Video: Alibaba.com - How to be Successful

The main focus of this blog has been to make the best use you can from Alibaba.com, but mainly to avoid fraud and scams on the part of suppliers so you DON'T have to use the Alibaba Fair Play Fund. But let's be positive today. I found a video on Alizila.com that offers business tips on how to be successful on Alibaba.

Video is below.

Trade Dispute Procedures for the Alibaba.com Website

 (Updated Nov 11, 2010)

Another helpful nugget that I dug up on Alibaba.com.  I especially like the fact that the have provided a graph that takes people through how the process works.  You can read this here as well.

Based on the principles of good faith and safe transactions, Alibaba.com has always committed itself to providing a safe-trading environment for buyers and suppliers. If a trade dispute arises with another party, please follow the following procedures to settle the matter. Alibaba.com will always do its utmost to aid you in your dispute. However, please be aware that all information on the other party's company/products posted on the Alibaba.com website is confirmed and published by them. They are solely responsible for the truthfulness, accuracy, completeness, and legality of such information. Alibaba.com does not represent Seller or Buyer in any transaction between users of the website, and is unable to make any judgment as to the performance of users in transactions. Therefore, these procedures only allow users to lodge their complaints. Alibaba.com neither guarantees nor undertakes that any dispute will be settled or that the results of the settlement will be appropriate.
If your complaint is related to your intellectual property rights, please refer to our Intellectual Property Protection Policy and Infringement Claims.

If your complaint is related to an online transaction processed on the www.AliExpress.com transaction platform, please submit your complaint or refund request directly through the transaction platform.

  I. Trade Dispute Procedures If complaints are repeatedly received about a member and such member is found in breach of the Terms of Use of our website, Alibaba.com will take appropriate measures, including the issuing a warning; suspending their Product Listings; or terminating their service.

If you would like to report dispute now, please click here.

If you would like to learn how to submit qualified evidence, please click here.

Click here to download the Counter Notification - Trade Dispute Form

II. Alibaba.com's Suggestions
We suggest that you contact the other party as soon as possible to help resolve the dispute. Many disputes can often be resolved after direct communication between the 2 parties. If you do not receive responses from the other party after attempting to contact them, you may also try to find out their telephone number to contact them by phone. If our dispute procedures do not meet your requirements, you may also protect your rights and interests using the following means:

Lodge legal proceedings with a court of competent jurisdiction Report your complaint to the relevant public security authority/police force If a written arbitration agreement has been reached between you and the other party before or after the dispute arises, the parties may refer the dispute to the relevant arbitration commission for arbitration.

Avoiding Gold Supplier Scams and the Alibaba Fair Play Fund

This is cross-posted from my other blog, Alibaba Fair Play Fund Facts. Many times, the best advice on how to avoid fraud and scams on Alibaba comes from those who are on the front lines:  the Gold Suppliers and buyers themselves.  These individuals have the experience to spot rip-offs and scams as well as how to know how to build a successful business on the Alibaba.com platforms.  And if you do get scammed, you can file a claim using the Alibaba Fair Play Fund.

This piece of very good advice comes from one of the Alibaba Gold Suppliers (I have omitted the name because I do not have his/her permission), but pardon the pun, it's gold for knowing which Gold Suppliers to trust.  You can find out more on the Alibaba Trade Forums.  The English is not perfect, but the advice is good.

Avoid scams and use the Alibaba
Fair Play Fund!

Some of the companies, even the Gold members of Alibaba turned out to be a business scammerin China... it's very important to verify your business partner as there are more and more business frauds coming forth in China. Here are my tips for you to verify a Chinese company:Generally speaking, there are some links online for you to check out companies in China: ...If you don't know Chinese, still you can pre-verify your business partners from following aspects: 

1. Contact information Please note that whether their contact information is right or not, most of the scammers don't offer a right address, tel and fax number online. Some of the tel numbers are empty and some add and tel don't exist at all, they don't offer a company tel number, a private number or mobile phone number instead. 

2. Registered corporate number Every legal company in China has to register itself with Chinese government authortities and obtain an unique company number. If your business partner cannot offer you a unique registered corporate number, definitely he is a scammer, of course, he may submit you a fake number, so you have to check it out with local administrative government organs with the number he offered. There is a Chinese organ called Bureau of Industry & Commerce ( have branches at all levels ), which is the only government organ responsible for the registration of legitimate companies or enterprises in China. 

3. Incredibly low prices, esp for international brands Most of Chinese scammers usually entice foreigners with a very low price. If the prices they offered is too low to believe, you may have a further investigation on your partner to know why their prices are so low. Most of the scammers in China profit a lot by selling replicas or fakes of some branded goods to the overseas market, this is very risky because the goods shall be confiscated or detained by Chinese customs houses in case it considered illegal in China. By the way, please remember that the price for authentic /original brands like Sony, Apple, Nokia, Dell etc should be almost the same at anywhere on the globe. You cannot import from the unthorized [sic] brands distributors with cheaper price in China. They must be selling relicas, refurbished ones or copies of brands etc ! Please simply forget such suppliers in China ! 

4. Payment and shipment terms The scammers never accept L/C as their payment terms, they prefer Western Union, Paypal and T/T etc. Also they never deliver goods through formal channels in China, they prefer to deliver samples by Express like Fedex, TNT, EMS to avoid more examinations from Chinese customs house. Most of the scammers use Private Bank Accounts in China! 

5. Warranty and after sale services Scammers never take some measures to guarantee their quality and after-sale services after your payment, they may promise you a lot before payment. It's lip-services [sic] only!!! Be careful with some of the Chinese suppliers!  By the way, I have to mention that, it does not mean the manufacturer has the right to sell or buy in case he has obtained a legitimate unique company number from local BIC in China. In China, all the enterprises with the right to import and export has to apply and obtain a certificate called Certificate of Import & Export from Ministry of Commerce of PRC and its authorized local organs in China after their registration at local BIC. 

Also a formal trade company has to register with Chinese Customs House and its branches before his formal business with foreign counterparts in China. Then he has to register himself with local Bureau of Inspection & Quarantine in case his products are in need of quality control. Without the registration from above local government authorities from China, no company can deal with you in formal channels in China.

So again:  do you homework, look for red flags concerning fraud or scams on Alibaba.com and if you think that you have been scammed, educate yourself about the Alibaba Fair Play Fund and seek restitution.

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.

Avoiding Scams: Finding the Right Alibaba Partner

A large part of avoiding fraud to begins with is finding the right partner in China.  Again, because the Alibaba.com site is a little unwieldy, I try to find articles and postings of interest from the forums that will help people.  Found one this morning, in fact.  Like many of the posts, the English is not great, my I don't speak Mandarin, so I try to put that in perspective

This forum posting deals with finding a reliable partner.  It's worth a read.

I would like you to give some tips on how to find a reliable partner in china. 

Good advice from a user on how to
avoid fraud on Alibaba.com

Like most of you am also just a simple man trying to find some cheap electronic products to sell them and make some money,i dont have a company just a regular folk.I have been scamed twice so far and finally i have found some lets say reliable partner in china.
First off all you must no that there is no original products like some well known brands for cellphones and laptops in china.If you want to buy original cellphone like nokia N95 8gb or something like that in China you can not get it for less than 400$ per pic.TRUST ME.
The things that they are selling in china and tell you that it is a original is actually high or bad quality copies.So the trust worthy supplier will tell you that at first place.I have seen some good tips on this forums so check them all out before you decide to do any shoping in china in case i forgot to write something down. 

Always try to talk to supplier that have web camera so they can show you the products via web camera,tell them to show you the batterie and to turn it on if possible.  Go on the official site of the brand that you are looking for to find out as many data as you can,you can even find the codes that you type in the cellphone on which you can know if it is original one. 

Always ask them for their business and export licence,phone number,web site etc... and call them and see if all the data matches what they have gave you. 

As far as i know there is no legal way to export copies of electronic products from China,because the company could get caught by their custom and get in serious trouble if caught exporting copy products.I found out that they have specialy arangment with some shiping companies who does not check out the products which they are shiping,and another way is that they first ship them to Hong-kong and then to you.And some thing abit that fraud companies that you complain to alibaba that he does not verified them enough,they are all legale registered companies with business licence to sell in China but what you need is company eho has export licenec issued by the Chinese department of foreign trade ministry. 

Google around the web on the forums to find out more about this company esspecialy on the forums like this one. 

When you are making an order ask them for sample to send you which you will pay for, but tel them that you will only pay 50% advance or even through paypal or something like that. 

And dont take that crap about not paying tax or custom fee that is up to luck they can not know that wheter your custom gonna charge some extra fee.The best thing that they can do is send you as gift-wrap,but if you want to import larger quantities of electronics you will pay custom fee and tax(ask them if they can split that large order in small one and send it on the name of your relatives or friends and also as gift-wrap)
Ok now lets talk about laptops. 

First you must know a difference between OEM/ODM (google it to find out what that means). 

There are some brands that uses oEM/ODM but some like IBM,APPLE does not use that and you can buy it only from cerftified dealers whic are very hard to find in china.If company says to you that they are certified dealer of some brand laptops ask them to send you "third party certificate" and then check out at the factory is that certificate valid.If you want to contact me and i will show you how does this certificate looks like. 

You can buy OEM/ODM laptops like Dell,Toshiba,HP. But you should always ask the supplier what is he selling you and ask them for warranty(for as i know only (OEM have internationaly waranty)the others have waranty given only by supplier.If he tells you that you have internationaly waranty tell him to give you serail number of laptop and warranty list so you can check it out on web or at the local supplier.I dont know if i have mentioned everything but this is basic if you have any question you acn contact me.I will answer to any question  and will recomend you some good companies. And dont forget it,you can make some money buying products from china but dont live in illusion taht you can get fillthy rich in just couple of month. 

I wish you luck. 

10 Signs of Online Fraud on Alibaba.com

As someone who spends WAY too much time on Alibaba.com, I can be the first person to tell you that it can be hard to find the information you are looking for to protect yourself from scams and fraud.  The information you may need is sort of all over the place.

So when I find something that I think is worth sharing, I'll post it here.

Today's entry is from one of the forums and the title speak for itself.  A good buyer on Alibaba is someone who is a good businessperson, but also someone with a well-honed B.S. detector.  And advice like this can help.  The English is not perfect, but you can get the meaning.

Top Ten Signs of Online Fraud on Alibaba.com

1. Too much marketing terms Home business opportunity: No experience required. No work involved. Earn $2000 in one week! It’s easy to spot these kinds of scams because they’re full of too good to be true promises. And, exclamation points, too. What job will earn you that much money in a week without having to have experience and NOT having to work at all? None. Nada. Zilch!

 2. Too friendly email I mean the intro part of the email. If an email from someone you don’t know starts with “Hello my friend”, “Dear friend”, and they weren’t filtered by your spam box, consider these emails not so trustworthy. This method of scamming is known as phishing or fishing for details or information that will put your financial security in danger.

 3. Money Matters It promises that you can make money online. But you have to pay that upfront, one-time fee first for some training materials. Shady!

 4. Assembled Jobs If a home based business opportunity requires you to assemble furniture or stuff envelops, these are generic but often overlooked signs of a true blue scam.

 5. Country Representative Job Offer Coupled with sign no. 2, if an email offers you a job as a payment receiver requiring you to deposit a check on their behalf or anything similar to that job description, you’re doomed if you reply.

 6. Job Offer that Requires Your Picture to Get Hired Unless you are applying as a model, which is not a form of online money making venture, someone who’s looking for, say, a virtual assistant and asks that she sends a picture is offering something suspicious. Lots of free job listing sites have these types of job posts. Be very, very careful.

 7. Employer has no online presence. If you are trying to win an online job but when you researched about the online presence of your would-be employer and there’s no trace of his name or his company, ask your employer about his company or his business first.

 8. Presence of Pressure Tactics. If the online business opportunity tells you that you will get a chance to win a anti-scam book if you sign up now or you can avail of an early bird discount, walk! Unless they’re coaching or consultancy services which are not direct ways to earn money online, you should not be subjected to these kinds of pressuring if the opportunity will really make you money.

 9. Request from Employer or Sponsor that You Keep the Offer a Secret Coupled with scam sign no. 2 and 5, if the email sender asks you to keep your transactions confidential just for any reason at all, red flag, red flag, red flag! They don’t want you to inform others that you are about to get scammed, of course.

 10. Emails from Someone in Nigeria Although many Nigerians who use Internet scamming as past time, have already figured out that lots of Westerners already know that they should not trust any email from someone in Nigeria, there are still those who are gullible enough to fall for these frauds. Educate your friends and family who love to use the Internet. They can still be too busy checking their emails or MySpace pages to know these signs.

Another Case Study on How to Avoid Alibaba.com Scams

Alibaba.com is a massive site, and to be honest, somewhat poorly organized when it comes to searching for information on how to prepare yourself:  to buy items while avoiding scams and fraud.

So from time to time, I'll sift through the site and pull out what I hope are some helpful nuggets of information that help you become a smarter buyer - or supplier - on the site and not have to use mediation, or at the end of the line, the Alibaba Fair Play Fund.

So here's another case study from Alibaba.com:

Description: 

Case study on how to avoid scams on Alibaba.com

This company cheated me out of $2000 USD. Our terms were $200 USD for shipping, $1000 USD once the tracking info was verified and the balance of $1460 USD paid once the package was received. This guy said that he was going to use a local courier. He gave the website and tracking number for checking. When it showed "package now on hold in London", I sent $1000 USD as per the agreement. After that the company demanded the balance right away. He said his superiors wanted payment in full due to something about an audit and not being allowed to give credit to people from the USA.   He said I needed to send at least $800 more and he'd take care of the rest.  So I scraped up $800 more and sent it.  Then he came with a new excuse.  Something about a death in the family and if I wanted my package I needed to go ahead and pay the last $660!  So basically, he's made up some fake business and website and is using it to con people into believing that there package is on the way.  Then he puts the package "on hold" and says "if you want your package, I'm going to need more money". 

Analysis:

• Avoiding use unknown shipping websites. It is a risky to allow unknown shipping websites to deliver your products. Before you accept this delivery method, do your own due diligence, including searching the shipping website on search engines to see what others have to say. Or you can go to http://www.whois.com/ to search for registered information of this website. Be wary if the domain of this website was created less than three months ago. 

• When your supplier is making excuses about the delivery (or lack thereof) of products and asking for additional payment, it is generally a trick. 

• Search the company name on the forum or search engine to find something useful to you. Or you can contact Alibaba's service team.