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Payout Funding Type

How to understand Merchant vs Conduit account payouts

Updated over 3 months ago

WinRed handles Payouts differently depending on whether the entity is a Merchant Account or a Conduit Account funded through WinRed PAC. This document will help you understand how your donor’s donations make it into your bank account!

Conduit Organizations

Conduit organizations receive donations earmarked to them by the donor via WinRed PAC. The WinRed PAC is an FEC-registered PAC that serves as a passthrough for donations. When a donor gives on a page, the candidates to whom they are giving are listed, and WinRed PAC distributes the funds to the recipient committees.

When a donor gives to multiple Conduit accounts on a single page, that donor processes one contribution to WinRed PAC, which is earmarked to the intended candidates. WinRed then divides the donation according to the split designated by the donor and distributes the funds to the recipient committees. This distinction is important because earmarked donations have certain FEC reporting requirements you must follow.

Payouts for conduit organizations are set by default nightly schedule. Conduit accounts will see their payouts initiated and delivered to their attached bank account on the same day. If there is a banking holiday on the day the funds are set to arrive, it will arrive the next day. You can change your payout schedule by reading more here. You can read more about banking holidays here.

Please make sure you read this article to understand more about how this works.

Merchant Organizations

Merchant organizations receive payments directly to their own Merchant account before the funds are distributed to their bank account. This is how most payment processors operate.

Unlike Conduit accounts, the funds go directly to you and are not conduited. When a donor gives to multiple Merchant accounts on a single page, that donor processes individual contributions for each organization on the page. The donor's funds are separate from the beginning and distributed to each organization to their respective Merchant account.

Merchant accounts are paid out in such a way that payouts are not initiated if the next day is not a weekday or a federal holiday. Otherwise, merchant accounts are set by default to a nightly payout schedule. You can change your payout schedule by reading more here. You can read more about banking holidays here.

You can read more about how to handle compliance for merchant accounts here.

Questions? If you have any questions, contact our team by opening a WinRed chat box at the bottom right of your screen or support@winred.com.

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