How to check a Chinese supplier before your first payment

1. Ask for the business licence and check it yourself

Every company in mainland China has a business licence — 营业执照 (yíngyè zhízhào). It shows the company name in Chinese, an 18-character Unified Social Credit Code (统一社会信用代码), registered address, legal representative, date of registration, registered capital and business scope2.

A scan of a licence proves little: it is easy to borrow one from another company. So look up the code or the Chinese name in the official registry, gsxt.gov.cn — the National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System14. Everything must match: the name character for character, the code, the address and the legal representative. If the company is not in the registry, you can stop there.

The registry is in Chinese only and often fails to open from abroad or asks you to register. In that case you can look the company up in commercial databases such as Qichacha (企查查) or Tianyancha (天眼查), which aggregate registry and court data. For the final check, rely on the registry itself — for example through a partner in China.

• The company was registered recently, yet the seller talks about “15 years on the market” — a reason to be careful.
• The business scope has no manufacturing — you are most likely dealing with a trading company, not a factory. That is not necessarily bad, but prices and lead times will differ.
• The company is on the list of abnormal operations (经营异常名录). Companies are listed, for example, for not filing an annual report, publishing false information, or being unreachable at their registered address3. The last one is especially worrying: there may be nobody at the address on the documents.
• The status is “revoked” or “deregistered” (吊销, 注销) — do not sign anything with such a company.

2. Pay only to an account of the same company

The beneficiary name in the bank details must match the name on the licence and in the contract. A common scam is a request to pay “to the manager's personal card”, “to a partner company” or “to another account because the old one is temporarily blocked”.

3. Make sure the factory exists

The best option is to visit the production site or send your representative. If that is not possible, ask for a live video call from the workshop: the equipment, the finished goods warehouse, the sign with the company name at the gate. A pre-recorded video or photos from the internet prove nothing.

Read the badges on Alibaba.com correctly too. “Gold Supplier” is the basic paid seller package. “Verified Supplier” is a more expensive package in which a third-party inspection company verifies the business on site5. It is a useful signal, but it confirms the company and its capabilities, not the quality of your particular order.

4. Samples first, then the order

Order samples, even if you have to pay for them. Check not only the look, but what matters to your customer: materials, dimensions, how mechanisms work, packaging.

Before production starts, approve a reference sample, often called a golden sample. One stays with the factory, one with you, both signed or sealed. The order is then compared with that sample, not with “what the manager said”.

5. Put everything that can be disputed into the contract

The contract or a detailed proforma invoice (PI) should describe the goods so that they cannot be understood differently:

• model, materials, colours, dimensions and tolerances;
• packaging, marking, quantity per carton;
• production time and the date the goods are ready to ship;
• what counts as a defect and what the factory does if defects are found;
• delivery terms under Incoterms (for example EXW or FOB). The ICC Incoterms rules define where the seller delivers the goods, who pays for what, and when the risk passes to the buyer7.

Ideally the contract is bilingual — Chinese and English or Russian — and says which version prevails in a dispute.

6. Don't pay 100% upfront

Split the payment into stages. In practice buyers often agree on a deposit to start production (for example 30%) and the balance after the finished goods are inspected before shipment. As long as you hold the balance, the factory has a reason to fix what the inspection finds.

If a supplier insists on full prepayment for a new deal, without samples or inspection, that is a serious risk, even if the price is noticeably lower than elsewhere.

7. Inspect the goods before shipment

Once the goods are on their way, returning them or making the factory redo them is almost impossible. So the order is inspected at the factory before it ships: cartons are picked at random, the goods are compared with the reference sample and the contract, the quantity and packaging are checked.

How many units to check and how many defects are acceptable is set by AQL sampling, described in the international standard ISO 2859-1 (current edition: 2026)8. Agree the AQL levels for critical, major and minor defects in the contract in advance.

Pay the balance only after an inspection report with photos and video.

Red flags

• The price is far below every other supplier of the same product.
• The seller rushes you: “discount only today”, “the price goes up tomorrow”.
• They can't or won't show the production on video.
• The payment details don't match the company name or suddenly change.
• They refuse to send samples or sign a contract that describes the goods.
• Simple technical questions get vague answers.

In short

1. Check the licence by its code in the gsxt.gov.cn registry.
2. Pay only to the account of the company on the licence and the contract.
3. See the production in person or on a live video call.
4. Get samples and approve a reference sample.
5. Sign a contract with a detailed description of the goods, defects and Incoterms.
6. Split the payment: part before production, the balance after inspection.
7. Inspect the goods at the factory before shipment.

If you'd rather not do this yourself, tell us what you need to buy: we will find a factory, check it and the goods before shipment, and arrange delivery.

Sources

1. 国家企业信用信息公示系统 — National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System, the official company registry of the PRC (State Administration for Market Regulation, SAMR).
2. Xinhua. 今年以来我国社会信用体系建设成效显著 — on the introduction of the 18-character unified code on business licences, 10 Sep 2015 (in Chinese).
3. 企业经营异常名录管理暂行办法 — Measures for the Administration of the List of Enterprises with Abnormal Operations, Art. 4 (2014; amended by SAMR Order No. 101 in 2025), text on China Law Translate (in Chinese).
4. China Justice Observer. How to Check China Company Registration Number.
5. Alibaba.com. Verified Supplier — seller membership packages.
6. FBI, Internet Crime Complaint Center. Business Email Compromise: The $50 Billion Scam, PSA I-060923-PSA, 9 June 2023.
7. International Chamber of Commerce (ICC). Incoterms® 2020.
8. ISO. ISO 2859-1:2026 — Sampling procedures for inspection by attributes, Part 1: sampling schemes indexed by AQL.

Links checked on 24 October 2026. This article is general guidance, not legal advice.