FAQ About the Alibaba Fair Play Fund

This comes from the Alibaba.com site, and is useful as a quick reference on what the fund is and how to use it:

FACTS:

Established in 2009, the Fair Play Fund initially covered fraud disputes between buyers and China-based Gold Suppliers. As of January 2011, the Fair Play Fund also covers claims filed against Global Gold Suppliers. Guidelines for Fair Play Fund: 

1. To be eligible for the Fair Play Fund payout, claimants must have presented a substantiated complaint before the Gold Supplier was removed from the site. Please note that Gold Suppliers are only removed from Alibaba.com after a complaint has been investigated and substantiated. 

2. Claimants with losses of US $1,400 or less are eligible for 70 percent of amount lost. Claimants with losses greater than US $1,400 will receive a maximum of US$1,000. Two-thirds of complainants lost less than US $1,000 to fraud. From January 2009 to March 2010, 715 complainants reported being defrauded by China Gold Suppliers and substantiated their claims, becoming the first group to benefit from the Fair Play Fund. 

After completing the application process, the complainants received a total of about US $400, 000 in reimbursements. As of December 2010, more than 2,000 complainants have benefitted from the Fair Play Fund and have received compensation totaling more than US $1,500,000. 

Like all other e-commerce B2B platforms, Alibaba.com acts as a marketplace and bears no financial or legal responsibility for transactions conducted between companies that connect outside our sourcing platform, but we do provide buyers and suppliers with assistance in compiling documentation and other evidence to resolve business differences, and when necessary, to pursue legal claims. Notwithstanding the new Fair Play Fund program, buyers still retain the right to pursue legal action against suppliers who don’t perform as expected and our assistance in those rare instances will continue to be available.