Last updated: 28 July 2026. Report turnaround below describes how we work today; the visit date itself is confirmed when we quote. An inspection is a sampling check rather than a certification, and this page is not legal advice.
This page covers one decision: whether anyone independent looks at your goods before the balance leaves your account. Below is why that moment is the only point at which you hold real options, what an inspection to AQL actually consists of, what happens when a batch fails, and how a visit is priced.
The asymmetry
Everything you can do, you can only do now.
Before the balance is released you can hold the shipment, require rework at the factory’s cost, renegotiate the price against documented defects, or walk away. Those are real options with real value.
After release, the goods are on the water and every one of them is gone. What remains is a request, made from ten thousand kilometres away, to a company that already has your money.
The factory’s own QC reports to the factory. That isn’t a conspiracy — it’s an org chart. It just means their report answers a different question than yours.
None of this requires distrusting your supplier. It requires only that somebody independent has looked at finished, packed goods while you still have the one piece of leverage you will ever have on this order. Trust is not a control. The unpaid balance is.
What an inspection actually is
AQL sampling to ISO 2859-1. Not someone glancing at a carton.
A statistically valid sample drawn from finished, packed goods. Defects classified as critical, major or minor against defined limits agreed before the visit — so “pass” and “fail” mean something specific, not something arguable.
What gets checked
- Quantity and packing
- Workmanship and finish
- Function and safety testing to your spec
- Dimensions and weight
- Materials against what was ordered
- Labelling, barcodes and markings
- Carton drop test
- Loading supervision where required
What you receive within 24 hours
Photo-documented findings, defect counts against the AQL limits, a clear pass or fail, and evidence you can put in front of the factory. Where the goods need a formal test report or a mark, that is a laboratory job and a different exercise — see standards and compliance.
One honest limit: AQL is a sample, not a hundred-per-cent check. It gives you a defensible read on a batch. Anyone selling you certainty at sampling prices is selling you something else.
If the batch fails
If it fails, it doesn’t ship.
That sentence is only true because you haven’t paid yet. A failed inspection before the balance is released is a decision you still get to make. The same failure discovered after release is a claim you have to file.
- You get the evidence within 24 hours. Defects photographed and counted against the agreed limits, in a form the factory can act on rather than argue with.
- The factory reworks, or it doesn’t. Most do, and quickly, because the money hasn’t moved. What they say at this point tells you a great deal about the next order.
- The batch is re-checked after rework — a new visit at the same US$268. (We don’t charge again where the re-check is needed because our own work was incomplete or wrong.) Same sampling, same limits, so the second result is comparable to the first.
- You decide. Ship, hold, renegotiate against the documented defects, or refuse. All four are still available.
Agree the re-inspection terms before the first visit
Put in writing, before anyone travels, who pays for a re-check after rework and how many re-checks are covered. Agreeing it up front is what stops the factory’s mistake turning into your second invoice, and it is a five-minute conversation while it is still hypothetical.
Our re-inspection terms are set out in the quote, so you can read them before you book rather than discover them after a fail.
Engagement model
How a visit is priced.
One factory visit is US$268, and the same number buys either job — a supplier verification visit or a pre-shipment inspection, whichever you need. That covers one factory, one visit and a photo-documented written report within 24 hours of the visit, at factories in China’s main manufacturing regions; anywhere further is quoted before you book. The visit date is confirmed when we quote.
- Pre-shipment inspection or verification visit US$268 per visit. One factory, one visit, one photo-documented report — you choose which of the two jobs the visit does.
- Short-notice or rush visit Usually possible. Tell us the loading date when you book and we’ll confirm before quoting.
- Ongoing inspection programme Quoted per client on annual scope; each individual visit stays US$268.
One fixed-price visit you can book outright, everything else quoted per request. No percentage of order value, and no open-ended hourly work. If the visit is not worth its own fee for the order in front of you, we will say so — a small top-up shipment rarely justifies a trip, and pretending otherwise is how sourcing companies lose clients they were about to earn.
Before you book
Four things worth knowing while there is still time.
- Book against the loading date, not the finish date. Goods need to be finished and packed for a valid sample, and the factory’s “ready” date moves. Give us the booking date and we will work backwards.
- Send the spec you actually agreed. The purchase order, the approved sample, drawings, artwork and packing details. An inspection can only check the goods against something written down.
- Say what a critical defect is for you. The classification is yours to set. A cosmetic mark that is minor for one buyer is a return for another.
- Resistance is information. A factory that will not schedule an inspection, or that keeps moving the date, is telling you something before you have paid to find it out. If it goes further than that, read what to do when a supplier stops replying.