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Chinese Inspections for Export Quality

According to an article by Nicolas Binse of Cotechna in China, there are ways to be relatively sure of the quality of products made by Chinese manufacturers before those products are shipped to overseas buyers.

Binse declares that once you begin controlling the quality of products being exported, the quality of the products tends to improve.

Binse agrees that quality issues do exist and that negative quality issues reflect on the image of Chinese-produced products along with causing losses of profit for the Chinese manufacturers. Losing future sales or having to accept returned products are negatives which are not popular to factory owners in China.

The traditional type of quality inspection is done just before shipping the products. It is a final random inspection based on AQL (Acceptable Quality Level) used since World War II for the US military. Using this method, a small quantity of products from the total shipment is inspected for appearance, packaging and whether the products perform as intended. Using only a small percentage of inspected products, one can assume that the quality is good for the rest of the shipment as long as the products are randomly inspected.

Several variables tend to influence this AQL type of inspection. Things such as the working shifts which produced the products could conceivably have differing quality issues. Also, if various machines were used in the production, there could be differing issues, especially if all machines are not identical in every way. If raw material happened to be from differing sources during the production of the goods, there could be some differences as well.

Another situation which Mr. Binse stated concerns a factory's internal inspectors switching the units being tested or even making repairs during the inspection process. Even the acceptable parameters are sometimes modified slightly in order to allow the products to pass the inspection. These issues negatively reflect on the factory's reputation.

Binse suggests that professionalism is necessary if a Chinese factory wants repeat business. Being professional in the final inspection will more likely bring repeat orders. Of course, if a manufacturer is actually using professional methods, he could be stuck with the problem of correcting problems found during the inspection. Corrections almost always cost money to be repaired. Still, it creates confidence in the minds of the buyers of the products about the factory's ability and honesty.

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