Paying a Chinese supplier: which routes have recourse, and which are one-way doors.

1. The routes, ranked by what you can undo

Rank payment methods by one question only: if this goes wrong, who can I ask to reverse it, and for how long? Everything else — fees, convenience, what the seller prefers — is secondary to that.

• Platform-held payment (Trade Assurance and equivalents). The platform holds the funds and runs a process against the order. Recourse exists, is time-boxed, and compares delivery against what the order actually said.
• Credit card. A second, independent process. Chargeback windows generally run from the expected delivery date rather than the order date, and they run in parallel with a platform case, so using one does not forfeit the other.
• Letter of credit. Heavier and bank-mediated, and worth the friction once order values get large. Payment is released against documents, so the documents become the specification.
• Bank wire to a company account. Weak. A recall can be requested and is occasionally successful if you move within hours, but it depends on the receiving bank's cooperation and is not a right.
• Anything irreversible by design — cryptocurrency, money-transfer services intended for sending cash to individuals, gift cards. Treat a request for these as the end of the conversation, not a payment option.

2. Why the off-platform wire is the one-way door

The single most expensive misunderstanding in China sourcing is thinking that because you found the supplier on a platform and talked to them on that platform, a payment you sent from your bank is covered by that platform. It generally is not. Platform protection attaches to orders placed and paid through the platform. Money that leaves outside it is usually outside the process entirely, however the account details reached you.

This catches careful people, because the details often arrive inside the official chat, on letterhead, mid-conversation, with a plausible reason: the platform is charging us a fee, our account is being audited this week, we can give you a better price direct. Sometimes that reason is even true. It is still the route with no recourse.

One practical habit closes most of this: decide the payment route before you negotiate the price, and treat it as fixed. A discount for going off-platform is not a discount, it is you being paid a small amount to give up your recourse.

3. "Pay this personal account instead"

A payment to an individual, rather than to the company you contracted with, breaks the link between your money and your counterparty. Whatever the explanation, ask for one thing: the beneficiary name on the account should match the company name on the contract and on the business licence.

If it does not match, that is not automatically fraud — group structures and Hong Kong trading entities are ordinary and often legitimate. It does mean you should get the mismatch explained in writing, in the chat, before you pay, and check that the entity you are actually paying is the one carrying the obligation. A reasonable supplier can answer this in a sentence.

4. Release fees, customs holds, and requests for your ID

There is a recognisable pattern that shows up after the goods ship rather than before. A message arrives saying the parcel is held — by customs, by the carrier, by an agency — and that a fee must be paid, or an identity document supplied, to release it. It is often well-written and cites a real agency.

Two things are worth knowing in advance, because they are hard to think through under pressure:

• Real duty and tax is billed by the carrier or broker handling your import, through their own channels, against a shipment reference you can look up yourself. It does not arrive as a link in a chat window from the person who sold you the goods.
• National ID numbers, tax numbers and driving licences are not release keys. A customs agency does not unlock a parcel because you sent a number to a seller. A request shaped that way is a request for identity data, whatever it says it is for.

The check that resolves it costs nothing: stop replying in the chat, and contact the carrier directly using a number or website you found yourself, quoting the tracking number. Either there is a real hold with a real fee, and the carrier will tell you, or there is not.

5. Structuring deposit and balance

A deposit with the balance due before shipment is the normal shape, and the balance is the part that matters. It is the only leverage you hold once production has started, so what it is paid against should be written down: inspection passed, photographs of the finished goods received, documents correct. Paying the balance because production has finished, rather than because it was checked, spends the leverage for nothing.

Two smaller points. Be wary of a deposit share large enough that walking away is unthinkable. And keep the payment terms in the order document rather than in the chat, for the same reason the specification belongs there — which is the subject of the guide on making a claim enforceable.

What none of this prevents

Choosing a reversible route does not stop a supplier from underperforming, and platform protection is a process with windows and evidence requirements rather than an insurance policy. What these habits do is keep a bad outcome inside a system where somebody can act on it, instead of ending in a bank transfer nobody can reach.

Rules, thresholds and platform processes change, and your bank's and card issuer's terms govern what they will actually do. Check the current terms of the platform and the card you are using, and where the amount justifies it, take proper advice before you send money.