Overview
Tax Form Management helps you collect and verify W-9 information from US-based advocates and manage reward approvals when required tax information is missing.
It tracks advocate earnings by calendar year, requests tax information based on your settings, verifies submitted information, and holds affected rewards when a valid W-9 is not on file.
How Tax Form Management works
Tax Form Management automates the W-9 collection process:
- Tracks each advocate’s year-to-date cash earnings
- It automatically asks advocates to fill out an electronic W-9 — by email and with a banner in their portal or reward widget/landing page — either at onboarding or upon reaching a threshold before they reach the limit
- Advocates submit their tax information through a secure, guided form (no paperwork)
- The information is verified against IRS records automatically
- If an advocate reaches the limit without a valid W-9, new reward approvals are held for that advocate
- Once the W-9 is verified, their rewards with an approval held status are automatically approved
Important: The earnings limit is fixed at $2,000 per calendar year. You can configure the threshhold for when advocates are first asked to submit their tax information, but the $2,000 limit cannot be changed.
What happens at the earnings limit
When approving a reward would cause an advocate to reach or exceed the $2,000 calendar-year limit without a verified W-9, the reward status changes to Approval Held.
The advocate is notified via email that tax information is required and directed to complete the form. If you utilize the Portal or Reward widgets, the advocate
They also appear in the Threshold Reached view in Tax Form Management, making it easy to see who is affected.
Verification and security
After submission, verification typically takes two to four hours. During this time, the form may show a pending or submitted status, and affected rewards remain on hold.
Tax Form Management protects sensitive information by:
- Requiring identity verification before the advocate can access the form
- Masking tax identification numbers after submission
- Displaying only the last four digits in Ambassador
- Using a standardized, secure tax form that cannot be customized
- Providing secure, time-limited links for W-9 downloads
Once verification is successful, the advocate’s tax information is marked as verified and eligible held rewards are released automatically.
Where to manage tax forms
Go to: Rewards & Payments → Tax Form Management
From here, you can:
- Configure Settings
- Monitor advocates approaching or reaching the annual limit
- Review tax form and reward approval statuses
- Resend W-9 requests
- Upload a signed W-9 on an advocate’s behalf
- Review current and previous tax years
Availability
Tax Form Management currently supports W-9 collection for US-based advocates. International tax forms, including Form W-8BEN, are not supported in the current version.
Questions? Review the related articles or contact support@getambassador.com.
Related Articles:
- How to Configure Tax Form Management
- How to Manage Tax Form Emails and Reminders
- Advocate Tax Form Experience
- How to Monitor W-9 Statuses and Held Rewards
- How to Upload a W-9 for an Advocate
- How TIN Verification Works and How to Resolve Errors
- Tax Form Management Status Reference and FAQs