Failed Payments
The Failed Payments report tracks payment failures and their outcomes, helping you understand how much revenue is at risk from failed charges and how effectively your recovery processes are working.
This report is accessible from the Cashflow tab group under "Failed payments".
Overview
Failed payments are a normal part of running a subscription business. Cards expire, bank accounts have insufficient funds, and technical issues occur. What matters is how these failures are resolved: either the payment is recovered (eventually succeeds), the customer churns (involuntary churn due to non-payment), or it remains at risk (pending resolution).
Timeline chart
The timeline chart displays a stacked bar for each period showing how failed payments were resolved:
| Segment | Color | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Recovered | Green (bottom) | Failed payments that eventually succeeded |
| At Risk | Orange (middle) | Failed payments still pending resolution |
| Churned | Red (top) | Failed payments where the customer churned |
The total bar height represents the total amount of failed invoices in that period. Older periods typically show less "At Risk" (orange) as payments have had more time to either recover or result in churn.
Movement table
The movement table shows detailed metrics across time periods:
| Row | Description |
|---|---|
| Total failed | Total amount of failed invoices in each period |
| Recovered | Amount that eventually recovered (click to see details) |
| At risk | Amount still pending resolution (click to see details) |
| Churned | Amount lost to customer churn (click to see details) |
| Failed % | Percentage of invoices that had at least one failure |
| Recovery rate | Percentage of failed invoices that recovered |
| Affected customers | Number of unique customers with payment failures |
Detail table
Click on any Recovered, At Risk, or Churned cell to see the individual invoices in that status. The detail table shows:
- Date - First failure date for the invoice
- Customer - Who the invoice belongs to (links to customer profile)
- Description - Invoice reference or description
- Status - Current status (Recovered, At Risk, or Churned)
- Attempts - Number of payment attempts made
- Amount - The invoice amount
How recovery is determined
GrowPanel tracks the latest transaction status for each invoice to determine recovery:
- Recovered: The most recent transaction for the invoice has
status = success - At Risk: The most recent transaction is
failedAND the customer is still active - Churned: The most recent transaction is
failedAND the customer has churned
This approach ensures that retry attempts and eventual successes are properly tracked, even if there were multiple failed attempts before success.
Summary metrics
The summary section shows key metrics:
- Revenue at risk (MTD) - Month-to-date unrecovered failed payment amount
- Recovery rate (MTD) - Percentage of failed invoices recovered, month-to-date
- Revenue at risk (YTD) - Year-to-date unrecovered failed payment amount
- Recovery rate (YTD) - Percentage of failed invoices recovered, year-to-date
Arrows indicate improvement (green) or deterioration (red) compared to the prior period.
Filters
The Failed Payments report supports comprehensive filtering:
- Date range - Select custom ranges or preset periods
- Interval - View by day, week, month, quarter, or year
- Currency - Choose your reporting currency
- Payment method - Filter by card, ACH, SEPA, etc.
- Additional filters - Filter by plan, region, customer segment, etc. (see all filters)
What's excluded
The Failed Payments report excludes:
- Refunds - Negative amounts (refunds) are filtered out to show only failed charge attempts
- Duplicate retries - Invoices are grouped by invoice reference, showing only one entry per invoice regardless of retry attempts
Exporting the data
Export the failed payments data as CSV by clicking the download icon.
Practical tips
- Recovery optimization: If your recovery rate is below 50%, consider implementing dunning workflows, smart retry logic, or card updater services.
- Payment method analysis: Use the payment method filter to identify if certain payment methods have higher failure rates.
- Churn prevention: Failed payments that result in churn represent involuntary churn. Reducing this through better recovery can significantly improve your retention.
- Monitoring: Set up alerts for unusual spikes in failed payments which could indicate technical issues with your payment processor.
