How is "あるちゃあるけど" used?

Question

As far as I understand "あるちゃあるけど" is close in meaning to "ないとは言い切れない" and "しいていえばある" but I could not find how it is used, nor understand the exact meaning.

Answer 1

Since you haven't provided any context, let me point out that ある could be used in several different ways, like

• stating that something exists (the literal meaning)
• stating that something is reasonable/common/good (cf. それはないよ).

あるちゃあるけど is sometimes used in a longer version

あるちゃあるけど、ないちゃない

with a loose translation being

You can't say that it's not a thing, but you can't really say it's a thing either.

(where ある is translated here with the second meaning).

あるちゃあるけど by itself means essentially the same thing:

あるちゃあるけど
I guess you could say that [but why would you? / but I don't fully agree / ...]

Answer 2

Believe you're missing a letter:

あるっちゃあるけど

It's an extremely informal way of saying:

あると言えばあるけど

I won't deny that we have it

But the underlying connotation is that item is not available for sale/use, or it's reserved for some reason.

-- Starfox