Renaud Anjoran, founder of Sofeast, a company specializing in the field of quality assurance and control based in the Chinese province of Guangdong, the home of Chinese electronics, explains the importance of quality control and how to behave if something were to go wrong.
Renaud is the person to call to make sure that their goods meet the quality standards you require or after ascertaining that your goods have a quality problem.
Renaud, tell us something about yourself and how you started working in the field of quality assurance and control.
I arrived in southern China because I was hired by an export company based in Hong Kong. But, after about a year and a half, I had the impression that the Chinese suppliers had already ripped me off in every possible way. I was frustrated, I had the desire to quit my job and devote myself to something different. And that’s what I did.
It seemed obvious to me that there was a need, among small and medium-sized enterprises intent on importing goods from China, for a company that would be responsible for guaranteeing the quality of the goods produced. So I started my own company and started offering this type of service.
Your company is located in Guangdong, far from Shanghai or Beijing. What is the reason for this choice?
Simply because, when we started (but the argument is still partially valid), all the importers who could and wanted to use our services did business with suppliers located near the Pearl River delta, in the province of Guangdong, in fact. The reason is that China’s economic opening began right here and, in particular, from the city of Shenzhen which is located opposite Hong Kong. This means that the manufacturing companies with the most experience – i.e. those that can guarantee you the best quality – are located here.
What exactly is quality assurance and what methodologies does it require?
“Quality assurance” is a much more general term than “quality control.” While quality assurance refers to the steps to verify that a given production stock meets the required quality standards, quality assurance is the process of preventing quality problems before they arise. Here are the most important steps:
1.) Review the design of new products so that you can predict and anticipate possible problems. The best would be to carry out this phase in the presence of the manufacturing company’s engineers.
2.) Consider various manufacturing companies and have the best of them sign a sales agreement.
3.) Ensure, through the specification list and careful inspection of product samples, that the supplier has fully understood the quality standards and various product features.
4.) Carry out one or more quality checks. Ideally, three should be carried out: one before, one during and one after the production phase of the goods, as the earlier a defect is identified, the easier it is to correct it.
5.) Improve the procedure as you gain experience and learn from your mistakes.
Note that the responsibility for organizing all the steps I have listed falls on the buyer, i.e. the importer.
Quality assurance is a huge industry in China. Why do you think that in other exporting countries such as Japan or the United States it has never developed in the same way?
First of all, goods made in China cannot be sent back to the factory if they are found to be defective. There is no warranty of any kind. Secondly, the Chinese legal system is very different from what the buyer is used to. And Chinese suppliers are aware of this. In addition, it must be considered that many of the problems related to China are due to communication difficulties. Sending an inspector to the factory is the best way to find out any defects before sending the balance of payment and shipment; that is, when the supplier can still be required to repair or remanufacture the defective goods.
Many of our readers run a medium/small business. Do you think hiring a quality inspector also makes sense for a business with limited resources?
There are workarounds such as always ordering minimum quantities or using a letter of credit for payments. The problem, however, is that these solutions are usually more expensive than a quality inspector, which nowadays in China can cost even less than 250 euros.
You’ve probably found yourself in the situation where the customer has sent you a list of product specifications that is anything but clear. This makes your job more difficult and, as a result, can harm the customer himself. What advice do you have for entrepreneurs who find themselves drawing up a list of specifications in view of a quality control?
Great question. We usually provide a document that should help customers prepare as complete a list of specifications as possible. The problem is that many of them don’t bother to fill it out. Many quality control agencies can also help the customer prepare the list, but only on condition that the customer sends a sample identical to the product that will be examined.
Chinese suppliers are sadly famous for using the cheapest materials and components possible at the expense of product quality, without notifying the buyer and with the sole purpose of increasing their profit margins. What is your tip to avoid this type of scam?
Yes, it is a risk that is always taken, especially when the buyer puts too much pressure on them to get the lowest possible price (as many suppliers tend to accept the order anyway and then recover the price reduction by using the cheapest possible materials or components). One way to avoid this problem is to inspect key materials and components before mass production. Once production starts, it’s usually too late.
What do you do when you discover too many defects during production?
In this situation, many buyers make the mistake of pushing the supplier to repair or remanufacture the goods before submitting them to further inspection. Unfortunately, this is often not enough.
Here’s an example of a customer who, after we found a very large number of defects, acted correctly: the buyer asked the supplier what his plan of action was and accepted his proposal, which was to repair ten defective product units and send them to the customer for an inspection of the repaired units (and therefore also of the repair procedure used).
Once satisfied with the repaired goods, the customer asked the supplier to separate the defective goods from those that met the quality standards specified in the sales agreement. At this point we were left with a thousand defective units and the customer instructed the supplier to repair only 10% of them so that they could further judge the repair work before the entire stock of defective products was repaired.
This way of proceeding in small steps avoids having to inspect all the goods again – perhaps several times – until the customer, now exhausted and short of goods in the warehouse, accepts the goods despite knowing that 10% of the stock is defective.
I also have some experience in quality control and, honestly, I can’t remember a single time when the inspection went perfectly. Have you ever carried out an inspection and found no defects?
No. In general, those who import from China should never expect to receive goods that are totally free of defects. The manufacturing process is not an exact science; Even the best Japanese production lines are not free from defects. The result you should aim for is to obtain goods with a low defect rate (say 1-2%) and, of course, without defects so serious that they could cause physical harm to the final consumer of the product.
What are your predictions for the future? In ten years’ time, will there still be a need for quality inspectors or will Chinese manufacturing companies have reached a standard and experience that makes any control useless?
To a certain extent, it will always be needed, as it is still needed today in countries such as the United States or Taiwan. Moreover, almost nothing has changed in the last five years. I think the reason is to be found in the behavior of that slice of importers who, always and in any case pressing for the lowest possible prices, let those companies survive
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