$2,000 is the threshold at which an American brand's payments to a creator, in a tax year beginning after 2025, oblige the brand to file a Form 1099-NEC with the IRS under the current instructions, and a brand that runs a monthly batch with one creator can cross it in a quarter. That form is the visible end of a classification the brand made, usually without noticing, the day it first paid a creator: that the creator is an independent contractor and not an employee. The IRS's page on the question says the determination depends on the entire relationship and the extent of the right to direct and control the worker, that there is no magic number of factors, and that a business which classifies an employee as a contractor without a reasonable basis may be held liable for the employment taxes.
The creator's side of the paperwork, the W-9, the 1099-NEC, the self-employment tax, is in the guides to getting paid and to taxes for creators in the United States. This guide takes the brand's side: what the IRS's test looks at, why the way a brand briefs and manages creators is evidence in that test, and the forms the brand collects and files.
Contractor or employee: the IRS's three categories
Three categories of evidence
The IRS states that facts providing evidence of the degree of control and independence fall into three categories. Behavioral: does the company control or have the right to control what the worker does and how the worker does the job. Financial: are the business aspects of the worker's job controlled by the payer, how the worker is paid, whether expenses are reimbursed, who provides tools and supplies. Type of relationship: are there written contracts or employee-type benefits, will the relationship continue, and is the work performed a key aspect of the business. The page adds that businesses must weigh all these factors, that some may point one way and others the other, that no one factor stands alone, and that the business should document each factor used in the determination.
Why the brief is evidence
A creator program is a set of behavioral facts. A brand that sends a brief with a product, a deadline and the deliverables, and leaves the creator to decide how, where and with what to film, is describing the independence the first category asks about. A brand that schedules the creator's days, dictates the equipment, requires attendance at its office, reviews every take in real time and supplies everything down to the phone is describing control over how the work is done. The Chicago and Dallas guides describe corporate buyers who onboard creators as vendors, with purchase orders and insurance certificates, which is the financial and relationship shape of a contractor; a brand that instead puts a creator on a weekly retainer, reimburses their expenses, provides their tools and makes them the face of the brand for two years has built facts on the other side of every category.
Two tax regimes, and the exposure
The IRS page states the two regimes. For an employee, the business generally must withhold and deposit income taxes, Social Security and Medicare taxes from wages, pay the matching employer share, and pay unemployment tax. For an independent contractor, the business generally does not have to withhold or pay any taxes on the payments. And it states the exposure: if you classify an employee as an independent contractor and you have no reasonable basis for doing so, you may be held liable for employment taxes for that worker, with a reference to Internal Revenue Code section 3509, and the relief provisions the page describes will not apply. When the answer is unclear, or when a business consistently hires the same types of workers for the same services, the page says the business or the worker may file Form SS-8 and ask the IRS to determine the worker's status.
| What the brand does with its creators | Which category it is evidence in | Which way it points |
|---|---|---|
| Brief, product, deadline, deliverables; the creator decides how and where | Behavioral | Independence |
| Scheduled days, required location, supplied equipment, real-time direction of takes | Behavioral | Control |
| Paid per deliverable on an invoice, own equipment, own expenses | Financial | Independence |
| Weekly retainer, expenses reimbursed, brand-supplied tools | Financial | Control |
| A written contract per campaign, several clients, no benefits | Type of relationship | Independence |
| Open-ended exclusivity, benefits, the creator as the brand's ongoing face | Type of relationship | Control |
The forms, from the brand's side
The paperwork for a contractor is short and sits on two IRS forms. Before the first payment the brand collects a Form W-9, which gives it the creator's taxpayer identification number; the creator-side guide describes why the request is not suspicion. After the year ends, once the brand's payments to a creator have reached $2,000 in the tax year, under the instructions for tax years beginning after 2025, the brand files a Form 1099-NEC with the IRS and sends the creator a copy. A creator who is not a US person is asked for a Form W-8 BEN instead, as the getting-paid guide explains. Payments made by payment card or through a third-party network are, per the same instructions, reported on Form 1099-K by the payment settlement entity rather than on the brand's 1099-NEC, which is why a brand paying through a platform that settles the payment and a brand paying by check may have different year-end files.
The exclusivity clause, read as a relationship fact
Brands like exclusivity, and creators price it, as the rates guide describes. Read against the IRS's third category, an exclusivity clause is also a fact about the relationship: a creator who is contractually prevented from working for anyone else in the category, for an open-ended period, on a retainer, with the brand as their only client, has fewer of the marks of independence the page's third category asks about, whether the relationship will continue and whether the work is a key aspect of the business, than one with a three-month category exclusivity per campaign and several other clients. What usually stops a brand from seeing this is that the exclusivity clause was written by marketing to protect the campaign, whereas, read against the page's third category, it is also evidence about the worker. The fix is not to abandon exclusivity; it is to keep it bounded, per campaign and per category, and to keep the rest of the relationship looking like what it is.
The brief for a brand hiring creators
- Write the creator relationship as a contractor relationship in fact, not only in the contract's title: deliverables and deadlines in the brief, the how and where left to the creator.
- Collect a W-9 before the first payment, or a W-8 BEN for a creator outside the United States, and file the 1099-NEC once payments reach the threshold in the current instructions.
- Bound exclusivity by campaign and category, and do not add employee-type benefits to a creator contract.
- Document the factors behind the classification, as the IRS's page asks, for each creator program rather than each video.
- When a program looks like employment, a retainer, a required schedule, the brand's equipment, ask counsel, and consider the Form SS-8 route the page describes rather than guessing.
Sources
- IRS, Independent contractor (self-employed) or employee?
- IRS, Instructions for Forms 1099-MISC and 1099-NEC (12/2026)
- IRS, About Form W-9
Checked on 20 September 2026. This guide is not legal or tax advice. Where this guide and the official source disagree, the official source prevails.
