I. Matters needing attention in the signing stage
We believe that prevention is the main way to reduce legal risks. Taking preventive measures in advance and taking more initiative with less investment can also avoid disputes and occupy a favorable position when disputes occur. In order to prevent legal risks, we should pay attention to the credit investigation at the signing stage and the design of relevant clauses in export contracts.
(a) the external credit investigation before signing the contract.
China's export enterprises generally attach importance to orders, not to the credit investigation of foreign businessmen, and not to the detailed terms of contracts. Taking advantage of enterprises' eagerness to place orders, foreign businessmen often propose to pay by D/A and then telegraphic transfer, and some unscrupulous foreign businessmen maliciously default on the payment for goods on the grounds of quality problems after receiving the goods. Therefore, for foreign businessmen with poor credit reliability, enterprises should adopt relatively conservative payment methods, while payment methods such as D/A and post-telegraphic transfer must be limited to trading with foreign businessmen with good credit. Even the old customers who have cooperated for many years, their credit status is not static. When there are some anomalies, they should also conduct credit surveys to keep abreast of customer information. From the practical experience, we can reduce 50% of overseas arrears cases by insisting on credit investigation of new customers before trading and regular investigation of old customers or timely investigation when doubts are found.
(2) Matters needing attention in the design of contract terms.
1, matters needing attention of agreed quality standards.
Quality disputes in international trade are often caused by differences in quality standards between buyers and sellers, so the most direct solution is to clearly stipulate product quality standards in export contracts. There are many ways to agree on quality standards.
For products produced according to samples, it is best to seal the samples for confirmation by both parties, and use them as the basis for determining quality standards in the event of disputes in the future. However, we should be careful to use samples to express quality, because it is difficult for export goods to be exactly the same as samples. Therefore, some requirements in products can generally be expressed by samples, and other parts should try to use indicators and words. It is the most commonly used method to express the quality of goods in international trade to describe the quality of goods in words.