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Hello, I am new to this forum and I find it very helpful and well made!
I work for a company who has been approached via mail by 3 Chinese trading companies who were interested in some of our products. After little negotiation on price and delivery terms, they sent us a draft of agreement and purchasing order (very urgent!). They also invited us to China, in order to discuss the agreement and sign it. We have decided to go, although we were suspecting some kind of fraud. Despite that we wanted to see with our own eyes and meet these people to "get some kind of feeling about them". We visited 2 of the 3 traders, one in Xi'an city and the other one in Shenzhen. Below their names:
Xi'An Jiaguang Trading Co. Ltd.
No. 36 Jixiang Road, Yanta district Xi'An City, Shaanxi China 710000
tel. +86 2963318566
web: www.xajgtrade.com
and
BRIGHTWAY GROUPSTOCK CO. LIMITED
No.286 FUHUA ROAD, FUTIAN DISTRICT, SHENZHEN CITY, CHINA
TEL. +86 755 36656346
FAX +86 755 36656349
POSTCODE: 518000
www.guangdaguoji.com
The Xi'an people were very friendly and nice, they took us to a restaurant and to some historical sites. They did not speak English, they had an interpreter. What struck me odd in particular was that the contract was pretty much completed by the interpreter and not by the general manager. This looked very strange to me. We weren't asked to pay anything in advance such as for gifts etc.. Instead, on the contract they asked us to pay a 3% on the value of the first batch, as a "quality guarantee fee", a kind of quality deposit, that they would return us at the end of the contract. We suggested to take out this 3% from their down payment but they said it wasn't possible for some reasons we didn't really get. This sounded quite strange anyway. In the end we signed the contract and left.
With the second Chinese company in Shenzhen we did not sign any contract, we just met them and discussed of possible cooperation. The day after we left they sent us a draft of agreement, also containing the following clause:
"The contract shall come into effect immediately after the contract is signed by two parties. This contract should come into effect after notarized and signed by both parties. The originals should be in triplicate. Each of the two parties owns one and the third
one is for the notary office. The cost of notary is 0.5% of total amount, each of the
two pay 0.25%.". We suggested to take out this 0,25% from their initial payment but they refused saying that "This charge is collected in advance by the China goverment, you pay the part of yours, we pay the part of ours, there is no connection between notary charge and prepayment of contract. If the contact is breached by any party, the goverment and concerned department will deal with it. This is a good guarantee for both of us due to the first cooperation.". This too sounds very strange to me.
Now, has anybody ever heard of these 2 companies? What would you suggest we do now? I suppose the contract we signed doesn't have any legal value if they are scammers, does it?
Thank you for your support!
Federica
I work for a company who has been approached via mail by 3 Chinese trading companies who were interested in some of our products. After little negotiation on price and delivery terms, they sent us a draft of agreement and purchasing order (very urgent!). They also invited us to China, in order to discuss the agreement and sign it. We have decided to go, although we were suspecting some kind of fraud. Despite that we wanted to see with our own eyes and meet these people to "get some kind of feeling about them". We visited 2 of the 3 traders, one in Xi'an city and the other one in Shenzhen. Below their names:
Xi'An Jiaguang Trading Co. Ltd.
No. 36 Jixiang Road, Yanta district Xi'An City, Shaanxi China 710000
tel. +86 2963318566
web: www.xajgtrade.com
and
BRIGHTWAY GROUPSTOCK CO. LIMITED
No.286 FUHUA ROAD, FUTIAN DISTRICT, SHENZHEN CITY, CHINA
TEL. +86 755 36656346
FAX +86 755 36656349
POSTCODE: 518000
www.guangdaguoji.com
The Xi'an people were very friendly and nice, they took us to a restaurant and to some historical sites. They did not speak English, they had an interpreter. What struck me odd in particular was that the contract was pretty much completed by the interpreter and not by the general manager. This looked very strange to me. We weren't asked to pay anything in advance such as for gifts etc.. Instead, on the contract they asked us to pay a 3% on the value of the first batch, as a "quality guarantee fee", a kind of quality deposit, that they would return us at the end of the contract. We suggested to take out this 3% from their down payment but they said it wasn't possible for some reasons we didn't really get. This sounded quite strange anyway. In the end we signed the contract and left.
With the second Chinese company in Shenzhen we did not sign any contract, we just met them and discussed of possible cooperation. The day after we left they sent us a draft of agreement, also containing the following clause:
"The contract shall come into effect immediately after the contract is signed by two parties. This contract should come into effect after notarized and signed by both parties. The originals should be in triplicate. Each of the two parties owns one and the third
one is for the notary office. The cost of notary is 0.5% of total amount, each of the
two pay 0.25%.". We suggested to take out this 0,25% from their initial payment but they refused saying that "This charge is collected in advance by the China goverment, you pay the part of yours, we pay the part of ours, there is no connection between notary charge and prepayment of contract. If the contact is breached by any party, the goverment and concerned department will deal with it. This is a good guarantee for both of us due to the first cooperation.". This too sounds very strange to me.
Now, has anybody ever heard of these 2 companies? What would you suggest we do now? I suppose the contract we signed doesn't have any legal value if they are scammers, does it?
Thank you for your support!
Federica
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