How Trustworthy is Alibaba.com?

Very few Chinese suppliers will give references. As for ratings, they are almost no indication whatsoever of a supplier's merits.

Gold supplier ratings are bought. The price for a long time was $2,990, but it was reduced recently to $299. It has gone back up to its original price, but thousands of suppliers acquired Gold Supplier status on the cheap. There is no extra verification done when a supplier becomes a Gold Supplier.

Verified suppliers are ones that Alibaba have verified actually exist. That is all they verify! There is no checking up on their manufacturing ability (almost all say they are manufacturers but they are not) and no checking of their financial status, or of their reliability in any way.

dhgate.com operate in a similar way to Alibaba and so do almost all the big sourcing sites. You cannot rely on ratings.

There are a few safe sourcing sites that have real manufacturers listed and where what you see is what you get.

And Stefan, size is no way to determine reliability. Alibaba have huge financial resources and consequently they advertise heavily. That is why so many people suggest them as a good source.

I suggest that before using sourcing sites, newbies should type in the site's name at Ripoff Report | Scams, reviews, complaints, lawsuits and frauds. File a report, post your review. Consumers educating consumers. and see what actual users of the sites have experienced.

Hi Ethan F,

I do provide a lot of useful information to warriors in my frequent forum posts, but there are good reasons, (apart from wanting people to buy my guide ) why I don't just publish the details online.

If you have a look at this thread If your secret B2B portals are so safe why don't you share? you will find there not only an explanation of why I don't simply broadcast the names of the safe sourcing sites, but also a lot of helpful information.

I have no doubt that many people, rather than spend $50, will use that information and try sourcing without professional guidance. That is entirely their choice. If people take notice of what I post on WF their risks will be reduced, but I can't post 39 pages, so they will miss some important information. As you will see if you follow the link above, there is some information it is better to not publish on the forum.

I was not a complete novice when I started importing. My first job after college was with a big shipping company and later I had a business exporting to Asia/Pacific countries for 9 years before I began importing. Another 22 years as an importer has probably made me immune to scams.

You would expect that with all that knowledge I would have avoided being scammed, but I was caught in my early days of importing and it cost me in today's dollars about $12,000. The interesting thing is that it was not a supplier in China, or any of the other countries where I sourced supplies, but it was a local air courier company rep that caught me.

To be fair, it was not the company itself but an unethical sales representative. I later discovered from a friend in the industry that many sales reps in the industry made good commissions by verbally quoting way too low and procrastinating about putting the quote in writing. Then when the goods arrived the importer was hit with a huge freight bill and had to either pay up or lose the goods.

I would have gladly paid $50 for an insurance policy that would help me avoid losing the huge sum that little scam cost me. There are many other ways to lose money importing, and from what I read on WF a large number of warriors have found those ways to lose money.

I've had nothing but success with Alibaba. The company I work with has a 6 year "Gold Supplier". Older the better I think.