What a held payment is, and why it isn’t escrow
A brand pays once, when both sides agree. Where the money sits, when it’s released, and what happens when a deal goes wrong.
- The brand pays once, when both sides agree. The money is released 72 hours after the post goes live, unless the brand raises a problem.
- Until then it’s held at the payment provider, not sent to the studio.
- The fee is 15% of the price, from the studio’s side. On an A$900 deal the studio gets A$765.
When the brand pays
A deal is agreed when both sides accept the price. That’s when the brand pays: once, for the whole deal, with nothing on top.
The brand has 3 days from agreeing to pay. If it doesn’t, the deal is cancelled. No money has moved, so there’s nothing to refund.
The studio makes the post once the money is held, so nobody starts work on a promise. Prices run from A$50 to A$50,000 a deal for now.
Where the money sits
When the brand pays, the money goes to a balance at the payment provider, Stripe, and it’s held there until the deal completes. It isn’t sent to the studio. When the deal completes, the studio’s share is transferred out and the fee stays.
Every move writes a line to the deal’s ledger. A charge puts the price in, from the brand. When the deal completes, a fee line and a payout line take it out again: the fee to Synthicate, the rest to the studio. A refund sends the whole price back to the brand instead.
So for every deal, what’s held is the charges less the fees, payouts and refunds. It’s exactly the price from payment until release or refund, and nothing before or after. That sum is checked before every move and again after it, and a deal whose ledger is off doesn’t move until a person looks at it.
Nothing money touched is deleted. Deals, ledger lines and messages are only ever added to, so both sides see the same history. The studio’s view says whose the money will be once the fee is taken: on an A$900 deal, “A$765 to you”, held.
When it’s released
Once the money is held, the studio makes a draft and sends it in the deal’s thread. The brand has 5 days to review it. It can ask for changes up to 2 times; after that it approves the draft or raises a problem. A draft nobody reviews in 5 days counts as approved.
The studio then posts on its own account, with the paid-partnership and AI labels, and pastes the live link into the deal. Synthicate never posts for it.
From then, the brand has 72 hours to raise a problem. It can confirm the post sooner. If it does neither, the money is released when the 72 hours are up: the fee is kept, and the rest goes to the studio. A brand that goes quiet can’t stall a studio.
When a deal goes wrong
Before the first draft, either side can cancel, and the brand is refunded in full.
After that, either side can raise a problem while a draft is in review or approved, and the brand can for 72 hours after the post goes live. A raised problem keeps the money held until it’s settled.
It’s settled one of two ways: for the studio, and the money is released, or for the brand, and it’s refunded. For now a person settles it by hand.
There’s an outer limit too. An Australian platform can hold money for at most 90 days, so a deal stuck in production has to be refunded before day 90. Every timer fits inside it.
Why we don’t call it escrow
Escrow has a legal meaning, and a held payment isn’t it. Stripe, the payment provider Synthicate is built for, says so in its own documentation: “Escrow has a precise legal definition, and Stripe doesn’t provide escrow services or support escrow accounts.”
So the product says held, the plain word for what happens: the money has been paid, and it hasn’t been released yet. You won’t find the word escrow in the app.
Stripe also lists “escrow services” and “content creation platforms” among the businesses it restricts, so Synthicate needs Stripe’s approval before it takes real payments.
What the fee is
The fee is 15% of the price, taken from the studio’s side. The brand pays the agreed price, nothing on top. The fee is fixed when the deal is agreed and stored on the deal, so a change to the platform’s rate later never changes a running deal.
It’s worked out in whole cents. The fee is 15% of the price to the nearest cent, with halves going up. The studio gets the price less the fee, so the two always add back to the price.
- The price
- A$900
- The fee, 15%
- A$135
- To the studio
- A$765
An odd price works the same way. On A$333.33, 15% is 4,999.95 cents, which rounds to A$50.00, and the studio gets A$283.33.
Payments are a sandbox for now: every screen and number is real except the money. The sandbox records exactly what Stripe will do, without moving money.
