Fees

Open Source Collective's fee structure

How Our Fees Work

Host Fee

Open Source Collective (OSC) charges a fixed 10% host fee on incoming funds. This means that when money comes into a hosted project from an outside donor, the fee is collected at this time. This is a payment from the hosted collective or fund account to OSC.

OSC does not charge for any other services it offers. There are no setup fees, balance minimums, or recurring charges for being part of OSC. OSC does not charge any fees when moving money from one hosted collective or fund to another.

Payment Processor Fees

We use third-party payment processors, such as Stripe, PayPal, and Wise, which apply their own processing fees to incoming donations and outgoing expenses. Their fees vary based on payment method, currency, and the country involved in the transaction. These fees are deducted from the collective balance at the time of the transaction.

There are ways to reduce these fees, including bundling your transactions, using a bank transfer instead of PayPal, or having the recipient set up a personal Wise account to receive the funds.

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What Our Fees Pay For

Host fees cover our costs for operational, legal, infrastructure, and financial services provided to hosted member projects. Beyond fiscal hosting, these fees also support our broader community work.

👉 Our budget is fully transparent — view it here.

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Can OSC Give Our Project a Discount?

Open Source Collective does not offer discounts. We keep a small buffer, lasting 6-12 months, in our core team costs to help us endure challenges like pandemics, recessions, and other financial risks.

In exceptional cases, we may consider a fee reduction for an extraordinarily high dollar amount one-time donation or balance transfer from another nonprofit. Any fee reduction is at OSC’s sole discretion and will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis.