Recovery States

Every failed payment in LostChurn progresses through a series of states that represent where it is in the recovery process. Understanding these states helps you track recoveries in the dashboard and configure your recovery workflow.

State Diagram

State Reference

New

The initial state assigned when a failed payment webhook is received. The system has recorded the failure but has not yet analyzed the decline code.

Classifying

The decline code is being mapped to a category and the recovery strategy is being determined. The ML model scores the retry probability and the orchestration engine decides the next step.

During classification, the system:

1. Looks up the raw decline code in the decline_code_map table
2. Determines the category (Soft Retry, Hard Customer, Terminal, Unknown)
3. Runs the ML scoring model to get a retry probability
4. Calls the orchestration decision tree to determine the next state

Silent Retry Pending

A silent retry has been scheduled but has not yet executed. The payment is waiting for the optimal retry time determined by the retry strategy.

Silent Retry In Progress

The retry is actively being submitted to the payment processor. This state is brief -- it lasts only as long as the API call takes to complete.

After the retry completes:

• Success: State moves to Recovered and attribution is recorded
• Failure with retries remaining: State moves back to Silent Retry Pending with the next retry scheduled
• Failure with no retries remaining: State moves to Communication Pending to begin dunning
• Failure with ML score below 0.10: State moves to Communication Pending (early escalation)

Communication Pending

The system has determined that customer communication is needed. The customer is about to be enrolled in a dunning campaign.

This state is reached when:

• Silent retries have been exhausted
• The decline category is Hard Customer or Unknown
• The ML model recommends early escalation

Communication Active

Dunning messages are being sent to the customer through the configured campaign channels (email, SMS, push, WhatsApp). The campaign step sequence is in progress.

During this state:

• Campaign steps execute on their configured schedule
• Each message delivery is tracked (sent, delivered, opened, clicked)
• If the customer updates their payment method and a retry succeeds, state moves directly to Recovered

Awaiting Customer

All scheduled dunning messages have been sent. The system is waiting for the customer to update their payment method or take the requested action.

Recovered (Final)

The payment has been successfully collected. This is a terminal state -- no further action is taken.

When a payment is recovered, LostChurn records:

• The recovery type (Silent Retry, Dunning Email, Dunning SMS, Self-Service, Backup Method)
• The attribution confidence score (how confident we are this recovery is attributable to LostChurn)
• The amount recovered in cents
• The time to recovery from initial failure

Terminal (Final)

The payment cannot be recovered. This is a terminal state -- all recovery activity stops.

A payment reaches Terminal when:

• The decline category is Terminal (fraud, stolen card, closed account)
• The customer does not respond within the configured timeout
• A team member manually marks the recovery as terminal
• All recovery strategies have been exhausted

The terminal reason is recorded for reporting (e.g., "Terminal decline: fraudulent" or "Silent retries exhausted, dunning timeout").

State History

Every state transition is recorded in the recovery state's history array. Each entry includes:

• The previous state and new state
• A timestamp of when the transition occurred
• A reason explaining why the transition happened

This history is visible in the dashboard when you click into a specific recovery, providing a full audit trail of every decision the system made.

Tracking State in the Dashboard

The LostChurn dashboard provides several views for monitoring recovery states:

You can filter any view by date range, decline category, recovery type, or amount.

Timeouts and Automatic Transitions

LostChurn enforces timeouts to prevent payments from sitting indefinitely in non-terminal states:

These timeouts are configurable in your merchant settings. Set them to match your subscription platform's grace period and dunning window.

Next Steps

• How Recovery Works -- overview of the full recovery pipeline
• Decline Categories -- understand how classification drives state transitions
• Retry Strategies -- learn about retry timing and escalation
• Key Concepts -- foundational concepts for using LostChurn