How To Settle With Your Vendors - Commission Rates, Taxes, and More

Festivals, rodeos, fairs, any event where you are bringing in food vendors and other concessionaires means settling with them at the end. Settlements is a formal way of saying you are going work with each vendor on costs they owe based on their commission rate, who is paying the taxes and POS transaction rate, if there is any rental fees, etc. Each of these is unique to the event and the person running the event which is why it becomes so important to have a unified way to 'settle' with every vendor since each of their situations could be different and have different terms. In this post we go through the most notable to take into account when you are settling, and what each of the key terms mean.

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What is usually included in the Vendor Settlement:

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Event details

• Location name, manager name, manager email
• Commission rates
• Commission rates are set by the venue and applied to each location.
• Alcohol (%), Non-Alcohol (%), Food (%), Other (%)
• Sales Tax
• Display sales tax (read-only)
• Display tax retained by (Venue or Location)
• Display tax on top or tax inclusive (read-only)  
• Deposits
• amount collected

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Show Costs:

• Show costs will apply to all locations and are a set cost.
• We need the ability to set event costs across locations.  
• We need the ability to override per location.
• Types of show costs
• Product: Water, Ice
• Equipment: Tent, Power, Kitchen equipment
• Permits: Health department
• Misc: catch all bucket

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Cash Adjustments:

• What cash was collected at the event

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Sales Details:

• the ability to see daily sales
• Sales details (Per location selected): Gross, Tax 1/2, Tips, Net Sales, Credit card, cash, Wristband, Alcohol Sales, Non-Alcoholic Sales, Food, Confirmed Cash
• Credit card processing fee/Braintree processing fees
• Recap (total from all locations selected)
• Total gross, total tax, total tips, total net
• Total commission (alcohol, non-alcohol, food, other) and total show costs (product, equipment, permits, mics)

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Settlement

• Final payment- Cash, check, to follow.
• Total retained by Vendor/Venue.
• Vendor Rep signature (add “legal” term blurb)
• Additional info box- Additional payment details & Notes
• Settled by- Name & Email

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Knowing more details on everything that can be in a settlement, what tools help you in settling?

• Manually with Excel - you can manually calculate the costs, taxes, cash adjustments, etc. within excel for each vendor to be able to determine what is owed. For each vendor you can create a tab and manually enter the calculations. If you have one done already you can duplicate that tab but be careful that you are checking all formulas as you make changes like one vendor paying for a table rental fee that another does not or you may miscalculate their total. Another helpful tip for those using excel: always double check the values of what the Register total sales were to ensure you are using accurate totals.

• Digitally with atVenu - with using atVenu Register you are able to settle with each vendor and their sales are automatically added into the Settlement, calculations are done automatically based on the values you enter, and all your point of sale summaries, transaction history, event information, and vendor settlement details are in one place. And you don't have to manually calculate everything yourself in excel. We do that for you.

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If you have an upcoming event where you will be settling with vendors, settle digitally without having to use excel with atVenu Register and our FNB Settlements feature. Get a free demo to learn more about the feature.

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Click to view an example Vendor Settlement atVenu produces

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