Online marketplaces make it easy to find hundreds of suppliers for any product. The hard part is knowing who is real, who actually makes the product, and who can deliver the quality you approved. Here are the checks we recommend before you place an order.

Factory or trading company: does it matter?

Trading companies are not bad in themselves; they can combine products from several factories. The problem is when a trading company presents itself as a factory: you pay a hidden margin, communication about quality goes through an extra layer, and the “factory audit” may show someone else’s production line. You should know which one you are dealing with.

Five checks before you order from a new supplier, and the warning signs

1. Check the business licence

Every Chinese company has a business licence with a unified social credit code (18 characters). Ask for it and check:

The company name matches the name on the contract and on the bank account you will pay.
The registered business scope includes manufacturing of your product (trading companies usually show only sales or import and export).
The date of establishment and registered capital are plausible for the size the supplier claims.

2. Check production capacity

Ask for a video call walking through the production line, with today’s date visible.
Ask which machines make your product, how many shifts they run and what their monthly output is.
Ask for references or photos of similar orders for other markets.

3. Order samples and compare them with production

Samples show what the supplier can make; they do not guarantee what will be shipped. Keep a signed reference sample and inspect production against it.

Reference sample and mass production compared during inspection

4. Audit the factory when it matters

For large orders, private label, or retail customers with social compliance requirements, arrange a formal factory audit, for example BSCI (social compliance) or ISO 9001 (quality management). An audit checks the premises, processes, workers’ conditions and documentation on site.

5. Pay safely

Pay only to a corporate bank account in the name of the company on the contract. Be very careful if a supplier asks you to pay a personal account or a different company.
Be suspicious if bank details change by email: confirm by phone or video call.
Use a deposit and balance structure, with the balance paid after a pre-shipment inspection.

Warning signs

Prices far below every other quote.
“We make everything”: a huge range of unrelated products.
No video call, no factory visit, no business licence.
Pressure to pay quickly, or to pay a personal account.

How TIMBOMDOM verifies suppliers

We check business licences and production capacity before you order, and arrange formal factory audits (BSCI, ISO) when you need them. You make one payment to our corporate account at Bank of China and we pay each factory locally, so you never have to send money to unknown accounts. We have worked with more than 2,300 factories since 2016.

Ask us to check a supplier or find one for you. Related: AQL quality inspection explained.