What evidence do I need before a dispute with a Chinese supplier?

Nobody assembles evidence while the relationship is going well, which is precisely when it is cheap and available. By the time a dispute has started, the supplier has stopped answering questions, the WeChat history is on a phone somebody replaced, and the person who approved the sample has left. The four categories below are worth holding as a matter of routine on any supplier you have paid.

1. Who the counterparty actually is

This is the piece most often missing and the one everything else depends on. A claim runs against a legal entity. Hold, from before the first order: the registered Chinese name, the Unified Social Credit Code, a copy of the business licence, and a registry record showing the entity was active and appropriately scoped at the time you dealt with it. A record retrieved later shows the position later, which is not the same thing.

2. What was agreed

• The signed contract or purchase order, with the specification annexed and versioned.
• The approved sample — the physical unit, signed and dated, held by you.
• The quality standard and tolerances, in the form they were agreed.
• Any variation, in writing. Variations agreed on a call and never confirmed are the weakest link in most files.

3. What was paid, and to whom

Bank remittance advices showing the amount, the date, and the exact name of the receiving account. Where payment went to an account in a name other than the contracting entity, that fact matters enormously and should be documented rather than quietly regretted. Keep the proforma invoices and any payment instructions you were sent, including the message that carried them.

4. The defect, contemporaneously

• Photographs and video taken on arrival, showing packaging, labels and carton marks before anything is opened.
• Quantities: what was ordered, what shipped, what arrived, what failed.
• An inspection report from an independent party where the value justifies it — the report’s weight comes from the inspector being independent.
• The shipping documents: bill of lading, packing list, commercial invoice, certificate of origin.
• Your notice to the supplier, sent promptly, describing the problem specifically. Delay in giving notice is a defence.

Keep the conversation

Most supplier communication happens on WeChat or WhatsApp and lives on one phone. Export it periodically, keep it with the file, and keep the original account identifiers rather than only the display names — a display name can be changed. Where something material is agreed on a call, confirm it in writing afterwards. That habit does more work in a dispute than any single document.

What this is for

A complete file changes the negotiation before it ever becomes a proceeding. A supplier who can see that you know exactly which entity they are, what was agreed, what was paid where, and what arrived, behaves differently from one facing a buyer with an angry email and some photographs. Most disputes are settled, not litigated, and the file is what settles them.