# Paying a Chinese supplier: the checks before the transfer | Confirm Supplier

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Confirm Supplier guide (CNAL Consulting, Spain). An executed international wire to China is in practice unrecoverable. The check that protects that moment takes two minutes.

## The rule

The holder of the receiving account must be exactly the same entity that signs the contract and issues the invoice. Same Chinese legal name, character for character. Not a similar name, not the parent company, not an abbreviation, not the English trading name.

## Why this is not only about scams

The risk is not just that a third party takes the money. Even when the supplier is real and the order gets made, if you paid an entity other than the one you hold a contract with, your counterparty can argue it never received payment and invoice you again. Having followed instructions received by email is a weak defence in a Chinese court. The name match is what keeps the obligation and the payment attached to each other.

## The four requests that should stop the transfer

- A personal account in the salesperson's name: no valid excuse exists. No legitimate Chinese company collects export orders in an employee's personal account.
- A Hong Kong account from a mainland supplier: can be legitimate if the subsidiary is disclosed in writing in the contract from the start. If it appears halfway through the deal, it is not.
- A third company's account presented as an agent or partner: you are paying someone you have no contract with.
- A last minute change of bank details by email: this is the signature of redirected invoice fraud.

## Redirected invoice fraud

It works better when the supplier is real. The attacker gets into the supplier's email or registers a near identical domain, watches for weeks, waits for a large invoice and writes just before payment saying the bank has changed. The importer pays and the real supplier chases its money weeks later.

The only defence that works: never accept a change of bank details through the same channel it arrived on. Phone a number you already had before the notice, never the one in the new email, and confirm with a person you know.

## If the supplier insists on Hong Kong

There are real reasons: it simplifies currency handling. But the convenience is theirs and the risk becomes yours. If you accept, the Hong Kong entity should be named in the contract as payment recipient from signature, be verifiable the same way as the mainland supplier, and the contract should state in writing that payment to that account discharges your obligation to the Chinese company.

## Pre-transfer checklist

1. Chinese legal name: contract, invoice and account holder must match character for character.
2. USCC: the code on the invoice must belong to that entity. See https://confirmsupplier.com/en/resources/what-is-the-uscc/
3. Active registration status. See https://confirmsupplier.com/en/resources/how-to-verify-a-chinese-company/
4. Country of the account: mainland China for a mainland supplier. Anything else needs contractual justification.
5. Voice confirmation if bank details have changed at any point.

## If you have already sent it

Act the same day: ask your bank for a recall (the window is measured in hours), report to the police in your country, warn the supplier through a channel other than email, and preserve emails with full headers, contract, invoice and transfer receipt. Recovery odds are low once the money has been withdrawn.

This guide is informational and is not legal advice on a specific case. If a payment has been diverted, speak to a lawyer quickly; deadlines matter.

## Quick questions

- Can a supplier have several accounts? Yes, several accounts under the same holder are normal. One account under a different holder is not.
- Does Trade Assurance or card payment solve this? It adds a useful layer over a direct wire, but carries value limits, time windows and conditions, and stops covering you once the conversation leaves the platform.
- What if the order is small? The check costs the same, and a small first order is the cheapest moment to be wrong.
- How do I know the company invoicing me is the one manufacturing? See https://confirmsupplier.com/en/resources/factory-or-trading-company/

A €500,000 order. A €250 report. China Simple Confirmation Report: €250 + VAT. China Due Diligence Report: €900 + VAT.

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