Understanding payouts

Here's the thing that surprises a lot of artists: Sonic Bloom never holds your money. When a fan tips you, buys a download, grabs merch, or joins your fan club, the payment goes from their card straight to your Stripe account. Stripe then pays it out to your bank. We're not in the middle.

That's what makes the 0% commission real — there's no pot of "your" money sitting with us.

When you get paid

Once your Stripe account is set up, payouts run automatically on a rolling 2-day schedule by default. So money you earn on Monday usually lands in your bank on Wednesday or Thursday.

You can change this in your Stripe dashboard — switch to weekly or monthly payouts if you'd rather batch them up. Sonic Bloom doesn't control the schedule; Stripe does, and it's yours to set.

First payout note: Stripe sometimes holds the very first payout a little longer (typically about a week) while they verify a brand-new account. After that, you're on the normal rolling schedule. This is standard for everyone on Stripe, not a Sonic Bloom thing.

Where to see your money

There are two places, and they tell you different things:

• Your earnings is the one place that adds it all up — the year, this month, what you're still owed, and month by month for tax season.
• Gig money lives on its own screen — see Getting paid for gigs for what you're owed and what the year has paid.
• Fan money shows in the place each thing is sold: tips on Get paid, per-release sales on that release's page under Music, orders under Merch → Orders, and members under Fan Club → Members. There's no single earnings page yet — the dashboard's Earned tile is your tips.
• Your Stripe dashboard is the source of truth for the actual money: your balance, payout history, and exactly when each deposit hit your bank.

What shows up on your bank statement

Payouts arrive as a deposit from Stripe (often shown as your own business/artist name, depending on how you set up your Stripe account). If a fan ever asks what a charge on their card was, it'll show the statement descriptor from your Stripe account — so it's worth setting that to something recognizable in Stripe.

Refunds

If you issue a refund (for a download or a merch order), the amount comes back out of your Stripe balance and returns to the fan's card. Stripe's processing fee on the original sale generally isn't returned by Stripe, so a refunded order can leave you slightly negative on that transaction — normal across every Stripe-powered store.

Questions about a specific payout?

Anything about timing and balances is best answered in your Stripe dashboard (or Stripe support — they're good). Anything about what you earned on Sonic Bloom, ask us.

Get in touch.