Commission Tracking

How commission is earned, attributed, and calculated in Rotor — salesman, technician, and upsell lines, base rates and modifiers, when commission lands, and how to answer a rep who says their number is wrong.

Written By Support Team

Last updated About 2 hours ago

Commission is where field-service software either earns trust or loses it. If a rep can't reconcile their paycheck to the doors they knocked, they stop trusting the system. This article follows a dollar of commission from the doorstep where it's earned to the payroll line where it gets paid — and shows you how to answer "my commission is wrong" with numbers instead of opinions.

For the mechanics of selecting a date range, exporting a CSV, and clicking Run Payroll, see Payroll. This article is about how the numbers on those lines are produced.

The three commission line types

Salesman commission — a percentage of the job total. This is what the rep who sold the plan earns.
Technician commission — a percentage of the technician's portion of the job. This is what the person who did the work earns.
Upsell commission — a percentage of the upsold line item value only, not the whole job. Crucially, upsell commission is calculated separately from and in addition to the technician commission. Both apply independently, so a tech who upsells gets paid twice on that job: once for servicing it, once for growing it.

That last point is the design intent of the whole system. You want your technicians noticing the wasp nest under the eave.

How a commission is earned in the field

A technician is at a quarterly pest stop and spots something the plan doesn't cover. In the Rotor mobile app:

They open the visit and go to the line items section.
They add the additional line item from the price book — say a $60 wasp nest treatment.
Rotor automatically attributes that upsell to the currently logged-in user.

No form, no note to the office, no "remember to tell payroll." The attribution happens because of who is signed in on that phone. See Mobile: Jobs & Visits.

It is also the single biggest source of misattributed commission. If two people work off one shared tablet, the upsell goes to whoever's account is signed in, not whoever made the sale. Fix that on day one.

How the sale gets attributed to the right person

Where the sale happens	Who gets credited
Quote created and later converted	The Salesperson selected on the quote. That attribution carries into the service plan on conversion
Service plan created directly on a customer	The signed-in user by default. You can reassign credit to another team member while building the plan
Upsell added during a visit	The user logged into the app at the time the line item was added
Service performed	The technician assigned to the visit

One distinction that trips people up: the Assigned User on a customer record is not the same thing as sales commission. Record assignment controls visibility and account ownership; commission attribution is set on the quote or plan. You can have a rep who sold the account and an office manager who owns it.

Fix attribution before the visit is completed if you can.

How the rate is resolved

Every commission number is base rate plus modifiers.

Base rates live in Rate Settings and are configured per employee. Which rate types are available depends on the employee's position:

Technician rate — commission percentage on technician line items
Salesman rate — commission percentage on sales
Upsell rate — commission percentage on upsold line items only
Hourly rate — for employees paid by the hour rather than on commission

A person can carry more than one — a crew lead might have a technician rate, an upsell rate, and an hourly rate at once.

Modifiers adjust that base rate according to conditions on the job:

Modifier type	Example
Frequency	Quarterly plan jobs add 2% to the commission — you're paying more for recurring revenue
Service type	One-time jobs subtract a set percentage — you're paying less for a customer who won't come back

Modifiers can add to or subtract from the base rate, and are configured separately for the technician, salesman, and upsell roles. That separation matters: you can reward reps for selling quarterly plans without changing what technicians earn on the same jobs.

When commission lands

For commission-based employees, commissions are applied based on the scheduled visit date — not the date the customer paid, and not the date the plan was sold. Hourly employees are calculated from hours worked in the selected weeks.

Two consequences worth planning around:

A rep who signs a big December plan doesn't get paid on it until the visits are scheduled and land inside a payroll period.
Commission can be paid before the money arrives, and before a refund happens. See Refunds & Disputes for how to handle a clawback.

A worked example

Maria sold a quarterly pest plan. Dave services it and upsells on site.

Rate Settings: Maria's salesman rate is 30%. Dave's technician rate is 15% and his upsell rate is 5%. A frequency modifier adds 2% to salesman commission on quarterly plans.

The visit. The scheduled quarterly service is $180. On site, Dave adds a $60 wasp nest treatment. Job total becomes $240.
Maria's rate resolves. 30% base + 2% quarterly modifier = 32%.
Maria's salesman commission. 32% of the job total. On the $180 she sold, that's $57.60.
Dave's technician commission. 15% of the technician's portion of the job. If the technician's portion is the full $240, that's $36.00.
Dave's upsell commission. 5% of the $60 upsold line item = $3.00, paid in addition to his technician commission.
Dave's total for the job: $39.00. Maria's total: $57.60.

The customer also leaves a $20 tip. Tips appear separately in the job breakdown and in the tip report.

Click the Info button on any payroll line to see this breakdown for a real job: total job amount, technician pay, salesman pay, upsells, tips, and company retained amount. That single screen answers most commission questions before they turn into arguments.

Checking commission before payday

Go to Financials → Payroll and select the pay period.
Filter to Unpaid only, and filter by role to review reps and technicians separately.
Expand each team member and scan their lines for anything that looks off — a missing job, a rate that doesn't match, a line credited to the wrong person.
Open the Info button on anything questionable and check it against the invoice.
Fix problems before you click Run Payroll. Once lines are marked paid, correcting them is a manual adjustment on the next run.
Download the CSV for your records or for your payroll provider.

Give reps a way to see their own numbers before payday. Most commission disputes are really "nobody told me" disputes.

"My commission is wrong" — troubleshooting

Symptom	Likely cause	Fix
A job is missing entirely from their lines	The visit is scheduled outside the selected date range — commission follows the scheduled visit date	Widen the date range. If the visit was never scheduled, schedule it
The upsell went to the wrong person	A shared device logged in as someone else when the line item was added	One login per person, always. Adjust this period manually
The percentage looks lower or higher than agreed	A modifier is applying — for example one-time jobs subtract a percentage	Check Rate Settings for base rate and modifiers, and confirm the job's frequency and service type
Rate is right but the dollar figure is low	A discount reduced the job total, or the commission base isn't what they assumed	Open the Info button and walk the breakdown with them line by line
The salesman commission went to the wrong rep	The wrong salesperson was selected on the quote, or the plan defaulted to whoever was signed in	Correct the attribution on the plan and re-check the payroll line before running payroll
They were paid for a job the customer later refunded	Commission follows the visit date, not the payment	Apply your written clawback policy as a manual adjustment. See Refunds and disputes
No commission lines at all for a new hire	No rates set in Rate Settings, or no position assigned	Set their rates and position before their first job, not after

Tips

Set rates and modifiers before a new hire's first job. Backfilling is painful.
One login per person. No shared phones, no shared tablets.
Confirm the salesperson on every quote before sending it.
Review unpaid payroll lines weekly rather than in a panic on payday.
Write your refund clawback policy down and have people acknowledge it when hired.

Congratulations! You can now trace any commission dollar from the doorstep where it was earned to the payroll line where it gets paid in Rotor.

Have additional questions? Our team is ready to help you succeed. Contact us through the chat or drop us an email at support@getrotor.com.

Payroll — select a pay period, export, and run payroll
Refunds & Disputes — handling refunds that affect paid commission
Mobile: Jobs & Visits — adding upsell line items in the field
Time Tracking — hours behind hourly pay

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