A short primer on the moving parts. Skip ahead if you already know the difference between Smart Retries and dunning.
In Stripe terms, a failed payment fires the invoice.payment_failed webhook with a decline-code reason. Common codes include expired_card, insufficient_funds, card_declined, and do_not_honor. Soft declines (temporary issuer holds, network blips) usually clear themselves on a retry. Hard declines — an expired card, a replaced card, a fraud-blocked card — won't clear until something changes on the customer's side.
Stripe's built-in retry engine re-attempts the same card on file across roughly three weeks per its smart-retry schedule, then marks the invoice uncollectible and cancels the subscription if the retry-schedule setting is configured that way. Stripe will salvage soft declines without you lifting a finger. It won't reach the customer, though — that part is yours, or your tooling's. Stripe's own docs detail the schedule.
When the failure is a hard decline — expired card, replaced card, fraud-blocked card — Stripe's retry can't fix it. Only a new payment method on file can. That's the recovery-outreach layer: branded email or SMS with a one-tap card-update link, sent on a cadence, escalating in tone if the customer doesn't act. Recurly research puts proper-dunning recovery rates at 60–80% of failed payments2. Retry tuning gets less mileage than this does.
Involuntary churn — customers who didn't mean to leave — accounts for 20–40% of SaaS churn1 across industries. It's the cheapest churn to fix because the customer already chose you; they just need a working card on file. And retaining a customer is 5–25× cheaper3 than acquiring a new one. Every dollar you spend on CAC stretches further when you don't lose the customer six weeks later to an expired card.
They do different jobs and they run on different surfaces. Most teams want both.
Stripe Smart Retries
Built into Stripe, no add-on cost. Handles transient declines well; can't reach the customer when the card itself needs replacing.
RecurMend
Flat fee on top of your Stripe plan. When the customer updates their card, we trigger an immediate retry on every open invoice.
They run in parallel. Smart Retries keeps trying the existing card while RecurMend reaches the customer to get a new one on file. Whichever wins first cancels the other.
The full cycle runs without anyone in the loop. Your customer sees your brand throughout.
Step 01
Stripe fires invoice.payment_failed. RecurMend picks it up via webhook within seconds, classifies the decline code, and decides whether to reach out (contactable hard failures) or stay silent (do-not-contact codes like fraud or stolen).
Step 02
Your branded recovery email lands in the customer's inbox with a secure, single-use magic link to update their card. No login required. SMS follow-up is available on Growth and Scale tiers, respecting quiet hours and consent.
Step 03
When the customer updates their card on your domain, RecurMend triggers an immediate retry on every open invoice for that customer. No waiting for Stripe's next scheduled attempt; the new card on file is charged on the spot.
What you get when you switch on RecurMend.
Every tier is a fixed monthly fee. RecurMend never takes a percentage of what you recover.
Connect Stripe, point a DNS record if you want the custom domain, and recovery starts on the next failed payment. No engineering ticket, no migration.
A configurable percentage of failed payments go to a control group with no outreach. You see your exact incremental lift in dollars — not a vendor estimate.
Your logo, colors, sender domain, and card-update URL (Scale). Customers see you reaching out, not a third-party recovery tool.
Common questions
Flat fee. No revenue share. Cancel any time before day 15.
Comparing tools? RecurMend vs Churnkey · RecurMend vs Stunning · Pricing breakdown.
