Coupon codes are how a lot of affiliate sales really happen, and they are also where most of the money leaks. This guide explains what coupon leakage and affiliate fraud look like in practice, exactly how Affiracle decides who gets credit for an order, which settings protect you, and the habits that catch the rest.
What "leakage" and "fraud" mean here
Three situations cost a store money without bringing it a new customer:
- Coupon leakage. A code you gave one affiliate ends up on public coupon sites and browser extensions. Customers who were already at your checkout search for a code, find it, and you pay a discount and sometimes a commission on an order you would have had anyway.
- Last-click hijacking. A customer is already on your site, leaves for a moment to look for a coupon, and comes back through an affiliate link. The affiliate did not bring the customer, only the last click.
- Self-dealing and fake orders. An affiliate buys through their own link to collect a commission and a discount together, or sends orders that are later cancelled.
Coupon and deal sites bring a large share of the affiliate sales on Affiracle, and many stores want them. The question is not whether to work with them. It is whether you pay for customers they brought, or for customers who were already yours. The settings below let you draw that line where you want it.
How Affiracle decides who gets credit
Understanding this one rule makes every other decision easier.
- A tracked click comes first. If the customer arrived through an affiliate's link within your cookie duration, the order is credited to that affiliate, whatever code was typed at checkout.
- A coupon is the fallback, and it is not instant. An order with no tracked click is not credited when it is placed. Affiracle can match such orders afterwards, in a coupon scan of the store's recent orders, and it creates a sale only if the code is assigned exclusively to one affiliate.
- A shared code never creates a sale by itself. A code assigned to several affiliates is something they can publish, but each of them is paid only for customers who also came through their link.
The coupon scan exists for stores connected through WooCommerce and Shopify, where Affiracle can read the codes used on each order. It does not run by itself today: if you work with exclusive codes, contact support to have it run for your store. Sales created from a coupon arrive as pending, like any other sale.
Shared code or exclusive code
Open Coupons for your store, load your codes from the store platform, and assign each one. Apply coupon shares a code. Apply exclusively ties it to a single affiliate. A code that is already shared cannot be made exclusive, and an exclusive code cannot be shared, until you remove the existing assignment.
| Shared code | Exclusive code | |
|---|---|---|
| Who is paid | Whoever's link the customer clicked. | The code's owner, even with no click, once a coupon scan matches the order. |
| Good for | Coupon and deal sites that send traffic through links. | Instagram, TikTok, podcasts and anywhere a link is awkward. |
| If it leaks | You lose the discount, but pay no commission on orders without a click. | You lose the discount and pay the owner a commission on every order that uses it. |
That is its strength and its risk. If an affiliate posts their exclusive code on public coupon sites, every customer who finds it at your checkout earns them a commission. Give exclusive codes to affiliates you know, and watch how they are used. Affiracle does not detect a leaked code for you.
Settings that protect you
All of these are in the store settings, under Stores, and you decide whether to use each one.
Enable last click override protection
When this is on, Affiracle checks whether the same visitor was already browsing your store in the 24 hours before they arrived through an affiliate link. If they were, the order is not credited to that affiliate. It is built for the customer who leaves your checkout to look for a coupon and comes back through a coupon site. Available on the Standard and Premium plans and during the trial.
Know the trade-off: it also removes credit from an affiliate whose follower looked at your store in the morning and bought through the affiliate's link that evening. Such orders are not recorded at all, so they will not appear in your sales list as rejected. If most of your affiliates are content creators rather than coupon sites, think before you turn it on.
Commission first time users only
Affiliates earn only on a customer's first order. This removes the incentive to collect commissions on your existing customers, which is most of what leakage is.
Manual conversion approval
Every sale waits as pending until you approve it, so you can reject an order that was cancelled or looks wrong before any commission becomes payable. When you reject, you choose a reason, and Fraudulent transaction is one of them. The affiliate is notified, with the reason.
Cookie duration and commission attribution
A shorter Cookie duration (days) narrows the window in which a click earns credit. Commission Attribution set to First click credits the affiliate who introduced the customer, not the one who appeared last.
Habits that catch the rest
- One code per affiliate. When a code shows up somewhere it should not, you know whose it is.
- Set limits where the code lives. Usage limits, expiry dates, minimum order and "new customers only" are set in your store platform. Affiracle reads the codes and does not override those rules.
- Search for your own codes. Once a month, search for your store name with the word "coupon". If an exclusive code is on a public coupon site, talk to its owner.
- Compare clicks with orders. An affiliate with many coupon orders and almost no clicks is either a creator whose audience types the code, or a leak. One message in the chat usually tells you which.
- Write the rules down. Say in the campaign description what is not allowed, for example bidding on your brand name in paid search, or posting exclusive codes on coupon sites. Affiliates can only follow rules they have seen.
- Pause, then talk. You can pause a single affiliate on a campaign from their page, without closing the campaign for everyone else.
Shared codes for coupon sites, so you pay them only for clicks. Exclusive codes for creators you know. Manual approval on. A usage limit and an expiry date on every code. Review coupon orders once a month.
What Affiracle does not do
So that you can plan around it: Affiracle does not alert you when a code leaks, does not block an affiliate from ordering through their own link on a regular store order, and does not receive refunds or cancellations from your store platform. A cancelled order stays pending until you reject it. Manual approval is the control that covers all three.
FAQ
A customer used an affiliate's code but never clicked their link. Does the affiliate get paid?
Only if the code is assigned exclusively to that affiliate, your store is connected through WooCommerce or Shopify, and a coupon scan has matched the order. It is not credited at the moment of the order. With a shared code, no.
A customer clicked one affiliate's link and used another affiliate's code. Who gets the sale?
The affiliate whose link was clicked. A tracked click always comes before a coupon.
Should I stop working with coupon sites?
That is your decision, and for many stores the answer is no, because they bring real orders. Use shared codes and last click override protection so you pay for the customers they bring and not for the ones you already had.
I think an affiliate is ordering through their own link. What can I do?
Compare the customer details on the order with the affiliate's details. If it is a self-purchase and your program does not allow it, reject the sale with a reason and tell the affiliate. State the rule in your campaign description so it is clear to everyone.
Where do I see how often a code was used?
In your store platform's coupon report, which counts every order that used the code, including orders that were not affiliate sales. Compare it with the sales that affiliate has in Affiracle.