A paint stripper composition comprising benzyl alcohol or a derivative thereof as main component and a chlorinated alkane.

Then, the phase transfer catalyst is recovered and reused by extracting the catalyst from spent aqueous base with fresh chlorinated alkane and using the mixture of chlorinated alkane and catalyst from the extraction as feedstock.

The invention concerns a process for producing unsaturated compounds from chlorinated alkanes by dehydrochlorination wherein a phase transfer catalyst is used during reaction of chlorinated alkane with aqueous base.