Guide
Inspecting before it sails.
An inspection is worth the most at the moment when the producer still wants the balance and the container is still in Indonesia. There are five such moments, most buyers use one, and the difference between a useful inspection and a decorative one is what the goods are compared against.
Five moments.
- Factory auditBefore you order
- Somebody goes to the address and establishes that the company makes the thing, on machines, with people. It answers the question that no document answers, and it is the cheapest hour in the whole process because nothing has been paid yet.
- First articleBefore the run starts
- One unit produced to your specification with your material, approved in writing before the line runs. For made goods this is the last cheap moment: a fault found here costs a sample and a fault found later costs a container.
- During productionAt roughly a third complete
- Worth it on large or complex orders, because a systematic fault caught at thirty per cent can still be corrected on the remaining seventy. It is the inspection most buyers skip and the one that saves the most on a long run.
- Pre-shipmentWhen production is finished and packed
- The standard one, and the one your payment terms should be attached to. Goods are sampled against the specification and the retained sample, packing and marking are checked, and the container is watched being loaded and sealed.
- Loading supervisionAt stuffing
- Somebody stands at the door and counts what goes in. It catches short shipment and substitution, which sampling by its nature cannot.
What sampling proves.
An inspector opens a fraction of the cartons. Acceptance sampling is a published statistical method, and what it gives you is a defensible judgement about the whole consignment from a sample of it. What it cannot give you is certainty about every unit.
That distinction matters in a dispute. A passed inspection means the sample met the agreed level, and finding a defective unit afterwards does not mean the inspection was wrong. Agree the sampling level and the acceptance criteria in writing beforehand, because arguing about them after a failed lot is arguing about the rules mid-game.
What a report has to contain.
Quantity against the packing list
Counted, not accepted. Short shipment is common enough that this line alone justifies the visit on many orders.
Product against the retained sample
The sealed duplicate held at the producer is what production gets compared to. Without one an inspector is comparing goods to an adjective.
Measured properties
Moisture on wood and agricultural goods, dimensions on made goods, weight per unit. Whatever your contract turns on, measured with an instrument.
Packing, marking and labelling
Carton construction, drop tests where relevant, and whether the marking matches what your destination requires. Labelling errors are found here or at a border.
Photographs and a written report
Dated, with the defects shown. This is the document a claim is built on, and a report with no photographs is worth very little in a dispute.
The mistake that undoes all of it.
Inspecting against a description. A report saying the goods conform to the purchase order is worth nothing if the purchase order said good quality rattan furniture. The inspector has no basis to reject anything and both sides find out later that they agreed to different things.
The fix is a sealed retained sample at the producer plus a specification with measurable terms in it. That combination turns an inspection from an opinion into a comparison, and it is the difference between a report you can act on and a report you can file.
Questions buyers ask.
Can I rely on the supplier's own inspection?
Their quality control exists and it is theirs. A producer checking their own goods has every incentive to pass them, which does not make them dishonest and does make the report a weak input to your payment decision. Independence is the whole point, and it costs a fraction of the shipment.
When should the balance be paid?
Against a passed inspection rather than against shipment. The moment before the container is sealed is the only period where a problem is cheap to fix and where the producer still has a reason to care. After it sails, you are choosing between argument and insurance.
Is a video call enough?
For a routine check on a supplier you already know, sometimes. For a first order, no. You cannot weigh anything, measure moisture, count a container or open a carton the camera was not pointed at, and every one of those is where the problems are.
What if the inspection fails?
That is the good outcome, and it is why the money is attached to it. Agree in advance what happens: rework and re-inspect at whose cost, a discount, or cancellation. Deciding that while a failed container sits in a yard is the worst time to negotiate it.
Do you inspect, or do you use a third party?
We inspect, and where you want an independent body instead we will arrange one and they invoice you directly. A factory audit from us starts at $250 depending on location. Inspection is also available on its own, for buyers who already have a supplier and want only this part.
Need eyes on a shipment?
Tell us the producer and the loading date. Inspection is a separate job from sourcing and plenty of buyers want only it.