliate's balance.
Already paid out: the balance drops by that amount and can become negative. The affiliate's next approved commissions cancel it out first.
Disapprove rather than delete. A conversion with an approved commission cannot be deleted, and disapproving keeps the record of what happened.
Pro Tip: Regardless of the scenario, it’s good practice to leave a comment on the commission. This way, the affiliate knows why the commission was disapproved and why their balance was adjusted.
For partial adjustments: you can edit the commission amount for the approved conversion.
The difference will be subtracted from the affiliate’s outstanding balance.
Automatic Processing
If you’re using a smart integration that connects directly to your Tapfiliate account—like our Stripe or WooCommerce integration—you can choose to have refunds, cancellations, and disputes automatically handled for you.
To enable or disable this option:
Go to your Integrations page
Select the integration
Go to Settings and toggle the option(s) on or off
This feature is enabled by default when you connect your WooCommerce or Stripe account to Tapfiliate.
With these options on, each integration handles the following for you:
Stripe: a full refund, an opened or lost dispute, or an expired uncaptured charge disapproves the commission. A partial refund lowers it.
WooCommerce: an order moved to Cancelled, Failed or Trash disapproves the commission. A refund lowers it, and a full refund disapproves it.
Shopify (Tapfiliate app): a cancelled order disapproves the commission. A refund lowers it, and a full refund disapproves it.
Wix: a cancelled order disapproves the commission. A refund lowers it, and a full refund disapproves it.
Setups that are not told about refunds. If your conversions come from the tracking script on your site or from the code-based Shopify pixel, Tapfiliate is not told about refunds or cancellations. In those setups, disapprove the commission or adjust the conversion amount yourself, on the Conversions page or through the REST API.
Advanced Processing (Using the REST API)
A developer can help automate the commission disapproval process or update commission/conversion amounts using the REST API.
The relevant endpoints for these actions are:
Keep in mind that implementing these automations requires a developer.
FAQs
❓Why is an affiliate's balance negative?
Affiliate balances are calculated as follows: all approved commissions minus paid-out amounts.
This means that if a commission that has already been paid out is later changed (for example, due to a refund), the adjustment will be reflected in the affiliate’s current balance.
To illustrate this, consider the following example:
An affiliate generates a conversion with a $10 commission. At this stage, the affiliate’s balance is $0.
Once the commission is approved, the affiliate’s balance increases to $10.
After the commission is settled and paid out, the affiliate’s balance returns to $0.
If the order or conversion is later refunded, you can disapprove the associated commission.
Once the commission is disapproved, the affiliate’s balance becomes –$10.
Note: Disapproving an approved commission always lowers the affiliate's balance, whether or not it has been paid out. If it was already paid out, the balance can become negative.
❓I did not disapprove these commissions. Who did?
A commission can be disapproved by someone on your team, automatically by an integration with refund handling switched on, or by your own setup through the REST API. In the change log, a change made by a team member, or through the REST API with their key, is recorded under that user's login. A change made automatically by an integration has no login against it.