Whether you're a developer adding travel to an agent product or an indie operator shipping a branded AI travel business, the question under the hood is the same: is the money real, and is it predictable? Before you build, you want to know exactly when it lands and how much of it is yours. Here's the full picture.

How do you get paid on RouteStack?

You get paid the way a business wants to get paid: on a weekly cycle, by ACH, into your account. There's no invoicing, no chasing, and no quarterly settlement lag.

The amount is set by you. RouteStack lets you put a markup on every vertical - flights, hotels, and cars- and you keep 100% of it. RouteStack doesn't shave a percentage off your margin; the markup you set is the markup you earn. That's the part that makes the model work, whether you're earning on a handful of high-value trips a month or running steady volume through a branded agent.

Here's a worked example. Your agent plans a road trip: fly into Denver, three nights in Aspen, a rental car for the week - totaling $1,200 across the three bookings. You've set a 10% markup, so you earn $120 on that single trip, kept in full, and it settles to you on the following weekly payout. Run twenty of those in a month, and you're looking at predictable weekly deposits, not a year-end reconciliation.

For an indie operator, that's recurring business revenue with a cash-flow rhythm you can actually plan around. For an agent developer, it's commission on every booking your agent ships, across all three verticals — the full economic loop, paid weekly.

How much you keep, and how you set it

You keep all of the markup. What you pay for is API usage, RouteStack is credit-based and starts free, with 100 API credits and an unlimited sandbox to build against before you spend anything. So the honest framing is: you keep 100% of your markup, and your cost is metered API credits, not a cut of your earnings.

Setting the markup is a one-time configuration per vertical, and you have three ways to do it:

1. Flat markup — pick a percentage or fixed amount per vertical and apply it to every booking.
2. Algorithm-suggested — let the pricing engine recommend a competitive markup so you're not leaving margin on the table or pricing yourself out.
3. Wholesale-plus-retail — start from the wholesale rate and layer your own retail price on top.

Flights go a step further with per-component markup — you can mark up the base fare, the seat, and the bags independently, rather than applying one blanket number.

// Set your markup per vertical — you keep 100% of it
await rs.markup.set({ flights: "8%", hotels: "12%", cars: "10%" });

// Or let the pricing engine suggest a competitive rate
const suggested = await rs.markup.suggest({ vertical: "hotels" });

Your earnings dashboard then shows income across flights, hotels, and cars in one view, so you can see exactly what each vertical is contributing. The commission and markup documentation is public — you can read precisely what you earn, how it's calculated, and when it pays out before you sign up.

Common concerns

Do I really keep 100% — are there hidden fees on my earnings?

Yes, you keep 100% of the markup you set. There's no platform cut on your margin. Your only cost is API credits, which are metered and start free; that's separate from what you earn.

What happens to my payout if a booking is refunded or charged back?

Because checkout and the merchant relationship run through RouteStack as merchant of record, the payment-side handling — including refunds and chargebacks — sits there, not in an account you manage. Your earnings reconcile against actual completed bookings.

When does the payout clock start, and is there a minimum?

Payouts run on a weekly ACH cycle. For the exact cut-off timing and any minimum-threshold specifics, check the public commission and markup docs — they spell out the schedule so you can plan around real dates rather than estimates.

Do I need a Stripe account or a finance team to receive this?

No. RouteStack is the merchant of record and handles the payment rail; you don't open a merchant account, and you don't need a finance team to reconcile it. For an indie operator, that's the difference between "I have a travel business" and "I have a travel business and a back office to run."

Start earning

You can have a bookable, multi-vertical trip running — and your markup set — before you commit a line of your own code. Start free with 100 API credits and an unlimited sandbox.

*This article is general information, not financial or legal advice; confirm current payout terms in the commission and markup documentation before launch.