How to track agent commission without disputes

Where commission disputes come from

Almost every dispute is one of five things, and each one is a rule that nobody wrote down.

1. The trigger. Is commission earned when the bank approves, when the loan is disbursed, or when the customer pays your fee? Each answer is reasonable. Two different answers in one office are not.
2. The base. Is the percentage taken from the fee the customer paid, the fee after costs, or the loan amount?
3. The tier. If rates rise with volume, does the higher rate apply to the whole month or only to the part above the line?
4. The split. When a lead passed between two agents, or came from a freelance referrer, who is paid and how much?
5. The change after payout. A case is edited the following month, and last month's figure no longer matches what was paid.

The first four are gaps in the rules. The fifth is a gap in the records, and it does the most damage to trust. The agent can no longer match the statement they were given to the money they received.

Put the rules on one page

Before the first case of the month, write the answers down and give every agent a copy. One page is enough. If you cannot answer a question yet, write that, and decide before the next payout.

These are the questions, each with an example of a clear answer. Your own answers may differ. What matters is that there is one answer.

• When is commission earned? For example: when the loan is disbursed and the customer's fee has been received.
• What is it calculated on? For example: the consultation fee actually collected, not the loan amount.
• What is the rate? For example: a percentage of the fee collected, a percentage of the loan approved, or a flat amount for each case. Some agencies also raise the rate with volume, which is covered below.
• What if a lead is shared? For example: a split agreed in writing when the case is created, such as half and half.
• What if a case is cancelled, or a fee refunded, after payout? For example: the amount is deducted from the next payout and shown on the statement with the reason.
• When is the payout? For example: a fixed date each month, such as the 10th.
• Who can change a figure after payout? For example: nobody. Corrections go on next month's statement as a labelled adjustment.

Tiered rates: the whole month or only the extra

Tiered commission rewards volume, and it is the commonest cause of a quarrel because there are two reasonable ways to calculate it. In one, the month's total picks a single rate and that rate applies to everything. In the other, each slice of the total is paid at its own rate, like income tax bands. The same month gives two different answers.

Neither method is wrong. The mistake is leaving it unwritten. Know the edge case of the whole-month method, too. With the same example bands, an agent who has collected RM 9,900 earns RM 1,980. One more RM 100 fee takes the month to RM 10,000, which earns RM 2,500. A RM 100 fee has added RM 520. Some teams like that jump because it is a strong reason to close the last case of the month. Others see it as a cliff and prefer slices. Decide which you want, and tell your agents.

Show projected, earned and paid separately

The question agents ask most is where their commission is. Answer it before they ask, by showing three states for every case.

• Projected. The case is open. The amount is an estimate and may never be paid.
• Earned. Your trigger has happened, for example the loan was disbursed.
• Paid. The money has moved and the payout is on a statement.

A rejected case shows nothing. Never show an open case's estimate as if it were money. That is how an agent comes to believe they are owed an amount when the bank has not yet approved the loan.

The monthly statement, and locking the month

Give each agent a statement once a month, built from the same case records that the work is recorded on. Not from a separate sheet that someone retypes. A good statement has one line per case with the fee collected and its status, the rate and how it was picked, every adjustment on its own line with a reason, and the total with the payout date.

Then lock the month. Once everyone is paid, freeze the figures so that a later edit to a case cannot quietly change a number someone has already received. Corrections go on the next statement. If an agent says March is wrong, you can show what March said on the day it was paid.

Freelance agents and referral partners

Freelance agents bring two extra problems. They should see only their own cases, and their terms are usually different from your staff's. Put their terms in writing, give them the same kind of statement, and show them only their own cases and their own commission. Never share the whole team's figures with them.

Doing it in a spreadsheet, and when to stop

A spreadsheet can produce a statement for a handful of agents if one person owns the formulas, the bands sit in a separate table, and the file is saved at month end as a copy that nobody edits. It breaks when several people edit the same cases, when agents want to see their own figures during the month, or when the rates differ from person to person. At that point the arithmetic is the smaller problem. Trust is the larger one.

The Loan Advisory CRM holds commission schemes with tiered rates that the owner sets in Settings, shows each person only the commission they are allowed to see, produces monthly payout statements, locks a month once it is paid and exports the statement to a spreadsheet. Its tiers pick one rate for the month's fees and apply it to the whole month, like the first method above. It follows the rules you choose, so write the one page first.