Setting up your administration for marketplace sales
Gross revenue, commission as an expense, and the settlement as a payment method: the accounting foundation that makes after-the-fact control possible.
The classic mistake: booking net
If you book only the received payout as revenue, you book too little revenue and lose all visibility into deductions. The correct approach: book the gross sale as revenue, commissions and fees as expenses, and the payout as payment against the outstanding balance. Only then is there anything to reconcile at all.
The marketplace as a debtor
Treat every marketplace as a debtor with a current account: sales increase the balance, settlements decrease it. The remaining balance is exactly the amount the marketplace owes you at any given moment — and the first place where structural payment problems become visible.
What data you must keep
- All order exports from your own system, including marketplace order numbers.
- All settlement specifications as delivered by the marketplace (original file, not just the booking).
- Return confirmations and tracking data.
- Your contract terms per marketplace: rates, payment deadlines, permitted cost types.
Period discipline
Settlements mix orders from multiple periods. Book revenue in the period of the sale and use reconciliation to link the payout to that revenue — not the other way around. Returns crossing period boundaries receive an explicit correction entry, including VAT.
Let the checks run automatically from now on.
Upload your order export and settlement — Linqer matches every order and shows you where money is being lost.
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