During sourcing and product development, suppliers prioritize quick action and chasing orders. Buyer delays or unclear information often cause significant setbacks.
Once production begins, buyers should remain engaged, as Chinese manufacturers frequently encounter delays.
Typically, they don’t immediately communicate delays to avoid repercussions like air freight costs. Instead, they disclose delays closer to the original shipment date, gradually extending them.
This tactic may lead buyers to skip final inspections due to time constraints, reinforcing supplier behaviour. Order Monitoring is crucial to prevent such detrimental patterns and ensure timely and quality deliveries.
How to manage your orders in China?
The following are a few important steps that need to be followed while sourcing from a country like China.
1. Product specification
Before, you finalize the deal with any Chinese suppliers, it is important that you must develop a clarity in the specifications of your product.
There must be written specification available and you must ensure that your Chinese supplier has fully understood your requirements.
2. Price negotiation
Maintaining realistic expectations helps refine prices accurately without receiving unsuitable supplies. In China, factories rarely reject target prices unless they are highly unrealistic.
Price typically correlates with quantity. Ensure you meet the minimum order quantity when placing your order after careful calculation.
3. Be clear about delivery dates
Delivery dates are non-binding unless explicitly agreed upon in writing. In China, delivery timelines are often disregarded.
For urgent orders, follow up with production to remind them of delivery schedules, ensuring timely receipt of materials.
Relying solely on supplier’s salespeople is unwise, as many are hired primarily for their English proficiency, lacking technical expertise and project management skills.
With few designated project managers in Chinese factories, order management responsibilities fall into a grey area.
4. Payment terms
Before payment, verify factory credentials and sign contracts. Typically, a 30% deposit is made, with the balance paid post-quality control and delivery.
Withholding 70% of payment until inspection incentivizes suppliers to heed requests and offers leverage for negotiations. Quality confirmation through inspection precedes final payment.
There should not be any ambiguity in your payment terms, as the moment you make the final payment, you lose all your controls on suppliers.
To effectively manage your orders in China, ensure clear communication and diligent follow-up, especially when ordering samples from Alibaba.
How to track production?
The following are a few ways you can manage to avoid most problems:
- While auditing the factory, check the capacity to ensure that they will be able to supply within a reasonable time frame.
- You may add 2 to 3 weeks in addition to the supplier’s committed date.
- For new products or factories, you may deploy inspectors during production to assess product quality, production progress, and compliance with approved manufacturing sites.
- You can also use project management techniques in order to track the progress in production.
Hiring a trustworthy sourcing agent in China can offer you a huge benefit in managing the supplies from China.
Maple Sourcing is one the trusted companies in China who has helped several businesses of the USA and other European countries to streamline their outsourcing process in China.