The short answer: a legitimate Chinese vehicle exporter can show you four things within one working day — a business licence whose scope includes vehicle export, a company bank account in the same name as that licence, per-unit documentation for the actual car you are buying (VIN, invoice, export certificate), and a willingness to let an independent inspector see the vehicle before it is paid for in full. If any one of those four is missing, the risk is not “small” — it is the whole deposit.
This guide is written for importers and dealers in Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, Latin America and select European markets who are sourcing from China for the first time, or who have been burned once and want a repeatable way to check the next supplier. It is a verification framework, not a sales page. Use it on us as well.
Why this is the question that actually matters
Most buyers start by searching for a car — a Toyota, a BYD, a Changan pickup. The car is the easy part. China has the deepest vehicle inventory in the world and dozens of exporters will quote you within hours.
The hard part is that you are wiring money to a company you have never met, in a country whose legal system you cannot easily use, for a vehicle you cannot see. The failure mode is almost never “the car was slightly worse than described.” It is:
- The deposit went to a personal account and the contact stopped replying.
- The car shipped, but the export documents did not match the VIN, so it could not clear customs.
- The mileage was rolled back and the buyer only discovered it after paying duty.
- The “company” was a broker with no vehicle, reselling another exporter’s photos.
Each of those is preventable at the verification stage, and none is preventable after the wire clears. So the order of operations matters: verify the company first, negotiate the car second.
The 9-point verification checklist
1. Business licence — and specifically its business scope
Every registered Chinese company has a business licence carrying an 18-digit Unified Social Credit Code. Ask for a photo of it. Then check two things most buyers skip:
- The scope of business must actually include vehicle sales or export. A company registered only for “trading consultancy” cannot legally issue vehicle export documents in its own name.
- The registered name in Chinese is the legal identity. The English name on a website has no legal standing in China — many exporters use an English trading name that appears nowhere on the licence. That is normal, but the two must be traceable to each other.
Codes can be checked against China’s public enterprise credit system. If a supplier hesitates to send the licence, the conversation is over.
2. Export qualification for used vehicles specifically
This separates serious used-car exporters from everyone else. Used vehicle export from China is a licensed activity, opened up progressively since 2019 and restricted to approved enterprises in designated pilot cities. New-car export and used-car export are not the same permission.
If you are buying used, ask directly: are you an approved used-vehicle export enterprise, or are you working through one? Both answers are acceptable. “What’s the difference?” is not.
3. The bank account name must match the licence
Non-negotiable. Payment goes to a corporate account whose name matches the business licence exactly. Not a personal account. Not a Hong Kong company “for convenience.” Not a third-party payment agent introduced late in the conversation.
This single rule eliminates the large majority of outright fraud, because a fraudulent operation cannot open and hold a corporate account in a name that survives your checking.
Be especially alert to a mid-transaction change of banking details. A payment instruction that arrives by email, changes the account, and stresses urgency should be treated as a compromised mailbox until you confirm it on a voice call to a number you already had.
4. Proof the car exists — and belongs to them
Photos prove nothing; photos circulate. Ask for evidence tied to the specific unit:
- A video walkaround shot on request, with today’s date or a requested item visible in frame.
- The VIN plate legible and matching the paperwork.
- The dashboard odometer reading in the same continuous shot as the VIN.
- The vehicle registration certificate for a used unit, showing first registration date.
A real seller does this in twenty minutes. A broker reselling someone else’s stock will send more still photos instead. Every unit in our stock list carries its own specification and condition disclosure for exactly this reason.
5. Independent third-party inspection
Insist the vehicle can be inspected by a party you choose, or by a recognised agency, before final payment. Some destination countries make this mandatory anyway — several markets require a pre-shipment conformity or roadworthiness certificate, and a vehicle that cannot pass inspection at origin will not clear at destination.
What a serious inspection covers: VIN verification, odometer plausibility against wear, accident and structural repair history, flood and fire damage indicators, and for electric vehicles, battery state of health — the single largest hidden value factor in a used EV, and invisible in photographs.
6. Document set — ask for the list before you order
Ask the supplier to name every document you will receive, before you place the order. A complete export set generally includes:
| Document | What it proves |
|---|---|
| Commercial invoice | Declared value — the basis of your import duty |
| Packing list | What is in the container / on the vessel |
| Bill of lading (B/L) | Title to the cargo; you need the original to collect |
| Certificate of origin | Origin — often needed for preferential duty |
| Export certificate / de-registration | The vehicle was legally exported, not stolen |
| Vehicle registration copy (used) | Provenance and first registration date |
| Inspection certificate | Where the destination country requires one |
An exporter who cannot recite this list from memory has not done it often.
The commercial invoice deserves separate attention. Some buyers ask for the declared value to be lowered to reduce duty. Understand the exposure first: customs in most markets value vehicles against their own reference tables, and an under-declared invoice can trigger reassessment, penalties and seizure — with the cargo accruing storage while it is resolved. The saving is small and the tail risk is not. Our Nigeria import guide walks through how duty is actually assessed there.
7. Payment structure — never 100% up front
A reasonable structure is a deposit (commonly 30%) with the balance against shipping documents — you pay the remainder when the bill of lading proves the car is on a vessel. Letters of credit are stronger still, and worth the bank fees on multi-unit orders.
A demand for 100% in advance from a first-time counterparty is a red flag on its own, regardless of the discount offered for it.
8. Who carries the risk between the factory gate and your port
Agree the Incoterm in writing: FOB, CIF or CFR. This decides who pays freight and insurance and, more importantly, at what moment the risk of loss transfers to you. Our shipping comparison covers how RoRo and container pricing differ.
Then ask the question buyers forget: is marine insurance actually purchased, and for what value? Under CIF the seller insures, frequently at bare minimum cover. Cars are lost at sea and vessels do catch fire. Insured value should be the landed value, not the invoice value.
9. Communication in your language, with a named person
This sounds soft and is not. Most disputes in China-to-Africa vehicle trade are not fraud — they are misunderstanding compounded by lag. A specification confirmed in imprecise English, a colour agreed by translation error, a shipping date read as a departure when it was a booking.
What good looks like: a named point of contact who answers in your working language, responses within a working day, and important agreements confirmed in writing rather than left in a voice note.
Red flags, ranked
Walk away immediately:
- Payment to a personal account, or to a company name differing from the licence
- Refusal to provide the business licence
- A price far under every other quote — in a commodity market with visible pricing, a 30% discount means something is wrong with the car, the title, or the intention
- Bank details changed by email mid-transaction
Slow down and verify harder:
- Only stock photos, never a live video
- Pressure to pay today because “another buyer is waiting”
- Vague answers on documents or the used-export licence question
- No willingness to allow inspection
- Contact only via a personal messaging account, with no company email domain
The one check most buyers skip
Ask the supplier a question they cannot answer from a script: something specific about your own destination market.
For example — what is the maximum vehicle age my country currently allows, and does the model you are quoting fall inside it? What is my discharge port and roughly how long is the transit? Is there a pre-shipment inspection requirement for my market?
An exporter who actually ships to your country answers immediately, because they deal with it every week. One who has only ever shipped elsewhere will be evasive or simply wrong. This costs you one message and tells you more than the entire company profile. Rules move with each budget cycle — Nigeria, for instance, cut its vehicle levies in July 2026. Confirm the current position for your country and model rather than relying on any supplier’s summary, including this one.
How Hanvia Motors is set up against this checklist
We would rather you apply the checklist to us than take a claim on trust.
Where our stock comes from. Hanvia works as an export consolidator for Chinese vehicle dealers. Partner dealers list real units they physically hold; we handle the export side, buyer communication and shipping. What you see in our listings — across BYD, Geely, Leapmotor, Toyota, Volkswagen and BMW — are vehicles held by identified dealers, not a catalogue of models we would go and look for after you pay.
Documentation and inspection. Each listing carries its specification and condition disclosure, with a dedicated third-party inspection record where an inspection has been carried out — inspecting body, report reference and date, shown on the vehicle page rather than promised in a chat. Whether you are after an SUV, a sedan or one of the export-ready models we rate for 2026, the disclosure standard is the same.
Communication. We work in English, French, Arabic, Portuguese and Chinese, including on WhatsApp, because most of our buyers are in West and East Africa, North Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, Latin America and select European markets — see our French-language Senegal guide or our note on hybrids into Nigeria. You get answers in your language, from a person.
What we will not claim here. We are not going to publish a volume figure or a client count to look bigger than we are. Ask us directly for what you need to see — licence, stock evidence, document list, references for your market — and judge from that. More about the company, or see what we handle end to end.
FAQ
Is it safe to buy a car from China?
Yes, when the counterparty is verified and payment is staged. The risk concentrates almost entirely in the verification stage — an unverified supplier paid 100% in advance. A verified exporter, a 30% deposit, and the balance against the bill of lading is a well-established, low-incident structure.
How do I check if a Chinese car exporter is a real company?
Request the business licence with its 18-digit Unified Social Credit Code and check the registered scope covers vehicle sales or export. Confirm the corporate bank account name matches the licence exactly. Then require a live video of the specific vehicle showing VIN and odometer in one continuous shot.
What is the difference between an exporter, a trader and an agent?
An exporter holds the export qualification and issues documents in its own name. A trader buys and resells, and may or may not hold that qualification. An agent introduces you to a seller and takes a commission without owning the vehicle. All three can be legitimate; the problem arises when an agent presents as an exporter, because there is then no one with a balance sheet standing behind the transaction.
Can I buy a used car from China legally?
Yes. China has permitted used vehicle export through approved enterprises since 2019, expanding progressively to more pilot cities. The constraint is usually on the destination side — your own country’s maximum vehicle age, steering-side rule and emissions standard decide what you can actually clear.
How much deposit should I pay?
Commonly 30%, with the balance released against shipping documents. Treat any demand for full payment in advance from a supplier you have not previously dealt with as a reason to stop.
What if the car arrives different from the description?
Your remedy depends entirely on what you documented beforehand — the written specification, the inspection report and the condition disclosure. This is why the inspection step matters more than the negotiation step. Without a pre-shipment record, a post-arrival dispute across two legal systems is usually not economically worth pursuing, which is precisely why the checks belong at the front.
Next step
Apply this checklist to any exporter you are considering, including us. If you want to start by testing the last item — the destination-market question — tell us your country and the model you are looking at, and we will come back with the current age and compliance position for that market plus what we actually hold in stock.