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Estd 4.22.2023
Introduction
In the complex landscape of SaaS financial operations, one metric stands out as a crucial indicator of revenue health: the Failed Payment Rate (FPR). For SaaS executives, this seemingly simple metric can have profound implications on cash flow, customer relationships, and ultimately, business valuation. While much attention is given to customer acquisition and growth metrics, payment failures represent a silent revenue leak that many organizations fail to properly address. This oversight can be costly—according to research from Visa, businesses lose approximately 1.5% of their annual revenue due to declined payments, with that number potentially climbing higher for subscription-based businesses.
This article explores what Failed Payment Rate is, why it should be on every SaaS executive's dashboard, and how to effectively measure and benchmark it against industry standards.
What is Failed Payment Rate?
Failed Payment Rate represents the percentage of attempted payment transactions that were unsuccessful. In the SaaS context, this primarily refers to recurring subscription payments that fail to process successfully due to various reasons.
The standard formula for calculating Failed Payment Rate is:
Failed Payment Rate = (Number of Failed Payments / Total Payment Attempts) × 100%
For example, if your SaaS platform attempts to process 1,000 subscription renewals in a month and 70 of those transactions fail, your Failed Payment Rate would be 7%.
Common Causes of Payment Failures
Payment failures typically stem from several sources:
- Technical issues: Gateway timeouts, API failures, or other technical glitches
- Card-related problems: Expired cards, insufficient funds, or exceeded credit limits
- Banking restrictions: Fraud protection measures or international payment blocks
- Customer-initiated actions: Disputes, chargebacks, or cancellations
- Processing errors: Incorrect payment information or processing parameters
According to data from Spreedly, credit card declines account for approximately 13% of all payment attempts globally, making this one of the most common sources of payment failure in subscription businesses.
Why Failed Payment Rate Matters to SaaS Executives
1. Direct Revenue Impact
Every failed payment represents revenue that should have been collected but wasn't. For a SaaS company with $10M in Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR) and a 7% Failed Payment Rate, this equates to $700,000 in at-risk revenue annually. This is not merely delayed revenue—without proper recovery mechanisms, a significant portion becomes permanently lost.
2. Customer Retention Implications
Research from Recurly indicates that 53% of subscribers whose payments fail will churn if the issue is not resolved quickly. This creates an unusual churn driver that isn't related to product satisfaction or competitive pressures but purely to payment mechanics.
3. Operational Costs
Each failed payment initiates a series of recovery actions—from automated retries to customer service interventions—all of which incur operational costs. The average cost to recover a failed payment ranges from $40 to $70 when accounting for systems, personnel, and opportunity costs, according to data from ProfitWell.
4. Cash Flow Predictability
High payment failure rates introduce volatility into revenue forecasts and cash flow projections. This unpredictability can complicate financial planning, resource allocation, and investment decisions.
5. Valuation Impact
For SaaS companies seeking funding or preparing for exit, payment failure rates factor into due diligence assessments. Investors and acquirers recognize that elevated failure rates indicate potential revenue leakage and operational inefficiencies that may require remediation.
How to Measure Failed Payment Rate Effectively
Establishing Measurement Frameworks
To properly track FPR, executives should establish:
1. Consistent Calculation Methodology
Ensure your organization has a standardized definition of what constitutes a payment failure. Some companies only count initial failures, while others include retry attempts in their calculations. The most comprehensive approach is to measure:
- Initial Failure Rate: Percentage of payments that fail on first attempt
- Ultimate Failure Rate: Percentage of payments that fail after all recovery attempts
- Recovery Rate: Percentage of initially failed payments successfully recovered
2. Segmentation Analysis
Break down failure rates by:
- Payment method (credit card, ACH, direct debit, digital wallets)
- Subscription tier (are enterprise customers experiencing different rates than SMB?)
- Geography (international payments often have higher failure rates)
- Billing frequency (monthly vs. annual subscriptions)
- Customer tenure (new vs. long-term customers)
3. Temporal Analysis
Track FPR trends over time, examining:
- Day-of-week patterns: Some research indicates higher failure rates on weekends
- Seasonal variations: Many businesses see higher failure rates at certain times of year
- Month-over-month trends: To identify emerging problems or improvements
Benchmarking Against Industry Standards
According to combined data from GoCardless and ProfitWell, typical Failed Payment Rates by payment method are:
- Credit Cards: 5-9%
- ACH/Direct Debit: 0.5-2%
- Digital Wallets: 2-4%
For SaaS specifically, industry benchmarks suggest:
- Low-performing: >8% Failed Payment Rate
- Average: 5-8% Failed Payment Rate
- High-performing: <5% Failed Payment Rate
- Best-in-class: <3% Failed Payment Rate
What's particularly noteworthy is that according to Chargeback Gurus, B2B SaaS companies tend to have slightly lower failure rates than B2C counterparts, likely due to more stable payment methods and higher transaction values receiving greater scrutiny.
Implementing a Robust Measurement System
To effectively monitor and manage Failed Payment Rate, consider implementing the following:
1. Payment Analytics Dashboard
Create a dedicated dashboard that tracks:
- Overall Failed Payment Rate
- Segmented failure rates by key dimensions
- Trend analysis and forecasting
- Recovery rate effectiveness
- Revenue impact calculations
2. Failure Reason Tracking
Categorize failures by specific reason codes provided by payment processors. Common categories include:
- Insufficient funds
- Card expired
- Do not honor
- Invalid card
- Lost/stolen card
- Processing error
According to data from Stripe, "insufficient funds" accounts for approximately 30% of all payment failures, making it the most common decline reason.
3. Alert Systems
Implement alerts for:
- Sudden spikes in failure rates
- Failures exceeding predetermined thresholds
- Gateway-specific issues
- Unusual patterns requiring investigation
Conclusion
Failed Payment Rate is far more than just a financial operations metric—it's a critical indicator of revenue health that directly impacts growth, retention, and cash flow predictability. By understanding, measuring, and actively managing this KPI, SaaS executives can unlock significant value: reducing revenue leakage, improving customer retention, and creating more accurate financial forecasts.
The most successful SaaS companies maintain Failed Payment Rates below 5%, implementing sophisticated payment operations strategies that treat payment failures not as an inevitable cost of doing business, but as a solvable problem with direct bottom-line impact.
For executives looking to optimize financial performance, Failed Payment Rate deserves a prominent place on your dashboard alongside CAC, LTV, and churn—it may just be the hidden lever that helps unlock your next stage of profitable growth.
Next Steps for SaaS Executives
- Conduct a payment failure audit: Calculate your current Failed Payment Rate using the methodology outlined above
- Benchmark against industry peers: Compare your performance to industry standards
- Identify largest failure categories: Determine which specific reasons account for the majority of your payment failures
- Implement measurement infrastructure: Ensure you have the analytics capability to track FPR on an ongoing basis
- Develop a recovery strategy: Create a systematic approach to reducing failure rates and recovering failed payments
By making Failed Payment Rate a priority metric, you'll gain visibility into a critical revenue lever that many organizations overlook to their detriment.