Frequently Asked
Everything operators ask before they hire us.
Pricing, process, retailers, win rates, comparisons. Real answers, no jargon.
What ClearChain does
- What is ClearChain?
- ClearChain is a retail revenue recovery service for CPG brands. We recover money lost to retailer deductions, chargebacks, OTIF fines, shortages, and post-audit claims — primarily across Walmart, Target, Amazon, Kroger, Costco, Home Depot, CVS, and Walgreens. We run the program end-to-end: pulling data, filing disputes, and fixing the root causes that create repeat deductions. Pricing is a flat $5,000 per month, month-to-month.
- Who is ClearChain for?
- Mid-market CPG brands doing roughly $5M+ in retail revenue who are losing 2–5% of net revenue to deductions and don't have a dedicated in-house deductions analyst. If your finance team is writing chargebacks off as the cost of doing business and your ops team is too busy keeping the next PO on time to dispute them, that gap is exactly what ClearChain closes.
- How is ClearChain different from SupplyPike, iNymbus, or Vividly?
- Those are software tools. You still need someone in-house to log in, work the queues, file disputes, and chase root causes. ClearChain is the operator, not a dashboard. We do the work. Most clients choose us specifically because they tried software and nobody on the team had time to use it.
- Do you take a percentage of what you recover?
- No. ClearChain is a flat $5,000 per month, month-to-month. You keep 100% of every dollar we recover. Most chargeback firms take 20–30% of recoveries — we don't. Over a typical year, the flat-fee math beats contingency by a wide margin once recoveries pass roughly $20K/month.
Pricing & guarantee
- How much does ClearChain cost?
- Flat $5,000 per month. Month-to-month, cancel anytime, no long contract. No setup fee, no per-dispute charge, no percentage of recoveries.
- What is the money-back guarantee?
- If we don't recover at least 3x your fee, you get your money back. No fine print. Most recoveries start within 60–90 days, but retailer timelines vary — Walmart APDP, Target VMG, Amazon Vendor Central, and Kroger Supplier Hub each have their own response cycles. We anchor the guarantee to the outcome, not a clock we can't control. We pursue every claim until it's resolved.
- Is there a setup fee or onboarding cost?
- No. The $5,000/month covers everything: portal access, audit, dispute filing, root-cause work, weekly reporting. There is no setup fee and no per-dispute fee.
- Can I cancel anytime?
- Yes. Month-to-month with no contract. Cancel any month and you're done — no early-termination fee.
Related: Pricing details
Related: Pricing & guarantee
How it works
- How long does it take to start recovering money?
- Two weeks to start filing disputes; first recoveries typically land in 30–45 days from filing, which is the standard retailer dispute review window. Day 0–3: read-only portal access. Day 4–10: audit of 12 months of deductions. Day 11–14: disputes go out. Day 30+: ongoing filing plus root-cause work.
- Do I have to install software or give up admin access?
- No software. Read-only access to your retailer portals (Retail Link, Partners Online, Vendor Central, etc.) is enough. We don't need admin rights and we don't need anything installed on your systems.
- What data do you need from us to start?
- 12 months of remittance and chargeback data from each retailer you sell into, plus read-only access to those retailer portals. That's it. We don't need your ERP, your 3PL system, or your internal financials.
- How many disputes do you typically file per quarter?
- Usually 200–600 disputes per quarter for a mid-market CPG brand, depending on retailer mix and deduction volume. Walmart and Amazon volumes tend to be highest because their compliance programs (APDP, OTIF, ASN, chargeback codes 22/24/25) generate the most automated deductions.
- What is your win rate on disputes?
- Our career chargeback win rate is 94% across multiple clients. Win rates vary by retailer and reason code — straightforward shortage and pricing disputes win at higher rates than soft compliance fines. We don't file disputes we don't think we can win, because filing weak disputes burns goodwill with retailer ops teams we'll need on the next one.
What we recover
- What kinds of deductions can ClearChain recover?
- Shortage claims, pricing deductions, post-audit claims, OTIF fines, ASN/EDI compliance chargebacks, label-spec chargebacks, freight claims, MCBs (Kroger), and most retailer-specific compliance penalties. Roughly 60–80% of small deductions are disputable; the rest are valid and get reported back so you can fix the underlying SOP.
- Can you recover deductions that are past the dispute window?
- Sometimes. Some retailers allow appeals or re-opens for specific reason codes within an extended window, and post-audit claims often have longer challenge windows than standard chargebacks. We recovered $180,000 of previously-written-off claims for one client. We won't promise this on every engagement, but it's always worth the audit pass.
- Do you handle Walmart OTIF fines?
- Yes. OTIF (On-Time, In-Full) fines are 3% of cost for missed-window or short-shipment events. We dispute the disputable ones (carrier exceptions, retailer receiving errors, dock appointment issues) and trace the rest back to root cause — usually a 3PL workflow or a carrier lane problem you can actually fix.
- Do you work with Amazon Vendor Central chargebacks?
- Yes. ASN accuracy chargebacks, PO on-time chargebacks, prep fees, shortage claims, and CRaP-related issues. Amazon's automated chargeback system is one of the highest-volume and one of the most disputable — and one most brands feel least equipped to fight.
Related: Deduction code library · Dispute guides
Related: Walmart deduction recovery
Related: Amazon Vendor Central recovery
Operations
- Do you replace our in-house deductions or AR team?
- No. We work alongside finance and ops. For most clients we're effectively the deductions desk they couldn't justify hiring — a senior operator handling the work, with one weekly report into your team. Your AR team keeps owning cash application; we own dispute and recovery.
- How do you handle root-cause work with our 3PL?
- We trace recurring deductions back to the SKU, lane, carrier, or SOP that's causing them, then work directly with your 3PL to close the gap. Most repeat OTIF, ASN, and label-spec issues come from 4–6 fixable root causes; we don't just dispute the symptom each week.
- Will you work with our broker or sales agency?
- Yes, when it helps. Brokers can be useful for buyer-relationship issues; we handle the operational and financial side. We don't compete with brokers and we don't need to be in your buyer meetings.
- How often do we hear from you?
- Weekly written report every Monday with the prior week's filings, recoveries, and root-cause flags. Monthly review call. Plus direct Slack/email access — we don't hide behind a ticketing system.
About Steve & ClearChain
- Who runs ClearChain?
- Steve Schuster, founder. 20+ years in retail compliance and operations across 50+ retailers — including time inside Target and Walmart distribution centers as a supplier. Career to date: $5M+ in recovered and protected revenue across client engagements, 94% chargeback win rate, 75%+ deduction reduction by fixing root causes.
- Where is ClearChain based?
- United States. We work with US-based CPG brands selling into US national retailers.
- How many clients do you take on at a time?
- Small portfolio by design — typically a handful of active engagements. Recovery is operator-led work; we don't scale by handing accounts to junior staff.
Related: About Steve
Comparisons & alternatives
- Should I hire an in-house deductions analyst instead?
- A senior in-house deductions analyst runs $120–160K fully loaded, takes 3–6 months to ramp on retailer-specific playbooks (Walmart APDP, Target VMG, Amazon Vendor), and you still manage them. ClearChain is $60K/year, live in two weeks, and the outcome is owned end-to-end. The math favors hiring in-house only above roughly $30M+ in retail revenue with several active retailer relationships.
- Should I use software like SupplyPike or iNymbus?
- Software is useful when you already have a dedicated person to run it. The most common failure mode we see: a brand pays $2K/month for a deduction dashboard, nobody on the team has time to work the queue, and 60% of the dashboard alerts age out unactioned. ClearChain replaces the missing operator, not the software — and most clients drop the software once we're running.
- What if my retailer mix is mostly one chain?
- Single-retailer concentration (e.g., 80% Walmart) usually makes the math better, not worse. Walmart in particular has the deepest, most disputable deduction volume of any US retailer, and the highest payoff per hour of operator time.
Still have questions? See the glossary of retail deduction terms or pricing page.
Let's see if we're a fit.
A 30-minute call. Not a pitch. We'll tell you what we'd expect to recover from the retailers you sell.
Flat $5,000/month, month-to-month. If we don't recover at least 3x your fee, you get your money back.
Typical response: same business day.