For consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies, managing deductions from retailers has always been a major difficulty. In 2023, millions of dollars will be lost by retailers and CPG brands due to complex chargebacks, short payments, and compliance fines. Most finance teams are struggling with manual tracking in spreadsheets, submitting disputes late, and visibility into the root cause of these deductions.
This is where MarginWiz Deductions comes into play. MarginWiz Deductions is a modern, automated solution for managing deductions for CPG brands to mitigate revenue leakage and protect their profits. In this blog, we will learn what MarginWiz Deductions is, why it is important, and how it transforms the management of financial health for CPG companies.
Understanding the Deduction Challenge
Retailer deductions often happen for reasons such as late shipments, promotional compliance issues, pricing mistakes, or even data discrepancies. Some deductions may be legitimate, but many are not, and companies absorb these losses in pure revenue simply because they do not have capabilities to effectively appeal.
What makes this even worse is the typical process of using spreadsheets and manual processes makes tracking disputes across many retailers nearly impossible. It takes finance teams forever collecting purchased documents, hunting for documents, and putting together a claim. By the time they find everything, the time to dispute may be past due.
In fact, this is exactly what drives the need for margin solution software like MarginWiz Deductions for CPGs.
What is MarginWiz Deductions?
MarginWiz Deductions is an intelligent software platform created to manage retailer chargebacks and deductions. Itautomatically manages the entire process of capturing deduction data to filing disputes while delivering transparency in the financial impact on the business.
Key features include:
- Automated Tracking: Every deduction is captured and classified in real time.
- Dispute Management: Embedded workflows to allow your finance teams to quickly respond to retailer chargebacks.
- AI Insights: The program recognizes trends and root causes of frequent deductions.
- Dashboards & Reports: Teams have transparency and clear analytics.
- Seamless Integrations: Integrates easily with your ERP and accounting programs.
These key capabilities ensure that your organization not only recovers lost revenue but prevents it from happening in the future with MarginWiz Deductions.
Why CPG Companies Need MarginWiz Deductions
- Revenue Recovery
Deductions adversely affect profit margins. MarginWiz helps recover money by expediting the process and making it easier to dispute invalid claims. - Time Savings
With automation, you can eliminate the hours spent on spreadsheets and paperwork – enabling finance teams to spend more time on strategic, value-added work. - Better Retailer Relationships
When disputes are resolved quickly and accurately, companies are able to establish stronger partnerships with retailers – maximizing the efficiency of retail partnerships. - Data-Driven Decisions
Through AI-enabled insights, leaders can ascertain what promotions or process typically or repeatedly create the deductions and take proactive measures. - Scalability
As companies grow, the number of deductions will also increase. MarginWiz Deductions scales up with the company and prevents any claim from being missed.
How MarginWiz Deductions Works in Practice
Consider a Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG) firm that is distributing products to a number of national merchants. Each merchant possesses its own processes, systems and timing associated with providing the deduction. Absent automation, the finance team has to log into each of the merchant portals, extract data, and key that information into spreadsheets. Errors are frequent and disputes are often skipped.
With MarginWiz Deductions, the deduction data is pulled together into one system. The software organizes deductions, provides insights on invalid deductions, and creates pause packets with all necessary documents. The finance team can initiate disputes directly and watch progress in real time.
The outcome? Quicker recoveries, fewer errors, and better profitability.
The Role of AI in MarginWiz Deductions
The role of artificial intelligence is powerful in improving deduction management. Through the use of AI, MarginWiz Deductions is able to:
- Anticipate which deductions will more likely be unproven
- Determine a cadence of issues across retailers or product categories
- Suggest process improvements based on the deductions to further reduce chargebacks
- Create accurate financial forecasts based on deduction trends
This amount of intelligence also allows companies to be proactive, not reactive, and leverage deductions from a cost center to a strategic advantage.
MarginWiz Deductions vs. Manual Methods
| Aspect | Manual Process | MarginWiz Deductions |
|---|---|---|
| Tracking | Spreadsheet-based, error-prone | Automated, real-time capture |
| Disputes | Slow, deadline risk | Fast workflows, built-in tools |
| Insights | Limited, reactive | AI-driven, preventive |
| Visibility | Scattered data | Centralized dashboards |
| Scalability | Difficult as volume grows | Scales with business needs |
This comparison highlights why so many CPG businesses are shifting to solutions like MarginWiz Deductions.
Long-Term Benefits of MarginWiz Deductions
Over a period of time, companies utilizing MarginWiz Deductions have several advantage listed below:
- Higher Profitability: Less revenue leaking and more successful recoveries.
- Stronger Compliance: Retailer requirements are met more effectively.
- Operational Efficiency: Teams spend less manual processing and work.
- Better Planning: Increased accuracy in forecasting and budgeting.
- Competitive Advantage: Businesses are able to reinvest recovered revenue into growth initiatives.
Conclusion
Retailer deductions come with the territory of doing business in the CPG space, but they don’t have to be an endless loss. MarginWiz Deductions gives businesses the ability to track, dispute and avoid chargebacks.
Rather than relying on old-fashioned manual processes, finance teams can use automation, AI, and real-time analytics to regain revenue, enhance retailer partnerships and increase future profitability.
If your organization is struggling with deductions, it is time to investigate the smarter solution. MarginWiz gives you the tools to retain control and gain confidence in your ability to protect margins and grow with confidence.