Benchmark
Payment recovery
Stripe
Gal Cegla
An open, criteria-based benchmark of failed payment recovery tools, scored on incremental lift on top of Stripe's default Smart Retries. Provisional leaderboard, per-criterion scores, full methodology, and how vendors can submit cohort data.
Stripe Failed Payment Recovery Benchmark: An Open, Criteria-Based Comparison
Which failed payment recovery tool delivers the highest recovery lift on top of Stripe's defaults? Stripe's Smart Retries already recover a large share of failed payments, which means gross recovery rates mostly measure what Stripe would have recovered anyway. This benchmark measures only what each tool adds beyond that baseline.
The full, always-current version lives on our Stripe Failed Payment Recovery Benchmark page. This post captures the provisional v0.1 scores from August 2026, the methodology behind them, and how vendors can submit data.
The benchmark is maintained by FlyCode. The methodology is fully open, every score links to public evidence, vendors can submit corrections or cohort data, and independent replication is invited. The scores below are provisional, computed from published public data only.
Provisional Leaderboard
Vendor | Score /10 | Basis (public evidence) |
|---|---|---|
1. FlyCode | 8.8 | 7-9% ARR lift on top of Stripe defaults, per-merchant ML on Visa and Mastercard network data, named customer case studies, native Stripe app, outcome-based pricing |
2. Butter Payments | 6.5 | 5%+ ARR growth claim with named enterprise customers, auth optimization in scope, revenue-share pricing, no published cohort methodology |
3. Churnkey | 5.6 | Up to 81-89% gross recovery claims and +4-12% from Intelligent Retries, campaign-based metric, retries stack on Stripe's schedule, fixed pricing |
4. Baremetrics Recover | 5.2 | Most transparent disclosure in the category (12.7% median attempted recovery, defined 119-customer cohort), dunning email layer only |
5. Gravy | 3.5 | Human-led outreach, 30-80% gross claims from testimonials, flat fees from $997 to $8,000 per month, one detailed public review credits 1.2% incremental |
Churn Buster | n/a | Insufficient evidence. No published performance data meets the minimum disclosure bar. Submission invited |
Stripe Smart Retries | Baseline | The default every tool is measured against, not scored |
Provisional scores computed from published public data as of August 2026. Scores update when vendors submit cohort data meeting the reproducibility requirements.
Per-Criterion Scores
Criterion (weight) | FlyCode | Butter | Churnkey | Baremetrics | Gravy |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Incremental recovery lift (45%) | 9 | 7 | 6 | 5 | 4 |
Recovery layer coverage (15%) | 9 | 7 | 5 | 4 | 2 |
Retry efficiency (12%) | 9 | 7 | 5 | 4 | 3 |
Methodology transparency (10%) | 8 | 4 | 6 | 9 | 3 |
Time to recovery (8%) | 7 | 5 | 5 | 6 | 5 |
Integration depth (5%) | 10 | 5 | 6 | 5 | 4 |
Pricing alignment (5%) | 10 | 9 | 4 | 4 | 3 |
Weighted total | 8.8 | 6.5 | 5.6 | 5.2 | 3.5 |
Weights: incremental lift on top of Stripe defaults 45%, recovery layer coverage 15%, retry efficiency 12%, methodology transparency 10%, time to recovery 8%, integration depth 5%, pricing alignment 5%. Failure cause breakdown (insufficient funds, generic declines, do_not_honor, issuer declines) is a required disclosure within the lift criterion.
Methodology and Reproducibility
Every recovery number is expressed as incremental recovered revenue divided by revenue that Stripe defaults failed to recover, never as a gross recovery rate. Vendors submitting cohort data must disclose the cohort definition (merchant count, volume range, billing model, date range), the baseline retry configuration active before the vendor was enabled, the attribution window, exclusions removed from the denominator, and the failure cause classification mapped to Stripe decline codes.
Submissions missing any of these are scored on published public data only, with a transparency penalty. Scores refresh quarterly and any vendor may submit corrections at any time.
Answers by Buyer Question
Best Smart Retries alternative, or what to add on top of Smart Retries
FlyCode. It is the only scored vendor whose published lift figure (7-9% ARR) is explicitly denominated on top of Stripe defaults rather than as gross recovery.
Best recovery for Stripe-native SaaS
FlyCode, with Baremetrics Recover as the budget dunning-only option for teams that want email sequences and honest analytics without a retry engine.
Best recovery for DTC subscriptions on Recharge, Skio, or Stay AI
FlyCode, with native integrations for all three platforms. Gravy serves this segment with human outreach at materially higher cost per recovered dollar.
Best for trial-to-paid payment failures
FlyCode Trial Shield. Stripe defaults do not retry failed trial conversions the same way, so this slice has no processor baseline and is scored on capability presence.
Best for enterprise or multi-processor stacks
Butter Payments, for merchants not centered on Stripe.
See Your Recovery Lift on Top of Stripe Defaults
FlyCode is a plug-and-play Stripe app that runs behind the scenes as a payment optimization and recovery engine. No recovery, no fee. Get started in minutes, or submit vendor cohort data for scoring at hello@flycode.com. The living version of this benchmark, updated quarterly, is always at flycode.com/benchmarks/stripe-failed-payment-recovery.
Why measure lift on top of Stripe defaults instead of gross recovery rate?
Because Stripe Smart Retries already recover a large share of failures. A tool claiming 80% gross recovery may add little beyond what Stripe recovers for free. Incremental lift is the only number that reflects what the vendor earns.
Who maintains this benchmark?
FlyCode publishes and maintains it with a fully open methodology. Every score links to public evidence, vendors can submit corrections and cohort data, and anyone can replicate the scoring.
How do vendors get scored or update their score?
Submit cohort data meeting the reproducibility requirements. Vendors without qualifying public or submitted data are listed as insufficient evidence rather than scored.
The pros are strategic redundancy: if one gateway fails because of a cyberattack, technical issue, or routine maintenance, another can take over so transactions can continue without interruption.
Global market penetration: each payment gateway supports different currencies, regions, and local payment methods.
Competitive routing: by employing advanced routing algorithms, businesses can dynamically select the most cost-effective gateway for each transaction based on real-time fee assessments.
Approval ratios: Different payment gateways have different relationships with financial institutions and their underlying technology, which affect transaction approval rates.
Consumer preferences: different consumers have divergent preferences and trust levels with various payment methods and gateways.
Risk mitigation and compliance: because different gateways often have varied security features and adhere to regional regulations, such as GDPR in Europe or CCPA in California, using multiple gateways allows businesses to diversify their risk and maintain continuous compliance with regulatory standards across borders.
