When the first payout clock starts
Bi-weekly payouts begin 14 days after the first funded trade, not 14 days after you pass. If the first funded ticket is a week later, the clock starts then. If you start a free Venasri account, record that first fill date. Guessing from the pass email is how traders ask for a payout that is not due.
The split on that schedule is 80% at the start. Scaling takes it toward 90%. FTMO does not publish a dollar ladder of account increases in the same sentence. It says capital can increase when milestones are met and the 5% daily floor has not been breached. Leave the step size alone until the rules you are trading actually print one.
The 5% floor is still the funded account's daily test
Funded loss rules do not become decorative after the first withdrawal. The 2-Step daily limit remains 5%, reset at 00:00 CE(S)T from the day-start balance plus floating profit and loss. On $100,000 that is $5,000. A payout reduces the cash you can withdraw later. It does not widen the next day's line.
The lifetime maximum stays a static 10% from the initial balance on the 2-Step path. Equity Guard at 4.25% is the pass-plan lock under the 5% line, and the same idea applies once you are funded: stop the day before the official line. The 1-Step day is 3%, so a 4.25% lock is too loose there.
Milestones fail if the day fails
Capital increases are tied to milestones achieved without breaching the 5% daily floor. One breached day ends the scaling conversation. There is no hard consistency percentage, but extreme single-ticket gambling can be flagged in review. A payout request built on one oversized NAS100 day is the review you do not want.
The request ceiling remains 2,000 order and modification requests a day on MT5, MT4, cTrader, and DXtrade. Scaling the account does not scale that ceiling. A larger balance with the same hyperactive trail is a larger breach, not a safer one.
Standard and Swing still disagree after you are paid
Standard funded accounts flatten before the weekend and restrict red-folder news in the 2-minute window on each side of the release. Swing pays under the same split schedule and allows the hold at 1:30 maximum leverage. Open MT5 bot control on the tier you were funded on. A Standard account that starts holding Fridays after the first payout is no longer the account FTMO approved.
The $540 fee is the published price of the $100,000 evaluation. It is not a funded-account charge and it is not a scaling fee. Keep it out of the payout math.