How money works on The Artist Platform

Nothing.

There's no commission on your royalties and no deductions. The revenue we receive for your music goes to you.

You pay for your subscription. That's it — we don't take a percentage of what you earn on top of it.

This is the question we get asked most, and the honest answer has three stages. Only the last one is ours.

You'll see this in your distribution analytics fairly quickly.

Every store runs its own reporting cycle, and they are slow. Streams from one month typically reach us two months later at the earliest, and across platforms the lag generally runs two to six months. This is the longest part of the wait.

Once we've received and reconciled the revenue, it appears as a statement and becomes payable. We pay within 90 days of receiving — or being credited with — that revenue.

So your streams and your revenue will never line up in the same month. That's not an error, and it isn't unique to us — it's how streaming accounting works.

If you're newly distributing, expect around three months before your first statement appears. Nothing is wrong in the meantime.

If you're owed less than $100, your royalties carry forward to your next statement and are paid once your balance reaches $100 or more.

Nothing is lost while you wait. It accumulates.

Royalty payouts are made via PayPal, in USD.

Once your balance reaches $100 and we've prepared your statement, we'll send you a tax form to complete.

We need it before we can pay you. It's what lets us process royalties in line with European tax rules — not an optional extra, and not something we can work around.

It asks:

If you're being paid as a company, we'll ask for your company details and registration number instead, plus your VAT or TIN number where you have one.

It's a one-off. Fill it in when it arrives — if the form is outstanding, your payout waits, so the sooner it's back with us the sooner the money can move. This is the single most common reason a payment hasn't arrived.

We have two paid plans, Launch and Accelerate, plus a free tier. Every new account gets a 7-day trial.

You can pay monthly or annually, in advance. Your billing date follows the day you started — so a subscription that began on the 2nd bills on the 2nd each month.

If we ever change pricing, we'll tell you at least 30 days beforehand, and it won't affect the term you've already paid for.

One thing worth knowing: if you started on a discount, it applies to that first term only unless we've said otherwise. When it renews, it renews at the standard price. That catches people out, so it's worth checking before your renewal date.

You can cancel any time:

1. Click the profile icon in the top right.

2. Select My subscription.

3. Cancel, or downgrade if you'd rather keep some access.

Cancelling stops future billing. It doesn't delete your account.

Downgrading is worth considering instead. You can move from Accelerate to Launch, or from a paid plan to the free tier, and you keep everything included in the lower plan. You only lose the features exclusive to the plan you're leaving, and that happens at the end of your current billing cycle.

Within 14 days of purchase, you can cancel and get a full refund — including any tax or fees, and you don't have to give a reason.

To use that right, email [email protected]. It can't be done from your settings, so a refund won't happen automatically just because you cancelled. We'll process it within 14 days of hearing from you.

Refunds go back to your original payment method. We can't send one to a different card or account.

After 14 days, no refund applies — but you keep full access until the end of the term you've paid for. Nothing is switched off early.

Two exceptions worth naming: if we close an account for breaking our terms, no refund applies. And if you delete your account after the 14 days, the unused portion isn't refunded.

This is the part worth reading carefully, because it affects your releases.

Your already-distributed releases stay available to you — recordings, metadata and everything with them. What you can't do is create or distribute new releases until you upgrade again.

A three-month grace period starts. During it:

- We'll email you reminders

- You can't upload new releases

- Your existing releases stay live

If the subscription hasn't been renewed, there's a one-time maintenance fee that keeps your existing releases live in stores. We'll be in touch with you before your grace period ends and we'll sort that out with you.

Don't leave it until the deadline — we'd much rather set this up with you early than have your music come down.

With no renewal and no maintenance arrangement, your distributed releases are removed from stores after the grace period ends.

You keep your account and your FanHub. What you lose is access to the paid-only features — full visitor insights, fan contact details, advanced customisation, data export. The essential FanHub stays live.

They remain yours. A lapsed subscription doesn't take away money you've already earned.

If a figure looks wrong, tell us which reporting period and what you expected to see. We'll check it against what we actually received and come back to you with what we find.

We won't guess at a number before we've checked it — but we will always tell you what we can see.

Email [email protected] or use the chat in The Artist Platform. We aim to reply within 3 business days.