The Setup
When this dispensary signed a vendor agreement, buried in the terms was a credit clause: if product expires on the dispensary's shelf, the vendor credits 75% of wholesale value. Standard in cannabis — vendors include it because they know some product won't sell, and offering a credit keeps the relationship healthy.
The problem: nobody at the dispensary read the agreement after signing. Nobody tracked expirations against vendor terms. Nobody filed credit memos when product expired. The clause existed. The money didn't.
What We Found
During the first two weeks of onboarding, we pulled the dispensary's Metrc data and identified every product that had expired or been destroyed in the prior 90 days. Cross-referenced each against the vendor agreements on file. For one vendor, 31 units had expired — total wholesale value of $4,240. The agreement specified a 75% credit rate. That's $3,180 the vendor owed, per their own agreement, that nobody had asked for. See how credit recovery works.
How We Recovered It
Built a credit memo with the math: each expired SKU, package ID from Metrc, wholesale price, expiration date, and the 75% credit calculation. Attached the relevant clause from the vendor agreement. Sent it to the vendor's AP team.
The vendor reviewed, confirmed the expirations against their own Metrc records, and approved the credit. We applied $3,180 against their next open invoice and paid the net balance. One cycle. Done.
Why Expiration Credits Go Unclaimed
Three reasons.
- Nobody reads vendor agreements after signing. The credit terms are there but invisible. Agreements get filed and forgotten — the clauses that protect the dispensary sit unread while product expires on the shelf.
- Tracking expirations against vendor terms requires cross-referencing. You need Metrc data matched against each vendor's specific agreement. That's work nobody has bandwidth for — especially when each vendor has different credit rates, eligibility windows, and filing requirements.
- Building the memo feels like a confrontation. Even when someone knows credits exist, creating the documentation and sending it to the vendor feels adversarial. It's not — it's billing. But it requires process that most dispensaries don't have.
For a typical dispensary, unclaimed expiration credits represent 1-2% of annual COGS.
The Result
$3,180 recovered from one vendor, one 90-day period. The vendor didn't push back — the terms were in their own agreement. They'd budgeted for it. They just weren't being asked to pay it. For more on how we track and recover credits in cannabis, see our full guide.
Across all vendors with expiration credit terms, the dispensary's total recoverable credits exceeded $12,000 for the first year.
"The vendor's own agreement said they owed $3,180. Nobody read it. Nobody enforced it. We did."