Locking Period

A tracked commission is not a final commission. During the locking period the program can still adjust, reduce, or reverse it: for a refund, a canceled subscription, a duplicate order, or a failed fraud check. When the period ends, the commission locks and the amount is fixed.

The term comes from affiliate network vocabulary, where every transaction carries a locking date. For programs it is the correction window; for affiliates it marks the moment provisional earnings turn into real ones.

How it works in B2B SaaS

Each commission starts in a pending state with a locking date attached. That date is set either per transaction, for example 60 days after the conversion, or per batch, for example all of March's commissions lock on a fixed day in May. Until then, the program validates:

• It reverses refunded orders
• It removes duplicates
• It voids commissions that break program rules such as brand bidding or self-referral

After the lock, the commission is final from the affiliate's perspective. Changing it now requires a manual clawback, which most programs reserve for serious cases like proven fraud, because reopening locked earnings erodes trust fast. Locked commissions then flow into the payout schedule, subject to any payout threshold.

A worked example

Picture a CRM SaaS paying 20 percent recurring commission, where each commission locks 60 days after the billing event it came from.

An affiliate refers a customer who starts a 150 dollar per month subscription on June 1. The June commission of 30 dollars is created as pending, with a locking date at the end of July.

Two things can happen from here. If the customer refunds inside the window, the pending commission is reversed in place: nothing was paid, so nothing needs recovering. If the customer stays, the commission locks on schedule, becomes final, and is included in the next payout run. Every later billing cycle repeats the pattern with its own 60 day window.

Typical ranges and benchmarks

Locking periods commonly run 30 to 90 days after the conversion. Affiliate networks often use monthly batch locking, where an entire month's transactions lock together a fixed number of weeks after month end. In SaaS programs the sensible anchor is the refund window: lock a comfortable buffer after the last day a customer can get their money back.

Longer is not automatically safer. Every extra week of locking delays affiliate cash flow, and programs compete for good affiliates partly on how quickly earnings become real.

Locking period vs cookie duration

Both are quoted in days, so program listings blur them, but they sit on opposite sides of the conversion. Cookie duration runs before the sale: it is how long after a click a conversion can still be credited to the affiliate. The locking period runs after the sale: it is how long the credited commission stays adjustable.

A program with a 90 day cookie and a 30 day lock gives affiliates three months to convert a clicked visitor, then one month of validation before the commission is final. Reading one number as the other leads to very wrong expectations about when money arrives.

How it shows up in affiliate and partner programs

Network dashboards show a locking date on every transaction, and merchants on networks inherit default locking rules they can extend for validation-heavy products. In-house SaaS programs implement the same idea as commission statuses in their affiliate software.

Agreements should spell out what can change a commission during the window and what happens after locking. Recurring commission programs apply a lock per billing cycle, so a single referred customer generates a stream of commissions, each locking on its own schedule.

Common mistakes

The most common affiliate mistake is counting unlocked commissions as income; that number can shrink until the lock date passes. The mirror-image program mistake is reversing commissions after they locked without explicit contractual grounds, which is one of the fastest ways to lose serious affiliates.

Two more errors show up often:

• Setting the lock shorter than the refund window, which forces the clawbacks the design was meant to prevent
• Conflating the lock date with the pay date

A locked commission still waits for the payout schedule and any minimum threshold before money moves.

Frequently asked questions

What can change a commission during the locking period?

Refunds, cancellations inside a money-back window, duplicate or test orders, and violations of program rules such as self-referral or brand bidding. The affiliate agreement should list these triggers explicitly. Anything not on the list should not be grounds for a reversal.

Is a locked commission guaranteed to be paid?

In practice yes, subject to the payout schedule and any minimum payout threshold. Most programs treat the lock as a commitment and reserve post-lock reversals for proven fraud spelled out in the agreement. If a program routinely edits locked commissions, that is a signal to leave.

Are locking period and hold period the same thing?

They are often used interchangeably, and in many platforms one window serves both purposes. Strictly, the locking period ends the window in which the amount can change, while a hold period delays when the money becomes payable. When comparing programs, check what each term means in that program's specific terms.