The DIY version
Listen to Stripe events, dedupe deliveries, map failure codes, schedule emails, track invoice state, and build a recovery report.
Build vs buy
Dunlo vs custom Stripe webhooks
You can build failed-payment recovery yourself with Stripe webhooks, an email provider, a retry policy, and reporting. Dunlo packages that workflow for founders who would rather recover revenue than maintain billing edge cases.
Conversion path
Not ready to connect Stripe?
Use the benchmark first. It gives visitors a useful estimate before signup and keeps the next step lighter than connecting an account immediately.
Dunlo fit
You want a fast recovery layer without spending weeks on billing plumbing.
You prefer Stripe-first defaults over a custom internal system.
You want founder escalation and recovery reporting out of the box.
The hidden cost
The first webhook is easy. The maintenance cost lives in edge cases: duplicate events, stale state, retries, access rules, and missing visibility.
The Dunlo version
Connect Stripe, review the default sequences, and keep the recovery workflow outside your product roadmap.
Comparison
What changes in practice
This comparison is based on public product pages and documentation. Dunlo details reflect the current beta offer.
| Criteria | Custom Stripe webhooks | Dunlo beta |
|---|---|---|
| Setup | Requires webhook endpoints, queueing or jobs, email provider integration, templates, and a reporting surface. | Connect Stripe, review recovery sequences, and start monitoring failed payments. |
| Failure-code logic | You define and maintain the mapping from Stripe failure reason to customer action. | Built around failure-code-specific recovery messages and timing. |
| Reporting | You need to build MRR at risk, recovery rate, recovered amount, and open recovery state yourself. | Recovery visibility is part of the product surface. |
| Maintenance | Engineering-owned. Every billing edge case becomes product maintenance. | Product-owned by Dunlo, with a narrow scope around Stripe recovery. |
| Best fit | Teams that want billing recovery logic deeply customized inside their app. | Founders who want the recovery discipline without building a billing subsystem. |
Who should use Custom Stripe webhooks
- You need custom app access rules tightly coupled to billing state.
- You already have strong billing infrastructure and own background jobs.
- You want full control over every retry, email, and reporting decision.
Who should use Dunlo
- You want a fast recovery layer without spending weeks on billing plumbing.
- You prefer Stripe-first defaults over a custom internal system.
- You want founder escalation and recovery reporting out of the box.
Beta transparency
What can be verified today.
Dunlo publishes assumptions, recovery mechanics, and its proof policy before it publishes customer outcomes.
During beta, customer outcomes are published only with approval and enough context to be useful.
Visible assumptions
The public benchmark exposes the illustrative failed-payment bands and 62% recoverability assumption used in its model. Updated July 2026.
Visible mechanics
Failure reasons, recovery timing, customer update links, and founder review are documented before signup.
Visible proof policy
Customer metrics and stories remain private until the sample is useful and the customer approves publication.
Free beta
Recover failed payments before they become churn.
Build if recovery is a core engineering investment you want to own. Use Dunlo if you need the failure-code workflow, emails, reporting, and escalation now without turning it into an internal project.