Settling a show with the artist: what bindro works out, and what you still send

What does a split actually do to the money?

A split is a division of one payout, not several payouts. After a show has happened, bindro schedules a single payout for it, subtracts the platform fee and the reserve, and divides what is left by the shares you configured. Each party's amount is written as its own row against that payout with the share that produced it copied alongside, so months later the payout can still explain itself even if you have changed the deal since.

Shares are basis points and must total exactly 100% — that is a database rule, not a warning in the form, so a set that adds up to 90% cannot be saved at all. The allocation uses largest remainder, meaning the leftover cents go to the biggest fractional claim rather than each share being rounded on its own. That is the difference between three shares that add up to the payout and three shares that add up to a cent less than the payout, which is the kind of discrepancy that costs an hour to find.

Take the worked night: 170 tickets at $18.00 in a 200-capacity room is $3,060.00 gross. Platform fees of $244.80 leave $2,815.20 net, the 9% reserve holds $253.37 of that for 90 days, and $2,561.83 is what the shares divide on the day. A 70/20/10 between headliner, house and support divides that figure exactly, with no cent left over and none invented.

How do I set a different split for every show?

Set a house default once and override it per show. On the money screen you enter shares as plain text — "Venue:60, Headliner:40" — and choose whether they apply to every show or to one. A set saved against a show replaces the default for that show entirely rather than merging with it, which is what you want when the support act is on a percentage this Friday and not next.

Changing shares is treated like changing where your money goes: it needs the owner's role and a fresh step-up authentication, and it is written to the audit log. That is deliberate — a split is the instruction that decides who gets paid, so it should be as hard to change quietly as the bank details are.

The important timing detail is that shares are frozen onto a payout when the payout is scheduled. Edit them the week after and you change future shows, never the one that has already settled. If you realise the deal was wrong after the show, fix it between yourselves; bindro will not rewrite history to match.

Why does bindro not send the artist their share?

Because it has nowhere to send it. Bindro stores a payout destination for your organisation — the account you connect in the console — and it does not store one for a split recipient. The recipient is a name and a percentage, and nothing in the product asks the headliner for their bank details or holds them if you had them.

The engine is honest about this rather than approximate. Before the first transfer of a settlement goes out, every payable party's destination is checked, and if any of them is missing the whole settlement stops and names them. That rule exists so a show can never be half-paid — the headliner transferred, the support act not, and money moved that no ledger entry explains — and it is the reason a split show waits rather than partially paying.

So the practical shape today is: bindro does the arithmetic, the freezing, the refund re-cut and the record, and you do the payment. That is still most of the job — the part that generates arguments is what the number should be, not the bank transfer — but plan on making the transfer yourself and tell your artists that is how it works.

What deal shapes does bindro not understand?

A share is a percentage of the net of that show's ticket sales. Everything else in the standard vocabulary of live music deals is outside the model, and it is better to know that before you promise it to an agent.

• A guarantee — a fixed fee paid regardless of sales. Bindro has no concept of one.
• A "greater of the guarantee or a percentage of net" clause, or any breakpoint where the percentage changes above a threshold.
• Deductions before the split — backline, sound engineer, hospitality, the door person, PRS-style fees. The net bindro divides is ticket sales minus the platform fee and the reserve, and nothing else.
• Cash taken on the door, which bindro deliberately does not record at all, and therefore cannot include in anybody's percentage.
• Bar takings and merch sold at the table, which are recorded in the till for your own numbers but are your money already and never enter a split.
• Merchandise pre-ordered with a ticket at checkout, which is the exception: it is platform money, so it IS inside the split. If the headliner is on 70% of the net, they are on 70% of the pre-ordered shirts too unless you agree otherwise.

When does the money actually arrive?

Two days after the last set of the show, and once per show. Bindro will not schedule a payout until every session of a show has ended, and it never pays before delivery — that is the platform's hardest money rule and it is not configurable, because paying an organiser in advance is the one thing that turns a cancelled run into somebody else's loss.

The consequence to design around is how you model a run. If you list a residency as one show with eight dates, you are paid once, two days after the eighth. For weekly programming, one show per night is what keeps the cash flowing weekly.

A 9% reserve is withheld at release and returned 90 days later. It is a delay rather than a fee, sized from the expected cancellation rate for this vertical, and it is the buffer that stops a refunded show becoming a debt you have already spent.