(Otherwise known as Back-End fees or Redemption Fees) A mutual fund for which you pay a commission when you sell your shares. This can be a flat fee (meaning everyone pays the same amount of money when taking money out of the mutual fund) or a sliding-scale fee (meaning that the longer you keep your money in the mutual fund, the smaller the fee you have to pay when you take it out). For example, if you’ve had your money in a mutual fund for just one year, you might have to pay a back-end load of 5%, but if you have kept it in the mutual fund for five years you might have to pay a back-end load of only 1% or perhaps no back-end load at all.