At a Glance
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- Cannabis vendor credit recovery captures money owed to you from returns, expired or destroyed product, co-marketing deals, and below-keystone markdowns on aging inventory
- Four credit types: return credits, expiration and destruction credits, co-marketing credits, and aging-markdown credits
- The platform builds each credit memo; ShelfiQ handles delivery, vendor questions, and approval
- Each monthly memo charges only the defensible base by default — non-pre-approved co-marketing is shown for transparency but not billed unless the vendor agrees
- Approved credits are deducted from the vendor's next payment or settlement
What Is Cannabis Vendor Credit Recovery?
Cannabis vendor credit recovery is the process of reclaiming money your dispensary is owed when products are returned, expire on the shelf, sell at a markdown because they lingered, or when vendors owe you for co-marketing promotions. Dispensaries lose money every year because these credits slip through the cracks. The platform tracks every credit-eligible event and turns it into a formal credit memo that gets applied to your next vendor payment.
We built our credit recovery system around four distinct credit types, each with its own trigger and workflow. Whether inventory comes back defective, ages past its sell-by date, sells below keystone because it sat too long, or a vendor agreed to fund a promotion, the result is the same: a credit memo that reduces what you owe.
The Four Types of Credits
- Return credits — Generated when product is sent back to a vendor due to defects, recalls, or overstock. The platform tracks returns in Metrc and matches them to the original purchase. Learn more about return credits.
- Expiration and destruction credits — Generated when product expires or is destroyed before it sells. If your vendor agreement covers it, the platform flags aging inventory and builds the memo against the original cost. Learn more about expiration credits.
- Co-marketing credits — Generated when a vendor funds a promotional discount. The vendor agrees to cover part of a price reduction, you run the promotion, and a credit memo is created for the funded amount. Learn more about co-marketing credits.
- Aging-markdown credits — Generated when product that has aged past its category threshold sells below keystone. The platform tracks days on shelf by category — 60 days for flower, pre-rolls, and concentrates; 120 days for vapes, edibles, and everything else — and recovers a configurable share of the margin you gave up.
How Credits Get Applied
Once a credit memo is approved, the amount is deducted from the vendor's next outgoing payment. For consignment vendors, credits offset the next settlement. For wholesale vendors, credits are subtracted from the next AP check. Every deduction is itemized on the payment stub so both sides have a clear paper trail.
Every credit memo runs through the same approval workflow. A vendor has three choices — approve, approve a specific amount, or decline with a reason — and ShelfiQ carries out whichever they pick. They get 10 calendar days from the day the email is delivered, with reminders before the deadline; if they stay silent, the documented credits — returns, destruction, pre-approved co-marketing, and aging markdowns — move forward, applied automatically for vendors you've set to auto-approve on silence or staged as Ready for Approval for your one-click sign-off otherwise. Co-marketing the vendor never pre-approved still needs an explicit yes. Either way, they keep 60 days to dispute afterward.
Why Credits Go Uncollected
Without a system in place, credits fall through for predictable reasons: no one tracks expiration dates across hundreds of SKUs, return paperwork gets lost, and co-marketing deals are agreed to verbally but never documented. Across dozens of vendors, the uncollected total adds up to real money left on the table every year.
The platform closes every one of those gaps. Returns are tracked in real time through your POS and Metrc. Expiration and aging dates are monitored daily. Promotional agreements are recorded and converted into credit memos the moment the promotion ends. Everything flows into your QuickBooks integration so your books stay accurate.