How do I calculate a commercial buyout in Germany?

A German commercial buyout is negotiated as a percentage of the basic day rate for a usage term, and the client reads it line by line. Set the line's unit to Percentage, point its Fee at the talent Fee, and the line reads as a percentage of the fee it sits on, which is what the contract says.

The arithmetic comes from the rate list and the agreement. Splinde's own guidance on German commercial buyouts (the usage fee, called Nutzungshonorar in German) states the shape as day rate times media percentage times territory factor, and makes two points worth building in. All rates are per year, so a second year is a second multiple of the same rate. And digital is priced on its own: client homepage and social carry their own percentages. The figures depend on the VELMA rate list that German commercial buyouts are calculated from and the year the job runs in, so you enter the percentages and territory factors from the list that applies.

Build the buyout line

Add a General Cost Item under the talent line and name it the way the deal reads.
Click the unit label above the middle number field. In Search Unit, type Percentage and pick it. Do this before you type a rate, so the figure you enter is the percentage itself.
In Fee, type @, open the Cost Items tab and pick the talent line's Fee. The buyout now follows the day rate instead of repeating it.
Type the media percentage into the middle field.
In Amount, type the term. 1 for one year, 2 when the client wants two.

Set the rate once

Open the Variables tab, click the +, choose Create new Variable, and create a Variable of type % Percentage holding the media percentage. Then type @ in the buyout line's middle field and pick it from the Variables tab. When the rate is renegotiated, one edit moves every line pointing at it. The term works the same way if a second year is still in discussion.

Good to know

Each field holds one number or one @ pointer. Day rate times media percentage times territory factor spreads across the Cost Item's own Amount, middle field and Fee. For a fourth multiplier, chain a second Cost Item whose Fee points at the first line's Total.
Give each media channel its own Cost Item rather than one bundled buyout. Homepage, social and TV then read as three lines a client can see and discuss.
Switching to Percentage rewrites plain numbers, and a field that already holds an @ pointer keeps it.
If the buyout does not need its own line, a Markup AddOn on the talent Cost Item adds the percentage on top of that line, calculated on its Amount, days and Fee. Its rate field takes an @ pointer to the same Variable.