This screen enables you to review and update the commissions for a particular contributor. For example, you may go to this screen to enter missing data that is preventing the fee from being paid. You can also spike or cancel commissions in this screen.
Editing commission details
If you need to modify the payment(s) for a commission you can click on any of the Fee fields or the Fees.. button. This will bring up a Fees window in which you can modify the existing payment(s), cancel a payment, or add another payment.
Status displays messages relating to the processing of the commission:
Commission fee processing. If a commission has been paid the total fee and the date of payment with be shown, otherwise one of the following message will be displayed:
confirmation is queued for dispatch. The commission confirmation email will shortly be sent to the contributor.
queued for review - this means that it has been sent to the Editor's Office as an exception because there is some financial abnormality. Reasons why items are sent for review are explained in Commissions Approval
If a commission has been sent to Accounts Payable (AP) the message reflects this:
sent to AP on ... in message ...
Otherwise, under Reason(s) for delay(s) one of these messages will be displayed under Status if the payment is delayed.
Once a payment instruction for the commission has been sent to AP the fee details cannot be updated, although an extra fee can be added. If you need to change the details of a payment instruction already sent to AP, please contact the RCS Administrator.
The Notes section at the bottom of the screen allows you to add any comments related to the commission. If the commission have been cancelled/rejected from AP- the reason will be inserted here.
Spiking a commission
If you are revisiting a commission to spike it, you have two options:
click on the Spike button and determine what is going to happen with the agreed fee when presented with a choice like this:
enter a fee in the Spike fee field and then click on the Spike button:
NB Clicking on the Rate button adjacent to Spike fee field calculates a fee equal to 50% of the original Total fee in line with the Freelance Charter. GNM usually pays the full fee for commissioned work that isn't going to be published unless it falls well below the standard GNM reasonably expects. However, where a partial spike fee (aka kill fee) is due, GNM never pays less than 50% of the original commission fee.
Once the commission has been spiked you will be prompted to check the fee correct, and also check the cost centre is correct.
You also need to enter the appropriate spike Account code, which as a rule is different from the Account code originally used for the commission.
Payment recipient
By default the contributor is the payee, i.e. receives the commission fees. However, if the contributor has a permanent agent, such as a literary agent, then the agent is the default payee. In the case of a deceased contributor, their estate is defined separately as an agent, with a permanent agent relationship to the deceased, thereby ensuring payment goes to the estate.
If the commission has been negotiated directly with a contributor who has an agent, select Contributor under Pay. If a contributor has more than one agent, use the options under Pay someone else to determine who will receive the commission fee(s).
If the commission is with a contributor who wishes the fee to be donated to charity, the payment will be made to a charity nominated by GNM. If the contributor wishes to pay a different charity, the payment must be made directly to the contributor and they must then make the donation personally.
Confirmation recipient
By default the contributor receives the confirmation letter unless s/he has a literary agent in which case that agent would receive the confirmation (they would also be the Payee in this context unless you override it by choosing another payee option.)
To adjust who receives the commission confirmation, choose an option under Confirm to. If you are paying a third party, e.g. a contributor's second agent, and you want the email to go there, select Payee. In some cases, further contacts have been set up for the contributor, e.g. the contributor is a book publisher and GNM buys from more than one individual at the book publisher, and you can choose one of these to receive the confirmation by choosing from the list in the Recipient field.
If the confirmation letter has already been sent to the designated recipient then the recipient fields are disabled. To resend the confirmation to the same just uncheck the Confirmed? checkbox and it will be resent. If you wish to resend the confirmation to someone else, uncheck the Confirmed? box and then use the options under Confirm to as described above.
Fulfilling a commission
Only some desks have the ability to manually fulfill content as most desks should be matching published content to commissions, the normal process whereby commissions are fulfilled. However, in cases such as Obituaries the content may not be published for some time but the commission needs to be marked as fulfilled in order to trigger payment of the agreed fees. If you need a commission fulfilled but do not have access to the Fulfill button, please contact the RCS Administrator who will be able to fulfill the commission for you.
If you do have access to this feature: press the Fulfill button to mark a commission as fulfilled. If it has not been matched to its corresponding published content you will be navigated to the Matching history screen to identify the published content if at all possible and to match it. It is very important to make the match if it is possible, as this helps prevent someone else seeing the unmatched content and entering another payment for it, and it also ensures that the commission's rights profile is linked to the content, which can have implications for secondary uses of the content.