Members Vault: the Q4 checklist I run in October (one item is permanent) Members only

Q4 does not create problems in a shop. It multiplies the ones already there. A fee line that is forty cents wrong in July is wrong three hundred times over in December, and one threshold changes your shop permanently if you cross it in November. This is the list I work through in October, with the arithmetic I actually run.

1. The $10,000 Offsite Ads line — the only item here you cannot undo

Etsy's Offsite Ads fee has two tiers. Under $10,000 of trailing twelve-month revenue you pay 15% and may opt out. At $10,000 the rate drops to 12% and you can no longer leave — that lock lasts as long as the shop exists. Not the tax year. The shop.

A seller sitting at $8,600 on 1 October, currently opted out, is about to make a decision without knowing it is one. A $2,000 Q4 puts them at $10,600, and the opt-out does not come back if next year is quieter.

On a $20,000-a-year shop, the annual cost at 12% depends entirely on how much order value gets attributed to an offsite click:

• $1,000 attributed (5% of revenue) — $120 a year
• $2,000 attributed (10%) — $240 a year
• $4,000 attributed (20%) — $480 a year

I have no verified figure for what share is typical, and I will not invent one. Use your own attributed total from the last twelve months.

Two mechanics matter more than the percentage. The fee is charged against the whole order total, not just the listing the buyer clicked, and there is a ceiling: "The Offsite Ads fee for any individual order will never exceed $100 USD."

The 15% is a cost. The $10,000 line is a decision, and you only get to make it once.

2. Three fee lines that December multiplies

Listing fees are charged per unit, not per listing. You pay $0.20 to publish, then another $0.20 for every additional unit that sells from that same listing. A sticker listing that moves 25 units in December costs $0.20 + $4.80 = $5.00 — 3.3% of $150 in revenue, inside a line most calculators still treat as a flat twenty cents.

Processing fees hit a wider base than the item price. In the US the rate is 3% + $0.25, applied to the full amount the buyer paid — item, shipping, and any sales tax. Tax money you never keep still widens the base you pay 3% on.

Share & Save has two exclusions that land squarely in Q4. It credits 4% of the eligible order total back as its own line in the Fees section of your payment account — not as a reduction of your transaction fee. Orders that arrived through Offsite Ads are excluded, and so are share links you send in Etsy Messages or paste into a listing description. If the holiday plan is "put the link in the description," there is no credit at the end of it.

3. Build the 1099-K bridge in October, not February

The federal threshold in force, per IRS FAQs issued 23 October 2025: the form is required once gross reportable payments pass $20,000 and transactions pass 200. Both, not either. Any workbook still printing $600, or the $5,000 / $2,500 phase-in, is out of date.

Two things go wrong every February. Tax is owed on the income whether or not a form arrives. And the number on the form is not your revenue — Etsy reports what buyers paid, "without regard to any adjustments for... fees, refunded amounts, or any other amounts." Illustrative figures below, not mine and not yours:

• 1099-K gross: $24,800
• Less refunds issued: $620
• Less Etsy fees (listing, transaction, processing, ads): $3,410
• Less shipping labels bought through Etsy: $2,150
• Cash that actually reached the bank: $18,620

Build that sheet while the quarter