How to Set Up Commission Tiers in Pulse

Commission setup in Pulse lives in Commission Management, which is accessible to admins. There is no default template to start from — the admin defines the tier structure from scratch. Until tiers are configured, Pulse falls back to a flat 8% rate on all attributed revenue.

Commission basis: Revenue or Gross Profit

The first decision in Commission Settings is which base to calculate on:

• Revenue mode — commission is a percentage of the gross payment amount collected. If a client pays R10,000 and the active tier rate is 10%, the rep earns R1,000. This is the simpler mode and the default.
• Gross Profit (GP) mode — commission is a percentage of the profit on collected invoices, not the full amount. GP is calculated as the difference between the selling price and cost price on each invoice line, applied proportionally to the amount paid. If the same R10,000 invoice had R6,000 in cost, the GP is R4,000, and the rep earns R4,000 × 10% = R400.

In GP mode, tier thresholds still use revenue figures to determine which tier is active — only the multiplication base switches from revenue to GP.

An important note about GP mode: if an invoice line has no cost price entered, that line defaults to 100% margin (the full amount counts as GP). This makes accurate cost data on invoice line items essential when running GP mode. An admin warning appears in Settings if GP mode is active to prompt cost data review.

The tier schedule

Tiers are flat-rate bands. Each tier has:

• A minimum revenue threshold — the monthly collected revenue a rep must reach to activate this tier
• An optional maximum threshold — leave blank to make a tier the uncapped top band
• A rate percentage — applied to the rep's entire monthly base (revenue or GP), not just the amount above the threshold
• An optional label — a display name like "Bronze", "Silver", "Gold"

The flat-rate model means tiers are not marginal. If a rep collects R260,000 and the 15% tier starts at R200,000, they earn 15% on the full R260,000 — not just the R60,000 above the threshold. Crossing a tier threshold therefore has a meaningful jump in earnings.

Example tier schedule

• R0 – R99,999 → 8%
• R100,000 – R199,999 → 10%
• R200,000 – R299,999 → 12%
• R300,000+ → 15%

Saving tiers

When you save the tier configuration, Pulse immediately recalculates all currently open periods using the new rates. Periods that are already locked or paid are not affected — historical earnings in closed periods are permanent.

The fallback rate

If no tiers are defined, Pulse falls back to 8% on all attributed revenue. A warning on the Commission Tiers tab tells you when this fallback is active. Set up at least one tier to take control of the rate.

Per-rep rate adjustments

Admins can apply an individual rate adjustment to any rep without changing the org-wide tier schedule. There are two types, and only one can be active per rep at a time:

• Rate override — bypasses the tier schedule entirely for that rep. The override rate is applied flat to all revenue (or GP) the rep collects, regardless of how much they collected. Use this for senior reps or those on a negotiated rate outside the standard structure.
• Rate bonus — adds a percentage on top of whatever tier rate the rep has qualified for. For example, if the tier rate is 10% and the rep has a 2% bonus, they earn 12%. The bonus stacks with tier progression — reaching a higher tier still gives the rep the tier uplift, plus the bonus on top.

Both types show a visual badge on the commission overview: amber for override, purple for bonus. Rate adjustments are set by admins from the rep's commission detail page and are never self-serve. Setting a new override clears any existing bonus on that rep, and vice versa.

Other commission settings

• Grace period days (0–30) — if a payment settles within this many days into a new month and the prior month is still open, the commission is credited to the prior month. Set to 0 to disable.
• Auto-lock — automatically locks prior open periods when month-end runs, so they stop accumulating new events.