Coming to the Canton Fair? The Legal Checklist Before You Pay a Supplier
来广交会采购？给供应商付款之前先过一遍这张法律清单
The 140th Canton Fair runs in Guangzhou from 15 October to 4 November 2026, in three phases (Phase 1: 15–19 October; Phase 2: 23–27 October; Phase 3: 31 October–4 November). More than 210,000 overseas buyers had pre-registered by the 18 September press conference, and this year registered overseas buyers are automatically enrolled in the Fair's new membership programme, with points building toward permanent tiers.
Most pre-trip guides cover registration, hotels and payment apps. This one covers only the legal layer — in particular, the checks that are cheap to do before you pay a supplier and expensive to skip afterwards.
1. Getting In: Do Not Pick the Wrong Entry Route
The most common entry mistake for a first-time fair buyer is also the quietest one: treating the 240-hour visa-free transit policy as a general visa-free entry route. It is not one. That policy is built for travellers passing through China on the way to a third country or region — a buyer who flies in for the Fair and then flies home to the same country does not fit its logic, and arriving on the wrong basis can mean being refused entry at the border, with the trip, the meetings and the deposits arranged around it all lost at once.
So before booking, answer one question honestly: which entry basis actually covers you — a visa-free arrangement that applies to your passport, or a business (M) visa obtained in advance, using the Fair's invitation in support? If the answer is not clear-cut, treat that as a pre-departure task, not an airport task. (For how the same transit trap catches people travelling for medical treatment, see the related guide on medical treatment in China.)
2. Before You Pay: A Booth Is Not a Verified Company
An exhibition booth, a glossy catalogue and a business card are marketing materials, not verification. Before any deposit moves:
• Ask for the business licence and check the name. Get the supplier's full registered Chinese company name and its Unified Social Credit Code, and make sure the name on the licence, the name on the contract and the name on the bank account are one and the same company. A mismatch between a company's Chinese registered name and the English name it trades under is one of the most common sources of confusion — and of payments that cannot be traced back to the party you thought you contracted with.
• Pay the company, not a person. Insist on paying the contracting company's corporate bank account. Refuse requests to remit to a personal account, or to an account held by a different company "in the same group". This year the Fair itself, working with 11 financial institutions, is promoting cross-border trade finance and risk-management services for overseas buyers — regular payment channels are expanding, which makes an insistence on a personal account even harder to justify.
• Keep the paper trail as you go. Retain the booth business card, quotations, sample-confirmation records, chat logs in which specifications and prices were agreed, and payment receipts. None of this feels like legal work at the time; in a dispute, it is the evidence chain.
3. The Contract: Do Not Let It Stay at Proforma-Invoice Level
A proforma invoice plus a chat thread is how many first orders start — and how many disputes become unprovable. Before the balance is paid, the written contract (even a short one) should state, at minimum:
• Specifications and quality standards. The exact product specification, materials, tolerances and any applicable standard, by reference to the confirmed sample — so that "not what we agreed" can be tested against a document, not a memory.
• Inspection, and final payment tied to it. Who inspects, where and when (before shipment is the point that matters), what happens if the goods fail, and an express link between passing inspection and release of the final payment.
• Delivery date and the consequences of delay. A fixed delivery window, and what follows if it is missed — a right to cancel, a price reduction, or agreed damages — written down in advance rather than negotiated after the season is lost.
• Intellectual property, especially for own-brand / OEM orders. Who owns the moulds, designs and artwork; that the supplier may not produce the same branded goods for others; and what happens to tooling when the relationship ends.
• Governing law and where disputes are heard. The applicable law and the forum — a named arbitration institution or court — agreed while relations are good. A dispute clause negotiated after a dispute exists is not negotiated at all.
None of this requires a long document. It requires that the five points above exist on paper, signed by the same company named on the licence and the bank account in Section 2.
4. If Something Goes Wrong: Fix the Evidence First
If goods arrive late, off-specification, or not at all, the order of operations matters:
• Fix the evidence before you negotiate. Preserve the contract, the payment records and the communications collected under Section 2, and record the condition of any goods received (dated photos, inspection notes, correspondence) before positions harden.
• Do not let time run silently. Chinese law sets time limits on enforcement and claims; a judgment or award is not self-executing, and deadlines that are missed can be difficult to revive. (See the related guide on the two-year deadline for applying for enforcement of a Chinese court judgment.)
• Match the remedy to the paper. What you can realistically recover — refund, re-shipment, damages, enforcement against assets in China — depends largely on what the contract in Section 3 actually says and on the evidence in Section 2. That is why those two sections come before this one.
Thinking beyond a single order? Buyers who move from spot purchases to a standing presence in China face a different set of questions — company establishment and foreign-investment structuring — covered in the foreign-investment practice page. This article is for general informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice; entry policies, fair arrangements and the law applicable to a specific transaction should be verified for your own situation, and professional advice should be obtained for a specific case.
Source text · 原文： The full bilingual text of the Announcement of the National Immigration Administration on Further Relaxing and Optimizing the Visa-Free Transit Policy for Foreigners is available in the China Law Resources library: read or download the PDF →
本篇依据的原文中英双语版（PDF）已收入中国法律资源库：《国家移民管理局关于进一步放宽优化外国人过境免签政策的公告》
Buying from Chinese suppliers, or about to sign with one? A short review of the supplier, the contract and the payment route before money moves is far cheaper than a dispute afterwards. I can assess your order documents and the clauses that matter.
Request a Contract Review中文版
第 140 届广交会 2026 年 10 月 15 日至 11 月 4 日在广州分三期举办（一期 10 月 15–19 日、二期 10 月 23–27 日、三期 10 月 31 日–11 月 4 日）。据 9 月 18 日国新办发布会口径，境外采购商预登记已逾 21 万；今年已登记境外采购商自动成为新推出的会员计划成员，积分可累积为永久等级。
市面上的行前攻略大多讲注册、酒店与支付工具。这一篇只讲法律层——尤其是付款之前成本很低、付款之后代价很高的几项核查。
一、入境方式别选错
第一次来参展的采购商最常见的入境错误，也是最不起眼的一个：把 240 小时过境免签当成通用的免签入境通道。它不是。过境免签的制度逻辑是「经中国前往第三国或地区」，专程来参展、再原路返回本国的人并不符合这个逻辑；入境依据选错，可能在边检就被拒绝入境，行程、约好的会面、围绕这趟行程安排的订金，一并落空。
所以订票之前先诚实回答一个问题：真正覆盖你的入境依据是哪一个——适用于你所持护照的免签安排，还是提前办好的 M 字商务签证（以广交会邀请函为支持材料）？答案只要不是一清二楚，就把它当作出发前要办完的事，而不是到机场再想的事。（同一个过境陷阱如何坑到就医人群，见本站就医指南。）
二、付款前验供应商：展位 ≠ 已核实企业
展位、精美画册和名片都是营销材料，不是核实结果。订金汇出之前：
• 要营业执照、对公司全名。拿到供应商的中文注册全名与统一社会信用代码，并确认营业执照、合同、收款账户三处是同一家公司。中文注册名与对外英文名对不上，是最常见的坑之一——也是款项日后无法对应到签约主体的源头。
• 只付对公账户。坚持付签约公司的对公账户；拒绝付个人账户、或付给「同集团另一家公司」的账户。今年广交会官方与 11 家金融机构合作，为境外采购商提供跨境贸易融资与风险管理服务——正规付款通道正在变多，这让「只能付个人账户」的说法更站不住脚。
• 边谈边留痕。展位名片、报价单、样品确认记录、谈定规格与价格的聊天记录、付款凭证，都留存好。当时看不像法律工作，发生争议时它们就是证据链。
三、合同别停留在 PI／口头
形式发票加一串聊天记录，是很多首单的起点——也是很多争议最后无法证明的原因。尾款付出之前，书面合同（哪怕简短）至少应写明：
• 规格与质量标准。产品规格、材质、公差及适用标准，并锚定已确认的样品——让「货不对版」能对着文件检验，而不是对着记忆争论。
• 验货节点与尾款挂钩。谁验、何时何地验（关键在出货前）、不合格如何处理，并明确把「验货通过」与「释放尾款」挂钩。
• 交期与逾期处理。固定的交付窗口，以及逾期后果——解除、降价或约定赔偿——事先写明，而不是等销售季错过之后再谈。
• 知识产权（自有品牌／OEM 贴牌尤甚）。模具、设计、图稿归谁；供应商不得为他人生产同品牌货物；合作终止后模具如何处置。
• 适用法律与争议解决地。在关系尚好时就约明适用法律与管辖论坛（具名的仲裁机构或法院）。争议发生后再谈争议条款，等于没谈。
这不需要一份长合同，需要的是以上五点落到纸面，且签约主体与第二节里营业执照、对公账户上的公司是同一家。
四、出问题后：先固定证据，再谈判
货物迟到、货不对版、或干脆不发货时，顺序很重要：
• 先固定证据，再谈判。把第二节留存的合同、付款记录与沟通记录先封存，已收货物的状况先留带日期的照片、检验记录与往来函件，再进入交涉。
• 别让时效悄悄流逝。中国法对申请执行与主张权利设有期限，判决或裁决不会自动兑现，错过期限往往难以挽回。（可参阅本站关于申请强制执行两年时效的指南。）
• 救济取决于纸面。实际能追回什么——退款、补发、赔偿、在境内财产上执行——很大程度取决于第三节合同到底怎么写、第二节证据留得全不全。这正是这两节排在前面的原因。
不止一单的打算？从单次采购走向在华常驻，问题就换了一组——企业设立与外商投资架构，见本站外商投资业务页。本文仅供一般信息参考，不构成法律意见。入境政策、展会安排与具体交易适用的法律请按自身情况核实，具体案件请咨询专业顾问。