Settlements: How the Math Calculates Itself

A settlement is the financial close of a transaction: contract X owes seller Y a payout for the period’s activity, with chargebacks deducted, with platform fees deducted, with the resulting net payable recorded. In most ITAD operations, that calculation lives in a spreadsheet that one finance person maintains. The platform’s settlements engine replaces the spreadsheet.

Auto-generated from contracts

Each contract defines a pricing model (per-unit, per-kilo, fixed-purchase, revenue-share, lease-return, hybrid — see contracts-pricing-models article). At the trigger event (receiving complete for inbound, sale closed for outbound, period-end for periodic settlements), the engine reads the contract terms, the asset/order data, and computes the settlement. The result is a settlement row in the queue, with the math broken out line by line.

Chargeback engine

For lease-return contracts, the chargeback rules in the contract define penalties: € per missing device against the manifest, € per defect code against the damage matrix, residual-value floor for devices below an acceptable grade. The engine reads the receiving session’s reconciliation, the testing audit, the grading record, and computes the chargeback set. Each chargeback is a line item with its trigger documented.

Review before posting

The auto-computed settlement lands in /core/settlements with a "draft" status. Finance reviews — the line items are visible, the math is editable (with reasons logged), the chargebacks can be waived per-line. When finance is satisfied, posting moves the settlement to the invoiced state and triggers the invoice generation.

Multi-currency snapshot

Settlements record both the deal currency and the platform reporting currency, with the exchange rate at posting time. Six months later, when somebody runs an annual report, the historical rate is preserved — the report doesn’t silently re-translate.

Settlement reports

/core/settlements/[id]/report is the printable per-settlement document with the full breakdown: contract reference, period, line items, chargebacks, fees, net payable, currency translation. Sent to the client as the formal settlement notice.