How shall we choose third party inspection & quality control company in China?

During our communication with many international buyers or owners customers, they often have a question: “There are many inspection companies in the market, how should we choose the right third party inspection company or quality control company in China to ensure that our quality control objectives are achieved?”

Indeed, it is very important for international buyers or owners to choose a suitable third-party inspection company. Choosing a suitable third party inspection company or quality control company can greatly reduce the quality risk of purchased goods.

Combining our inspection practice and purchasing experience for many years, we would like to share the tips how to choose a right 3rd-party inspection company or quality control company.

Most of the largest companies use third-party inspection or quality control services instead of opening their own offices or hiring their own local personnel, and even the smallest companies or individuals can afford the very same services and performance.

Those companies are unlikely to fly an individual to China just to schedule their next container shipment or one-time small inspection requirements, however, these companies often send a quality control inspector to China or the quality control inspectors in China to spend a few days checking the product operation or process, and most of the quality control inspectors come from 3rd-party inspection companies.

Third-party inspection company or quality control company have local skilled personnel stationed in your sourcing or procurement locations, they consolidate the needs of multiple companies and they aggregate overhead for lowest costs.

We would like to share several tips to choose a suitable third-party inspection company as below:

1. Does the inspection company have accreditations in accordance with ISO9001, ISO 17020 or other related standards? Do they have the capability to offer your required inspection services? The essential accredited management system such as ISO9001, ISO17020 is basic service guarantee, since there are too much freelancer without standardized management, so the service quality cannot guaranteed strictly.
2.  Does the inspection company have similar experience working performance with your purchased product in the past? Although sometimes the single inspection service does not cost much, but the rich experience can guarantee your purchased products quality and it’s worthy to spend money for the inspection services.
3. Does the inspection company assign an experienced account manager and skilled inspector? Generally large inspection companies or agencies do not take care of their small clients properly, and their inspection services price is higher.
4. Does the inspection company assign full time experienced and skilled inspector? Do they subcontract your work to another ageny or freelancer?
5. Does the inspection company submit a detailed inspection report in English?
6. How much is the inspection services (all-inclusive price)?

We believe with above tips you can get your required inspection services with lower cost and ensured quality.