Step 6: How Payments Work

You’ve created your story, you’ve successfully promoted it, and your audience is loving it. Now how do you turn that into earnings?

As long as you have Stripe connected, your readers are able to send you tips for stories that they love. Tips are sent directly to your Stripe account, and Stripe sends them right to your bank—no minimum earning needed to access them. You can read all about how to send and receive tips here.

Aside from tips, Vocal also pays you for the engagement your stories receive. Every time your story is read, it’s calculated by Vocal, and the earnings automatically accrue in your Wallet where you’re able to check them at any time.

Your Vocal Wallet keeps track of the following:

Reads displays the views and engagement you have received from your stories, and how much that's generated in earnings.

Withdrawn keeps track of how much money you have withdrawn from your earnings into your Stripe account.

Current Balance shows you how much money you currently have available in your Vocal account. In order to request a withdrawal, you will need to reach your withdrawal minimum of $35, or $20 for Vocal+ creators.

Tips keeps track of the micro-transactions you have received. Tips do not show in your Current Balance as they are transferred directly into your account.

Your Transaction History includes any tips from your audience, withdrawal logs, and weekly earning round-ups.

Learn more about your Vocal Wallet here.

How your earnings are calculated:

Your reads are calculated on a CPM (cost per thousand) basis. Free Vocal creators earn $3.80 per every 1,000 reads; Vocal+ members earn $6.00 per every 1,000 reads. And once your earnings reach your withdrawal minimum ($35 for free Vocal creators, or just $20 for Vocal+ creators), the “Request Withdrawal” button becomes available to you.

Before you request your withdrawal, double check your Stripe Dashboard, which you can access through the Dashboard link in your Wallet. Always be sure that all of your information is kept up to date—you wouldn’t want your withdrawal to be sent to an expired debit card or closed bank account.

Once the withdrawal has been requested, you’ll see the funds reflected in your bank account in 3-5 business days, converted to your local currency.

How you get paid after winning a Challenge:

Challenges work a little bit differently. If you’re one of our selected winners or runner-ups, you’ll receive an email notification to the address associated with your account. Someone from our team will also reach out to you via your email address to collect any necessary tax or shipping information that we’ll need before we can send over payment. Once we have any applicable info we’ll need from you, we can provide your prize.

If the Challenge had a cash prize, we’ll send the prize money to your Stripe account, and it’ll be automatically exchanged to your local currency if necessary. If the prize you’ve won is an item, we’ll send it to whatever shipping address you provide.

Introducing: Bonuses

Creator Bonuses, in conjunction with Vocal's other monetization features like Reads, Tips, and Challenges, help creators by providing an extra opportunity to earn money on Vocal. Bonuses are another way we can cheer on our creators, by congratulating them for meeting certain milestones!

Unlike Tips, which are payments sent directly to your Stripe account and do not reflect in your current balance, Creator Bonuses allow the Vocal team to add money to your current Wallet balance. For example, if you have accrued $48 from Reads and receive a $20 Bonus from Vocal, your total balance would be $68.

Bonuses reflect immediately in your Wallet’s balance and are displayed in your Wallet's transaction history.

What about taxes?

At the end of each year, if your earnings total the threshold required by law for us to provide you with tax forms, we'll do so. If you've already provided us with your tax information, we'll send the applicable forms to you by mail; if we're missing any required information, we'll reach out to you via email and ask you to complete a quick form to give us any additional information we need. Then you'll receive the required documentation in the mail.

Any other questions about getting paid?

You can find a section all about how payments work in our Help Center here.

Congratulations! You’ve shared your stories, grown your fan base, and earned some money. Now, let’s do it again.

Step 7: Stay Inspired →