# Selling scorecard access

> From FilmScorecard Help: https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/selling-scorecard-access

Once a scorecard is released — with its season, or on its own ahead of it —
its filmmaker can read their score for nothing and pay to unlock the working
behind it — every judge's answers, the averages, the written notes, the reviews
and their season rank. This guide covers what is sold and at what price, what
has to be true before anything can be sold, what you earn, what a discounted
sale earns you, where the figures appear, how to see whether one submission has
been unlocked, comping access for a filmmaker, and what happens on a refund.

**You do not price this and you do not run the checkout.** Both belong to the
platform. What is yours is the payout account the money lands in, the figures on
your dashboard, one button that gives a filmmaker their scorecard for nothing,
and **your organization's own promo codes** — the one way to sell below the
platform's price. See [Promo codes](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/promo-codes.md).

## What is sold, and for how much

**Access to one submission's scorecard in one category, for $29.99 USD, once —
and $22.49 for each further category of the same submission.**

- **A submission judged in one category is one sale of $29.99.** That is most
  of them, and nothing about it has changed.
- **A submission judged in more than one is sold a category at a time.** Each
  category is its own scorecard, with its own judges and its own notes, so each
  one is unlocked in its own right. The first costs $29.99 and every later one
  is **25% off** at $22.49 — two categories come to $52.48, three to $74.97.
- **The filmmaker buys them in one press.** The button on their page unlocks
  every category still locked, in one payment, and your Orders list records
  **one row per category**. See
  [Paying for your scorecard](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/paying-for-your-scorecard.md) for their side of
  it, word for word.
- **The discount follows what the submission already holds**, whether it was
  paid for, comped by you or unlocked free, and however long ago. A submission
  holding one unlock is charged $22.49 for the next one.
- **Only a category with an approved creative scorecard is sold.** What a
  filmmaker pays for is the judges' work, so a category the film is attached to
  but nobody has scored has no section on the filmmaker's page and is not
  charged for — and a category scored so far only on its technical review or
  press kit is on the filmmaker's page, with its score, but has nothing for
  sale until a creative scorecard in it is approved. A category with no
  creative scorecard at all is never for sale; a comp is the only way to open
  it.
- **The price is platform-set and the same everywhere.** Every festival on
  FilmScorecard sells at the same figures. **There is no price field on any of
  your screens**, on the season, the festival or the organization — not hidden,
  not greyed, not coming.
- **It is per submission, per season.** A filmmaker with two films in your
  season buys twice; one film in two of your seasons is two scorecards.
- **Access is permanent.** It does not expire, it survives archiving the season,
  and it cannot be taken back.
- **A category bought and then taken off the film stays bought.** Removing a
  category with **Edit categories** is never refused for a purchase: the
  filmmaker keeps that section on their page, exactly as it stood when the
  category was removed, and the sale stays on [Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md). A removed
  category nobody bought is never offered for sale. See
  [What removing a category leaves behind](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/submissions.md#what-removing-a-category-leaves-behind).
- **The submitter's score is free** and always was. What they pay for is
  everything behind it.
- **A filmmaker with one of your promo codes pays less** — and the sale is
  otherwise an ordinary one. Only a **Free unlock** code, which exists only
  where FilmScorecard has allowed your organization free codes, makes it cost
  nothing. See [Discounted sales](#discounted-sales).

## What has to be true before anything sells

Three things, and all three are yours except the last:

1. **The submission's scorecard is released** — with the season, see
   [Releasing scorecards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md), or on its own ahead of
   it, see
   [Releasing one submission's scorecard](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-one-scorecard.md).
   Either one opens the purchase at once.
2. **The category has an approved creative scorecard.** A submission with
   nothing scored has no page at all, so there is nothing to sell; a category
   scored only on its technical review or press kit has a section on the page
   and nothing for sale; and on a submission in several categories, only the
   categories with an approved creative scorecard are on sale.
3. **Your organization's payouts are fully enabled on Stripe** — see
   [Connecting payouts](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/connecting-payouts.md).

**A released scorecard with payouts unfinished shows its submitter the price
and the list of what they would get, and no button**, under one line:

> This festival is not set up to accept payments yet. Check back soon.

That is the whole of what a filmmaker is told, and it is the state your amber
[dashboard banner](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-overview.md#the-payout-banner) is warning you about.
Nothing is lost while it lasts — a submitter who comes back after you finish
onboarding gets the ordinary card. **No promo code works in the meantime.**

## What you earn

**What the filmmaker pays, less the platform fee and your share of Stripe's
processing fee, is yours.** Both come off at the moment of the sale, not in a
monthly invoice: the charge is taken by FilmScorecard, the platform fee and
your processing share are kept back together, and the rest is transferred into
the Stripe account your organization connected.

On an organization FilmScorecard has not changed, a $29.99 scorecard sold with
no code comes to:

| | |
| --- | --- |
| **Paid** | $29.99 |
| **Platform fee** — 20% of what is paid | $6.00 |
| **Processing** — your half of Stripe's fee, estimated at 2.9% + 30¢ ($1.17) | $0.59 |
| **To you** | $23.40 |

- **Your terms are on the Payments tab** of Organization settings, stated in
  one line — for example "FilmScorecard keeps 20% of what each order pays, at
  least $2.00. You pay 50% of Stripe's processing fee, estimated at 2.9% + 30¢
  an order." They are your organization's own, and no screen of yours can
  change them. See
  [the platform fee line](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/connecting-payouts.md#the-platform-fee-line).
- **The platform fee is your rate on what the order pays** — or, if
  FilmScorecard has set your organization up that way, on the order's full
  price before any code — and **no paid order is charged less than $2.00 of
  it**, unless your rate is 0%. At 20% the floor never comes into it on a
  full-price scorecard — 20% of $29.99 is $6.00 — so it matters on a low rate,
  or on an order a deep code has made cheap. See
  [Discounted sales](#discounted-sales) for what a code changes.
- **Your processing share is an estimate made when the order is placed** —
  2.9% of what the order pays plus 30¢, at your organization's share, 50%
  unless FilmScorecard has set it otherwise. FilmScorecard pays the rest of
  Stripe's fee, and anything Stripe charges beyond the estimate. It applies to
  every paid order, at a rate of 0% too.
- **A payment covering several categories is split across them.** The fee and
  the processing share are divided between the categories in proportion to
  what each one was charged, to the cent, and a promo code's discount is worked
  out category by category, so the rows always add up to what Stripe charged.
- **Each sale keeps the fee it was actually charged.** If your terms are
  renegotiated later, last month's sales keep last month's figures — nothing is
  recalculated behind you, and a CSV downloaded twice reads the same both times.
- **When the money reaches your bank is Stripe's business.** Balances, payout
  schedules and transfers live in your Stripe dashboard and nowhere here.

## Discounted sales

**Your organization makes its own promo codes**, on the
[Promo codes](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/promo-codes.md) screen — owners and org admins only. A code
takes a percentage or an amount off, and you decide which of your seasons it
works in, how many times it can be used and between which dates. A filmmaker
who has one types it into the checkout dialog before they go to Stripe. **A
code works only at your own festivals**, and nobody else's code works at yours.

What a code changes for you:

- **It applies to each category at that category's own price**, after the 25%
  extra-category price. A 20% code takes $6.00 off a $29.99 scorecard and $4.50
  off a $22.49 one; a $15.00 code takes $15.00 off each.
- **On the usual terms, the platform fee follows what is paid**, so the
  platform shares the discount with you. A 20% code on a $29.99 scorecard
  leaves $23.99 charged, $4.80 of platform fee, $0.50 of processing and
  **$18.69 to you**.
- **On full-price terms**, if FilmScorecard has set your organization up that
  way, the platform fee stays where it would have been with no code, so **the
  whole discount comes out of your share**: the same 20% code leaves $23.99
  charged, $6.00 of platform fee, $0.50 of processing and **$17.49 to you**.
- **Every coded order pays at least what covers its own fees** — the platform
  fee, with its $2.00 minimum, and your processing share — and never less than
  $0.50. Each category keeps its share of that minimum, so a code worth more
  than the rest of a category's price stops there. Codes are capped when you
  make them so that a lone $29.99 scorecard still covers both — 92% or $27.81
  off on the usual terms, which leaves an order of $2.18: $2.00 of platform fee,
  $0.18 of processing and nothing for you. See
  [How deep a code can go](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/promo-codes.md#how-deep-a-code-can-go). A code at
  that limit leaves you nothing on the order, and never a debt.
- **A Free unlock code makes the order free**, and it is the only code that
  can. It exists only where FilmScorecard has allowed your organization free
  codes: the filmmaker who types one goes straight back to an unlocked page
  without visiting Stripe, nothing is charged, and nobody — you, the platform
  or Stripe — takes anything. The rows on [Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md) read **Free
  unlock** at $0.00 with the code on them, and the filmmaker is emailed a
  receipt. The Free unlock codes of earlier days, made before FilmScorecard
  asked, were all ended and stay ended.
- **Your figures are what was paid.** Gross on the Revenue card, the Amount
  column and the figures on [Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md) all read the discounted
  amount, because that is the money that went through Stripe. Nothing on your
  screens adds the discount back in, except the Revenue card's **Discounts**
  line, which is what codes took off.
- **The code is recorded on the order.** The order panel prints **List price**,
  **Code** and **Paid** in place of the single Amount line — see
  [When a promo code was used](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md#when-a-promo-code-was-used) — and
  the Orders CSV carries **Discount** and **Code** columns beside Amount. The
  season's Revenue card and its scorecard-sales CSV report what was paid, and
  name no code.
- **The filmmaker's receipt names it too**, with the list price, the code and
  what they paid.

**How often each code has been used**, and the most recent orders it went on,
are on the [Promo codes](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/promo-codes.md) screen. Nothing emails you when a
code is used. **To tell filmmakers about a code**, email it to them from that
screen — see [Emailing a code](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/promo-codes.md#emailing-a-code).

## Where the figures appear

**The Revenue card** on the [Season overview](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-overview.md#revenue),
under **Scorecard sales**: **Scorecards sold**, **Gross**, **Platform fee**,
**Processing** and **Host net**. **Sold counts unlocked categories, not
submissions** — free unlocks and comps included, both at $0.00 — so a
two-category film unlocked whole counts as two. A refund takes its sale out of
the count and its money out of every line.

**The scorecard-sales CSV**, from **Export CSV** on that card, **one row per
category unlocked**:

```
Purchased at, Receipt, Submission, Amount, Platform fee, Processing, Net, Currency
```

A submission unlocked in two categories is two rows with the same title and two
different receipt numbers. **This file names no category** — the list that does
is the [Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md) CSV, which carries a Category column.

Money columns are plain two-decimal numbers with no currency sign, so a
spreadsheet reads them as numbers, and **Net is a column rather than a sum you
have to write** — it is Amount minus Platform fee and Processing, computed the
same way the card computes it. Refunded sales are not in the file.

A title that begins with `=`, `+`, `-` or `@` is written with an apostrophe in
front of it, so a spreadsheet shows it as text instead of running it as a
formula.

**Both need the *View revenue and payouts* permission** — see
[Who can open it](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-overview.md#who-can-open-it). Somebody without it has
no Revenue card at all, and the CSV address answers them "page not found".

**The Orders screen**, behind **View orders** on that same card, is the
organization-wide list — one row per category unlocked, across every festival,
buyer and receipt named, discounts and refunds kept and marked, with a
**Processing** column beside the fee — for owners and org admins only. See
[Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md).

## Whether one submission has been unlocked

Open the submission from the [Submissions](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/submissions.md) list and go to the
drawer's **Settings** tab. In the **Scorecard link** card, under the line that
says where the scorecard's release stands, a second line says whether it has
been unlocked:

| The line | What it means |
| --- | --- |
| **Not unlocked** | Nothing has been bought or comped. The filmmaker can still see their score. |
| **Unlocked · SC-40318 · 14 Aug 2026** | Bought, comped or freely unlocked, with the receipt number the filmmaker's own page shows and the date it happened. |
| **Unlocked · SC-40318 · 14 Aug 2026 · 1 of 2 categories** | The same, on a submission in more than one category, with how many of them are unlocked. |
| **Refunded · SC-40318** | It was unlocked and then refunded in full, and nothing on it is unlocked now, so the page is locked again. No date: the purchase date is no longer the fact that matters. |

- **The count is categories, not purchases.** "1 of 2 categories" means one is
  open and one is not; **2 of 2** means the whole submission is unlocked. The
  line names the most recent unlock's receipt number, whichever category it
  belongs to.
- **A category the film is attached to counts in the M**, even if nobody has
  scored it yet — so a submission can read "1 of 2 categories" while the second
  one is not yet on sale at all.
- **Only the categories the film still competes in count, on either side.** A
  category it has been taken out of is in neither number, even if the
  filmmaker bought it — they keep that section on their page, and
  [Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md) keeps its row, but this line no longer counts it. A
  submission whose only purchase was in a removed category reads **Not
  unlocked** here, while the Submissions table's **Purchased** column still
  ticks it.

**This is the only per-submission view of any of it.** The line does not say
whether the filmmaker paid, was comped or unlocked for free, which category is
open, what they paid, or whether a code was used. The Submissions table's
**Purchased** column ticks every row with an unrefunded unlock — a removed
category's included — for the same people, and says nothing more. The list that
does say which — across every festival, one row per category, with the buyer
beside each row — is [Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md), for owners and org admins.

**It only appears for somebody with *View revenue and payouts*.** For anybody
else the line is not drawn and the figures are never read — there is no greyed
version and nothing on their screen to say a line is missing.

## Comping access for a filmmaker

**Comp scorecard access** gives one filmmaker their full scorecard at no charge.
Use it for a filmmaker you owe a favour, a mistake you want to make good, or a
guest of the festival.

The button sits under the unlocked line in that same card, and **it is only
drawn when there is something to comp**: the submission's scorecard has been
released — with the season, or on its own — its season carries the usual
price, and **at least one of the categories it still competes in holds no
unlock of any kind**. A submission that is unlocked in every one of them —
bought, comped or refunded — shows its line and no button.

1. Press **Comp scorecard access**.
2. A dialog confirms it, headed with the film's title:

   > **Comp scorecard access for The Lighthouse Keeper?**
   >
   > This unlocks the full scorecard permanently, at $0.00. The festival earns
   > nothing on a comped scorecard.

3. Press **Comp access**, or **Cancel**.

The dialog closes, the screen re-reads, and the line becomes **Unlocked**
with a receipt number and today's date.

Six things to know before you use it:

- **It opens every category that is not already unlocked**, in one press —
  including a category nobody has scored yet, which then opens for the filmmaker
  the moment a scorecard for it is approved, and a category that is not for
  sale. Each category gets a receipt number of its own.
- **It opens only the categories the film still competes in.** A category it
  has been taken out of is never comped, and a section the filmmaker bought
  there before it was removed is not a reason to hold the button back from the
  rest.
- **It fills the gap and nothing more.** On a submission where the filmmaker
  has already bought one of two categories, comping opens the other and leaves
  the purchase exactly as it was.
- **A refunded category is skipped and never re-granted.** If every category has
  been bought and refunded there is nothing to comp, and no button.
- **It cannot be undone, and it earns you nothing**, by design. There is no
  un-comp, a comped category can never afterwards be sold, and each comped
  category is recorded at $0.00 with a $0.00 fee — counting in your
  **Scorecards sold** with no money against it.
- **The filmmaker is not told.** No email is sent — a receipt for $0.00 nobody
  asked for is mail nobody wants — so if the point is a gesture, tell them
  yourself. Their page is unlocked from their next load, and from their side it
  is indistinguishable from paying.

**A comp is the one way to give one scorecard away from your side.** The other
way is a **Free unlock** promo code, which the filmmaker types themselves — and
which exists only where FilmScorecard has allowed your organization free codes.
See [Free unlock codes](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/promo-codes.md#free-unlock-codes).

**And it is the answer to a filmmaker stuck with one category open and one
closed.** Their own page cannot sell them the remaining category today, so if
they write to you asking for it, comping is what opens it — at no charge, and
earning you nothing.

### Who can actually comp

Two conditions, and they are not the same condition:

- **Seeing the line** takes *View revenue and payouts* — festival admins by
  default, owners and org admins always, and anybody the box has been ticked
  for. See [Festival access](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/festival-access.md#capabilities).
- **Comping** takes that **and** being somebody who can change the season.

For nearly everybody those are the same people. The exception is the one this
permission exists for: **a read-only viewer given revenue** — a board member, an
accountant. They see the unlocked line, and no button: the comp needs somebody
who can change the season, and a viewer cannot. If a tab left open from before
their access changed still shows one, pressing it answers:

> Scorecard access could not be comped. Refresh the page and try again.

**That sentence is the answer to every refusal**, including an entry somebody
else has just comped and a scorecard that has not been released. It never says
which, deliberately — a refusal that named its reason would tell somebody who
may not act on a submission that the submission exists.

## Refunds

**Scorecard purchases are final, and the product says so to the filmmaker
twice** — on the card before they press, and again in their receipt email. It
is printed a third time on the Stripe invoice that comes with that receipt.

- **There is no refund button anywhere on your screens**, and none on theirs.
  Nothing in this product asks for a refund or grants one.
- **A refund is an exception handled off-platform**, and only FilmScorecard can
  issue one. If a filmmaker writes to you about a charge, that is the route —
  not a control you are failing to find.
- **A full refund re-locks every category that payment bought**, permanently.
  Each of those categories drops out of the Revenue card and the CSV, and
  **none of them can ever be sold or comped again**. On [Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md)
  each row stays, marked Refunded, with the amount that was charged — and, on a
  discounted sale, the code that made it that figure. **The code does not get
  its use back.** A section the filmmaker had kept from a removed category is
  taken off their page by a refund too.
- **It can leave a submission half-sold, and the filmmaker cannot fix it.** If
  one category was refunded and another was never bought, their purchase card
  shows the refunded state and offers no button, so the remaining category can
  only be opened by a comp.
- **A partial refund changes nothing at all.** The scorecard stays unlocked and
  the sale stays in your figures. That is deliberate: a small goodwill gesture
  must not destroy somebody's access.
- **Nobody is emailed either way.** Not the filmmaker, not you.

## A sold submission cannot be moved

**Once any category of a submission has been unlocked — bought, comped, freely
unlocked, or refunded afterwards — that submission stays in its season.** The
Move dialog opens on one sentence in place of its controls:

> This submission's scorecard has been purchased, so it cannot be moved.

and **Move** stays dim. A receipt names the season it was sold in, and nothing
on your screens can re-key one. See
[Moving a submission to another festival](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/submissions.md#moving-a-submission-to-another-festival).

The same fact blocks an import rollback: a batch holding a submission whose
scorecard has been unlocked is refused whole, and the refusal counts
submissions — see [Imports](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/imports.md).

## What this does not do

- **No price of your own.** Not per season, not per festival, not per
  submission, not per category. The figures are the platform's.
- **No fee terms of your own.** The platform rate, what it is charged on and
  your share of processing are set by FilmScorecard for your organization.
- **No code after the fact.** A promo code works only when the filmmaker types
  it at checkout; nothing applies one to a sale already made, and nothing lowers
  the price for everyone — see [Promo codes](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/promo-codes.md).
- **No refund UI, and none planned.**
- **No sales notification.** Nothing emails you when a scorecard sells; the
  Revenue card, the CSV and [Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md) are the record.
- **No per-season list of who has unlocked.** The state is per submission, in
  the drawer, one at a time, and the Submissions table's **Purchased** column
  ticks the rows; the list across every festival is [Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md), and
  it is for owners and org admins only.
- **No view of access codes, share links or who has opened a page.** Those have
  no staff screen at all.
- **No copy of the invoice.** Stripe writes one per payment and sends it to the
  filmmaker with their receipt; your side of the money is the Revenue card, the
  CSV and Orders.
- **Nothing about entry fees.** They are still collected on FilmFreeway and are
  not reported anywhere in this product. A fee the import brings in is shown on
  the submission's record and added into nothing.
- **Nothing about judge pay.** That is money you move yourself — see
  [Paying your judges](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/paying-your-judges.md).

## Related guides

- [Releasing scorecards](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-scorecards.md) — the one-way action that
  opens a season's scorecards, and what each submitter is emailed.
- [Releasing one submission's scorecard](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/releasing-one-scorecard.md) —
  opening one submission's scorecard ahead of the season, which opens its
  purchase and its comp at once.
- [Promo codes](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/promo-codes.md) — your organization's own codes: making
  them, choosing which seasons they work in and how often, pausing and ending
  them, emailing them, and how each one has been used.
- [Connecting payouts](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/connecting-payouts.md) — the Stripe account your share
  is paid into, the platform fee line with your processing share, and the amber
  banner when it is not finished.
- [The Season overview](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/season-overview.md) — the Revenue card, the
  scorecard-sales CSV and who may see them.
- [Orders](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/orders.md) — every unlock across the organization in one list:
  buyer, receipt, category, status, the figures, the discount lines on a coded
  sale, resending a receipt, and the CSV.
- [Opening a submission](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/opening-a-submission.md#the-scorecard-link) — the
  drawer whose Scorecard link card carries the unlocked line and the Comp
  button.
- [Paying for your scorecard](https://www.filmscorecard.com/help/paying-for-your-scorecard.md) — the filmmaker's
  side: the card, the promo-code field, the Stripe page, the receipt, and the
  three states with no button.