Commission Dispute & Adjustment Workflow

The problem this kills

Commission disputes are where trust between sales and finance goes to die. A rep is sure they got shorted on a deal, or that a split landed on the wrong person, so they fire off an email. Three reply-all threads later, someone promises to "fix it next run," and then nobody remembers the number, the reason, or whether it actually happened. The next statement comes out, the adjustment isn't there, and now you've got a grudge instead of a record.

The real damage isn't any single dispute - it's that disputes live in inboxes. There's no single place that says: which line was disputed, who decided what, on what evidence, and exactly which adjustment hit which run. When an auditor, a new VP of Sales, or a departing rep's lawyer asks "how did you get to this number?", you're reconstructing it from memory and Slack.

This tool replaces the email threads with a workflow that has a beginning, a middle, and a permanent end.

What you'll build

A small, private web app for your sales ops and finance team:

• A rep files a dispute against one specific line on one specific commission statement - tied to the run and line so it's always traceable, never a vague "my March was wrong."
• A filing window is enforced so disputes can't be reopened against runs that closed months ago.
• It routes to an owner - the manager or finance person responsible - who sees the disputed line, the rep's reason, and any uploaded evidence.
• The owner investigates and decides - Approve an adjustment (with an amount and a documented reason) or Reject it (with a reason). Nothing is silently changed.
• Approved adjustments - and only approved adjustments - feed the next commission run, so the fix actually happens and is visible.
• The rep is notified automatically of the decision by email.
• Everything exports to CSV in the exact columns your comp system or finance expects, plus a full audit trail.

What's inside the Implementation Plan

The plan is a single file you paste into an AI coding agent (Claude Code), which then builds the tool with you, step by step, in plain language.

It opens by interviewing you about your business. Before writing a line of code, the plan has the agent ask about your current dispute process, the systems and spreadsheets you use, exactly how your statements and runs are named and numbered, your dispute-reason taxonomy and resolution rules, your filing window, your typical and peak dispute volumes, and your messiest edge cases (mid-period rep transfers, deal clawbacks, split disagreements). It reflects a short tailored spec back to you, you give a thumbs-up, and only then does it build - so you get a tool shaped around your comp process, not a generic template.

From there it walks through: setting up the database and login, importing your statements, the dispute filing form with its duplicate guard and filing window, the routing-to-owner step, the review-and-decide approval gate, feeding approved adjustments into the next run, rep notifications, and the CSV/audit export. Every build step ends with a ready-to-copy prompt.

The governance it includes (this is the point)

This isn't a toy. The plan builds in the controls finance actually needs:

• Login so only your team can open the tool.
• Row-level security so reps see their own disputes and owners see what's routed to them - not everyone's comp data.
• A complete audit trail - who filed, who decided, what amount, what reason, and exactly when.
• A hard human approval gate - the tool can draft and route, but a person must review the evidence and explicitly approve or reject before any adjustment is recorded or flows to a run.
• A duplicate guard keyed on statement line + rep, so the same line can't be disputed twice at once and you never double-pay an adjustment.

Who it's for

Sales ops and finance teams who keep fielding the same "you missed my deal / the split is wrong" complaints and are tired of relitigating them in email. If you own commission runs and want disputes to be tracked, decided, and traceable - without buying a heavyweight comp platform - this is for you.

You've got this. Open the Implementation Plan and paste the first prompt - the tool interviews you, you confirm the spec, and you build from there.