Fees, Commission and Sales Models

This guide covers the money rules you set on the Commerce tab of Settings → Business Settings: the default buyer's premium, seller commission and tax, the founding period waiver, your sales operating model, and the caps on commission concessions in deal rooms. It also explains how these defaults interact with the other places a rate can be set, so you can predict exactly what a lot will be charged.

Before you start

• You need permission to manage business settings to open Business Settings. See Team members and roles.
• Nothing on the page is saved until you click Save Settings at the bottom. Saving writes every tab at once.
• Fee changes apply to calculations made after you save. Check the precedence rules below before changing a rate while lots are live.
• Setting fees and taxes, and choosing a sales operating model, are both required items on your launch readiness checklist. Each counts as done once you have saved the page (a deliberate 0% counts). See Getting started.

Fees & Taxes

Go to Settings → Business Settings → Commerce → Fees & Taxes. All rates are percentages from 0 to 100, to two decimal places.

Buyer Premium Rate

The percentage added on top of the hammer or sale price and paid by the buyer. The default is 0%. For example, with a 12% rate a lot selling for 1,000.00 carries a buyer's premium of 120.00.

Seller Commission Rate

The percentage deducted from the seller's proceeds. The default is 10%. For example, with a 10% rate a lot selling for 1,000.00 carries a seller commission of 100.00, and the seller is owed 900.00 before any tax on commission.

Tax Rate

A single tax percentage (for example VAT) that Babylon uses in three places:

• On the item price itself, but only for lots whose Tax Status is Taxable. New lots default to Taxable. Set a lot's Tax Status on its listing form, under Pricing & Bidding — see Listings and collections. Choose Tax Exempt for a lot whose price itself should not be taxed, or Margin Scheme for an item sold under a margin scheme (for example a VAT margin scheme for used or secondhand goods); both stop tax being charged on the item price, but are recorded separately for your own records. Tax Status has no effect on tax charged on the buyer's premium or seller commission below — those follow the two toggles regardless.
• On the buyer's premium, when Apply Tax to Buyer Premium is on.
• On the seller commission, when Apply Tax to Seller Commission is on.

The default is 0%, which switches off all three.

Apply Tax to Buyer Premium

On by default. When on, the Tax Rate is charged on the buyer's premium and added to the buyer's total. Turn it off if you do not charge tax on your premium.

Apply Tax to Seller Commission

Off by default. When on, the Tax Rate is calculated on the seller commission and deducted from the seller's payout. It never changes what the buyer pays, and it is independent of the buyer premium setting. On orders it appears as a separate Tax on Seller Commission line.

A worked example with a 1,000.00 lot, 12% buyer's premium, 10% commission, a 20% Tax Rate, the lot not taxable, and both tax toggles on:

• Buyer's premium: 120.00, plus tax on premium of 24.00. The buyer pays 1,144.00 plus any shipping.
• Seller commission: 100.00, plus tax on commission of 20.00. The seller is owed 880.00.

Founding Period Active

A launch incentive that waives both seller commission and buyer's premium on lots listed while it is on. It is off by default. Read this carefully before switching it on, because the waiver is permanent for each lot it touches:

• Every lot created while the toggle is on (including a lot created by duplicating another) is marked as fee-waived at the moment it is created.
• A fee-waived lot is charged 0% seller commission and 0% buyer's premium for its whole life, however long it takes to sell, and even after you switch the toggle off.
• The waiver outranks every other rate, including a rate override typed on the lot itself.
• Switching it on does not affect lots that already exist, and switching it off does not remove the waiver from lots created while it was on.
• There is no end date. You must switch it off yourself when your founding period ends, and you should give sellers whatever notice you agreed first.

There is no control in the admin to remove the waiver from an individual lot. If a lot was waived by mistake, contact Hammerd support.

How a lot's rate is decided

The rates above are your defaults. A lot can also pick up a rate from its own record, its marketplace tier, its authentication track, the seller's negotiated rate or their dealer tier. Babylon resolves them in this order, stopping at the first that applies:

1. Founding period waiver. If the lot was listed during the founding period, both rates are 0%.
2. Lot override. If staff set Commission Rate Override or Buyer's Premium Override on the listing, that rate is used, whether it is higher or lower than anything else. See Listings and collections.
3. Standing rates. For seller commission, Babylon compares the rate from the lot's marketplace tier or authentication track, the seller's negotiated rate (where one has been recorded) and the seller's dealer tier override, and uses the lowest of those that are set. For buyer's premium there is no negotiated or dealer rate: the authentication track rate is used if the track defines one, otherwise the marketplace tier rate.
4. Your default. If none of the above applies, the Buyer Premium Rate or Seller Commission Rate from this page is used.

Tier and track rates are set under Settings → Marketplace Tiers (see Marketplace tiers and authentication schemes). Dealer tier overrides are set under Trade Programme → Dealer Tiers (see Trade programme).

Tax is always calculated using the single Tax Rate and toggles on this page, whichever commission and premium rates apply.

If your payment collection model is Deposit only, Babylon collects only the buyer's premium and the tax on it at checkout, and does not record a seller commission on those orders. See Payments and checkout.

Sales Operating Model

Go to Settings → Business Settings → Commerce → Sales Operating Model. This decides who the buyer is dealing with, who fulfils, and whose details appear on the invoice.

Default Sales Model

• Model 1: Seller-led marketplace (used if you have never chosen): the seller is the commercial counterparty. They fulfil and usually appear as the seller to the buyer, while you run the marketplace.
• Model 2: Tenant-assisted: you help with logistics, custody or operations. Who owns an item while it is in your custody depends on the Model 2 in-custody owner setting.
• Model 3: Tenant seller-of-record: you are the seller of record for the transaction. A designated operational seller user handles buyer communications, disputes and fulfilment.

Fields that depend on the model

These fields appear only when the matching model is selected. Their saved values are kept if you switch to another model and back.

• Model 2 in-custody owner (Model 2 only, required): Tenant (the default) or Seller.
• Model 3 operational seller user ID (Model 3 only): search your users by name, email or ID and choose the person who acts as the seller for buyer messages, disputes and fulfilment. It must be an existing user in your account.
• Model 3 consignor tracking enabled (Model 3 only): on by default. Controls whether sales where you are the seller of record keep track of the consignor behind each item.
• Model 3 payout execution mode (Model 3 only, required): the only option is Manual. Payouts to consignors on Model 3 sales are paid by you outside Babylon and then recorded with Mark Paid Manually. See Orders, settlements and payouts.

Allow listing-level model override

On by default. When on, an individual listing may carry a sales model different from your default. The admin listing form does not currently offer a per-listing sales model choice, so in practice this applies to listings created through the API or an integration. Turn it off if every listing must follow your default.

Buyer-visible seller identity

The only option is Dynamic by model: the seller name buyers see follows the sales model of each sale, as described above.

The model you choose also changes how your business profile appears on invoices. See Business profile and localisation.

Commission Exceptions

Go to Settings → Business Settings → Commerce → Commission Exceptions. These settings cap how much commission staff can give back to a seller when agreeing a price in a deal room. The concession itself is applied from the deal room, not here. See Auctions, offers and deal rooms.

Max Commission Concession (% of accepted price)

The largest concession staff can apply, as a percentage of the deal room's accepted price. The default is 0.

For example, with a cap of 2% and an accepted price of 5,000.00, the largest concession allowed is 100.00. A concession can also never be larger than the commission on the sale.

Important: the help text says 0 disables concessions. In the current version a cap of 0 is treated as no percentage cap, so staff with the deal room permission can concede up to the full commission. If you do not want concessions at all, do not give staff a role that can manage deal rooms, or set a small non-zero cap.

Max Commission Concession by Category (category_id → %)

Optional per-category caps. Add a row per category with the category's ID under Category ID and a whole-number percentage from 0 to 100 under Max %. When a deal room's lot is in a listed category, that category's cap replaces the general cap above, whether it is higher or lower.

Which cap applies

1. A cap set on the deal room itself with Set Commission Concession Limit (Lot).
2. Otherwise, the cap for the lot's category, if one is listed.
3. Otherwise, Max Commission Concession (% of accepted price).

When a concession is applied, any tax on seller commission is recalculated on the reduced commission. The buyer's total does not change.

Common questions

I changed the commission rate. Why does a lot still show the old rate? Check the precedence list above. A lot override, a marketplace tier or track rate, a negotiated rate or a dealer tier rate all take priority over your default. A lot created during the founding period is always 0%.

Can I set different rates for auctions and fixed price sales? Not on this page. Use marketplace tiers or lot overrides.

Can I end the founding period on a date? No. There is no scheduled end. Switch Founding Period Active off on the day it ends.