Commission starts with attribution. Before calculating a percentage, a store must decide which representative owns an order placed by the customer, by staff in the storefront, or by an administrator.
Three attribution rules
SoftwareSilo can attribute a new order to the active staff user when that person orders in customer context. For direct customer orders, configuration can permanently use the customer's primary representative. Admin-created orders can receive an explicit representative. These rules should be written down before reports are used for compensation.
Orders store the staff ID, staff group ID, and calculated commission amount. Historical orders keep their stored assignment unless an administrator explicitly reassigns them. Cancelled orders set the stored commission to zero.
Choosing the calculation basis
The core module supports three percentage modes:
| Mode | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Net subtotal excluding tax | Percentage of the order's net subtotal before tax |
| Net subtotal including tax | Percentage of the corresponding amount including tax |
| Product discount | The percentage affects product price as a discount in the supported sales context |
The third mode is commercially different from paying a commission. Finance, sales, and ecommerce teams should agree on the intended result instead of treating the modes as interchangeable.
What the core reports do
Order and product reports show attributed activity to staff and administrators. Users can filter results, select visible columns, and export CSV. This supports review and transfer into another system.
The module does not keep a commission payout ledger with paid and unpaid states. If payroll or accounts payable needs settlement status, send the exported or API data to the system that owns payment and reconciliation.
Edge cases that change money
Document rules for cancellation, partial refunds, returns, credit memos, order edits, currency conversion, tax changes, shipping, discounts, and reassignment. The stored amount must be compared with the amount finance actually recognizes.
Also decide whether the commission follows the customer owner or the person who entered the order. A primary account manager and an inside-sales operator may both contribute. One field cannot express every compensation model.
Monthly control
Reconcile a sample of orders between Magento and the payment system. Include direct customer orders, assisted orders, admin orders, cancelled orders, and reassigned orders. Record the rule version used for each period so a later configuration change does not rewrite the meaning of old reports.
Related reading
Last reviewed: August 9, 2026.