How much of the commission on your dashboard actually reaches your account? Between the lead (the action the offer pays for) and the money withdrawn, the network applies filters nobody reads in the contract.
In Ecuador, a supplement campaign ran 131 days and sent 2,483 leads. The dashboard showed a 38.16% approval, and the math with every lead counted returned 21.28% (CPA Lenta, 2023).
Here you’ll learn the clean approval math, the real hold period by product, and the cash it demands.
Table of Contents
- 1 – What the CPA network takes from your commission
- 2 – Clean and dirty approval rates in CPA
- 3 – How long the hold lasts for each product
- 4 – Cap: the lead limit the CPA network buys
- 5 – How much cash the payout wait demands
- 6 – When a commission cut is shave
- 7 – Real CPA commission cases with numbers
- 8 – The mistakes that turn commission into loss
- 9 – The contract checklist before the first lead
- 10 – CPA commission FAQ
- 11 – Hold, approval rate and cap in CPA: the bottom line
What the CPA network takes from your commission
Hold is the window in which the network keeps the commission while it reviews the traffic. The approval rate is the share of leads the advertiser confirms, and the cap is the limit it buys per day.
| Filter | What it cuts | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Approval rate | rejected lead | AddSet (2022) |
| Trash | lead with no valid contact | AddSet (2022) |
| Cap | volume above the cap | Cpagram (2022) |
| Hold | money locked up | CPA Live (2026) |
| Shave | conversion never passed on | AddSet (2022) |
Each filter is a line in the contract, and every line can be negotiated. In Kazakhstan, a team delivered 50 first deposits and waited for the network to release the money (Cpagram, 2026).
- The advertiser pays only for the action it confirms, and the rejection vanishes from the math
- The trash sits outside the math: neither confirmed nor rejected (AddSet, 2022)
- The test cap rarely passes 30 first deposits (Cpagram, 2024)
- Traffic review is the reason networks give for the wait (CPA Live, 2026)
- On cash-on-delivery sales, some networks keep the money until the buyer picks up the package
Clean and dirty approval rates in CPA
The approval your manager quotes almost always ignores the trash, but your wallet doesn’t. The clean math counts every lead you paid to generate, which is why it matches the ad manager’s statement.
The approval math on a batch of 16 leads
The advertiser confirmed part of the leads, rejected another part, and the rest never became a valid contact. The math below comes from the AddSet report (2022).
| Item | Count | Math | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| Leads sent | 16 | base of the clean math | 16 |
| Confirmed | 8 | 8 ÷ 16 × 100 | 50% clean |
| Rejected | 4 | dirty base: 8 + 4 | 12 |
| Trash | 4 | outside the dirty base | doesn’t count |
| Dirty approval | 8 of 12 | 8 ÷ 12 × 100 | 66.7% |
| Gap | 50% to 66.7% | 66.7 minus 50 | 16.7 points |
The trash sits near 30% of leads in the niche (AddSet, 2022).
When the manager only quotes the dirty number, subtract the trash before closing your own math.
In Poland, an affiliate sent 362 leads, 179 came out valid, and half of those became sales, according to Cpagram, in 2024.
How much approval each product delivers
Approval changes by product, by country, and by contact quality. The niche’s public reports show the range where a result counts as normal.
| Product or situation | Approval | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Niche’s low range | 27% | public reports (2019 to 2026) |
| Niche’s common range | 40% | public reports (2019 to 2026) |
| Niche’s high range | 60% | public reports (2019 to 2026) |
| Betting | 30% to 60% | Cpagram (2026) |
| Supplement in Bulgaria | 70% | Cpagram (2021) |
| Supplement in Ecuador, clean math | 21.28% | CPA Lenta (2023) |
| Adult in India, on Facebook | 20% to 22% | CPA Lenta (2024) |
| Simple sign-up | 100% | Cpagram (2026) |
Below 27%, the lead’s ceiling drops too far, and above 60% it’s an unusual product or contact. The simple sign-up approves everything because it never goes through a call center.
A good call center moves the result, and in one case in Russia the approval closed at 45% with the network’s own call center (ProTraffic, 2019).
How long the hold lasts for each product
The hold period depends on the risk the advertiser takes. A product paid on the spot releases the money fast, and a product that depends on a bank’s review keeps the payment for weeks.
| Situation | Hold period | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Niche’s low range | 7 days | public reports (2019 to 2026) |
| Niche’s common range | 14 days | public reports (2019 to 2026) |
| Niche’s high range | 28 days | public reports (2019 to 2026) |
| Betting, niche standard | 14 days | ProTraffic (2022) |
| First payout in betting | 14 days | CPA Lenta (2024) |
| Revenue share | no hold | AddSet (2022) |
| Finance and loans | 15 to 90 days | Cpagram (2023) |
| Bank cards | 30 to 90 days | AffTrends (2025) |
| First review at a big network | up to 42 days | CPA Live (2026) |
The window shrinks once you have history with the network. In betting, the first payout waits 14 days and the next ones 7, and one network drops the wait to 7 days once the affiliate proves the traffic pays for itself, according to AddSet, in 2022.
- A long hold isn’t punishment: it’s the time the advertiser needs to know whether the lead became a customer
- An offer with no hold usually charges a higher floor on the first payout
- One messaging app started holding for 30 days the money of people earning inside it (Traffic Ultras, 2026)
- Get the hold period in writing before the test, along with the cap and the payout per action
Cap: the lead limit the CPA network buys
The cap is the number of actions the advertiser buys, and the volume above it has no contract behind it. In practice, blowing past it without notice is the fastest way to work for free.
- Common betting test: 20 to 30 first deposits, the standard for judging traffic (Cpagram, 2024)
- The country moves the test’s cost: in Thailand, a $500 test with an English-language creative pulled a 0.4% CTR and zero leads, and the same creative redone with a local actress for $150 pushed the CTR to 2.1% and cut the cost per lead almost 3 times (CPA Live, 2026)
- Kazakhstan: a team ran 50 deposits and the traffic went into review before the payment
- Same team, 2 months later: the network tripled the cap after watching the players come back
- Brazil, traffic resold between networks: 91 deposits arrived on a 30-deposit contract, and the advertiser rejected most of them
The Brazilian case cost dearly because nobody renegotiated anything along the way. The campaign delivered 91 first deposits on a 30-deposit contract, and the payment stopped at review (Conversion.im, 2025).
- Ask for the cap along with the payout per action, before launching the first campaign
- Set the tracker to switch offers when the volume reaches the ceiling
- Warn the manager when you’re close to the ceiling, and request the raise in writing
- Keep the conversation: in one public dispute, a raise agreed only over messages turned into a lawsuit between 2 networks
A big team gets a higher cap than a solo affiliate, because it delivers the volume in a day. According to Partnerkin, in 2025, whoever shows up with the dashboard in hand negotiates a higher payout per action.
How much cash the payout wait demands
The math that breaks the new affiliate is simple: you pay for media today and collect after the hold. The cash has to cover all the media running in that gap.
An offer with a 14-day hold and $100 a day in ads, for example, locks up $1,400 before the first payout. Add the test that didn’t convert, and the locked amount doubles.
- One team recommends keeping half the total budget in the working-capital reserve (Cpagram, 2024)
- A betting test on Facebook burns $500 to $3,000 per offer (Cpagram, 2024)
- For every test that pays, 4 or 5 don’t, which multiplies the cash required (Cpagram, 2024)
- In supplements, finding the combination that pays costs up to $1,500, plus $1,000 until the payout (Cpagram, 2024)
- Pulling more than agreed out of the reserve is the mistake that keeps the campaign from reaching the payout (Cpagram, 2024)
The 4 figures below come from the niche’s public reports from 2019 to 2026.
| Contract item | Niche range |
|---|---|
| Minimum payout, low range | $25 |
| Minimum payout, common range | $50 |
| Minimum payout, high range | $100 |
| Payment frequency | weekly or biweekly |
A low floor returns the money sooner, and a high floor locks the balance up longer. If you start with no money saved for that wait, you stop running before the first payout.
When a commission cut is shave
When approval drops, the affiliate suspects the network. The difference between an unfair cut and a natural drop shows up in the numbers, and a single sign never closes the diagnosis.
The signs that point to an unfair cut
An unfair cut leaves a trail across 2 screens that should match: the tracker and the network’s dashboard. A natural drop shows up alongside a change on your side or in the market.
- The tracker logs more actions than the dashboard: it could be an unrecorded conversion, so check the postback and the source tag (AddSet, 2022)
- Approval drops from 80% to 30% with nothing changed on your side: it could be a cut or a call-center failure, so ask for the call recordings and compare against other offers (AddSet, 2022)
- The drop is only on your account: it’s an individual problem, and it’s worth talking to other affiliates (AddSet, 2022)
- The drop hits the whole niche: it’s the market or the platform’s algorithm, and other offers on the same product show it (CPA Lenta, 2024)
- Approval drops right after the payout per action goes up: the network may be clawing it back from the other side, and the history before and after the raise shows it (Cpagram, 2023)
A network that shaves loses the affiliate, and the market finds out, so the cut usually costs it more than it costs you. One niche analyst points out that most suspicions turn out to be mistakes.
- Check that the source tag arrives on every conversion before accusing the network
- Compare the same product across 2 networks for 1 week, with the same ad
- Ask for the rejection reason lead by lead: a serious network hands over the list
- An overblown promise in the ad tanks the approval rate and invites the regulator too
What raises approval without switching offers
Approval responds to what you send, not just to what the network does. Every tweak to the page changes the quality of the contact that reaches the call center.
- A clinical-tone page instead of a hyped one: better leads and higher approval in the supplements case (CPA Lenta, 2023)
- A mask on the phone field: fewer leads with no valid contact (AddSet, 2022)
- Cutting cities with high fraud: better lead quality in Latin America (Cpagram, 2022)
- Support in the country’s language: higher approval on a men’s product in Russia (Cpagram, 2023)
- Filtering repeat customers: higher approval and fewer rejections in microloans (Pirate CPA, 2026)
Real CPA commission cases with numbers
The cases show what each filter took out of the commission. The table lists the product, the country, the volume sent, and what the network confirmed.
| Product | Country | Volume | Confirmed | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Supplement | Ecuador | 2,483 leads | 21.28% clean | CPA Lenta (2023) |
| Weight loss | Poland | 362 leads | 25% | Cpagram (2024) |
| Betting | Kazakhstan | 50 deposits | paid after review | Cpagram (2026) |
| Resold betting traffic | Brazil | 91 deposits | partly rejected | Conversion.im (2025) |
| Supplement | Bulgaria | not disclosed | 70% | Cpagram (2021) |
| Adult on Facebook | India | not disclosed | 20% to 22% | CPA Lenta (2024) |
- In Ecuador, the payout per action rose from $10.81 to $14.79 once the page started generating good contacts
- In Poland, 179 leads came out valid and half of them became sales
- In Kazakhstan, the network tripled the cap the following month, on the strength of the history
- In Brazil, the contract was for 30 deposits and the traffic source wasn’t the one agreed
In none of these cases did the fix come from arguing with the network. Ecuador improved with a page that generates good contacts, and Kazakhstan with a history that turned into a bigger cap.
The mistakes that turn commission into loss
The loss almost never comes from the payout per action. It comes from a contract condition nobody read before launching the campaign, and it only surfaces at the end of the month.
- Using the dirty reading in the lead’s ceiling: the real number comes out lower and the campaign is born in the red (AddSet, 2022)
- Running without knowing the hold: in finance, the review takes up to 90 days and the cash runs out first (Cpagram, 2023)
- Passing the cap without notice: the network can reject the extra volume (Conversion.im, 2025)
- Ignoring the quality requirement: the network rejects the deposit that lands on day 8 when the rule says 7 (Cpagram, 2022)
- Accepting a vague requirement: a rule demanding wagers 3 times the deposit has to be in writing (Affy, 2024)
- Pulling the working capital for personal use in the first good month (Cpagram, 2024)
- Promising what the page doesn’t deliver: approval drops and the platform can still block the ad for false advertising
One big network stopped getting paid by an advertiser and didn’t pay part of its own affiliates’ leads. The risk climbs the whole chain, and the affiliate is the last to know.
The contract checklist before the first lead
The conditions fit in a 10-minute conversation with the manager, before spending on media. Ask for everything in writing, and keep the answer for the end-of-month reconciliation.
- Ask for the clean approval rate, with the 30% trash already in the base (AddSet, 2022)
- Ask for the hold period, which usually sits between 7 and 28 days, and whether it drops after the first payout
- Ask for the test cap, 10 to 30 actions on most offers, and how to request a raise
- Ask for the quality requirement and the window in which a deposit still counts
- Ask for the payout floor, between $25 and $100 in the niche, and the payment frequency
- Work out the lead’s ceiling with the clean approval and compare it against the real cost at the source
- Set aside the hold’s cash, which is the daily media spend multiplied by the review days
- Check the source tag on every
postback(the automatic conversion notice) before raising the budget
Before accusing the network
When the commission comes in below expectations, the cause almost always sits on a short list. Check in this order, because the most likely cause comes first.
- The trash slipped into the math and the dirty approval skewed the calculation
- The volume passed the cap and the extra part fell outside the contract
- The quality requirement failed part of the leads
- The tracking broke and the actions arrived without the
SubID(the source tag) - Only after all that, compare the network’s dashboard against your tracker, action by action
These causes, 2 at a time, explain nearly every gap an affiliate sees. Any one of them alone gets solved with the manager, without switching networks.
CPA commission FAQ
What is hold in CPA?
It’s the time the network takes to release the money after a conversion. The amount shows up on the dashboard, stays locked during the review, and only then enters the payout queue.
How long does the hold last?
The most repeated window in the niche is 14 days. On banking offers, the review runs up to 90 days, according to AffTrends, in 2025.
What is the approval rate and how do you calculate it?
The approval rate is the share of leads the advertiser confirms and pays for. The math divides confirmed leads by the total sent, and the result changes depending on whether the base includes the trash.
What’s the difference between clean and dirty approval?
The dirty reading ignores the trash and comes out higher, and the clean one counts every lead sent. In a batch with half the leads confirmed, the clean math returns 50%, according to AddSet, in 2022.
What is a cap on an offer?
It’s the limit of actions the advertiser buys in a period. The common test ceiling sits at 30 first deposits, and the network can reject the volume above it.
What happens if I go over the cap?
Traffic above the ceiling has no contract behind it, and the network can refuse to pay. In one public dispute, 91 first deposits arrived on a 30-deposit contract, and the advertiser rejected most of them.
How much cash do I need for the hold?
The cash has to cover all the media running before the first payout lands. One team recommends keeping half the total budget in that reserve, according to Cpagram, in 2024.
What is shave and how do you spot it?
It’s the cut of conversions the network received and never passed on. The sign shows up when the tracker logs more actions than the dashboard, with the ad unchanged.
How do I raise my campaign’s approval rate?
Promise on the page the same thing the ad promises, and send leads with valid phone numbers. One team raised its approval by changing the page’s angle and cutting cities with high fraud.
What’s the networks’ minimum payout?
The most repeated floor in the niche is $50, according to public reports from 2019 to 2026. Networks that pay with no hold usually ask for a higher floor on the first payout.
Hold, approval rate and cap in CPA: the bottom line
The real commission is the payout per action multiplied by the clean approval, limited by the cap and delayed by the hold. Whoever reads those conditions before the test knows the result before spending.
- Redo the lead’s ceiling with the approval that includes the trash
- Get the hold period in writing and set aside its cash
- Confirm the cap and how to raise it before scaling
- Keep the quality requirement next to the payout per action
- Compare tracker and dashboard every week, without waiting for the review
The other guides in this series show how to choose the offer and how to read the metrics that decide profit.
On AddSet’s batch of 16 leads, the dirty reading gives 66.7% and the clean one gives 50%.
How we sourced this post
The numbers come from public offers and case reports in the niche, checked in August 2026. Each offer’s terms come from the networks’ own materials.
Commission, hold, and approval rates change without notice, and the catalog turns over every week. Check the offer in the dashboard before putting money on media.
Our fact-checking process is on the About CPA RAW page, and the other guides in this series follow the same method.
Spotted an outdated number? Let us know through the contact page.
This post is informational and not financial advice. Media buying carries risk: you pay for the traffic before you know whether it converts.
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