Oct 20, 2026Sourcing Guides
When the Inspection Fails: Rework, Re-Inspection, and the 70% That Hasn't Been Paid
A failed inspection is a batch problem with a payment attached. How we read the findings, sort the defects, choose between rework and replacement, and hold the 70% until the record clears.
The report says fail. The cartons are packed, the container is booked, and the 70% balance is still unpaid. The factory says the problem is small and it can fix it. What happens between that message and a signed release decides whether this lot is reworked, replaced, split, or remade.
This guide begins after a failed pre-shipment inspection, not before it. B&C Sourcify works from Shenzhen. The family behind the team runs a sheet metal shop, and mold and PCBA work sit alongside it. The order moves through inquiry, supplier check, sample and seal, production follow-up, inspection, balance release and loading. The report is one station on that line.
Read the Report as a Decision Document
A failed report tells you what this lot is, not what to do with it. It is also not a judgment on the whole supplier. Read it as a snapshot taken at one station: which requirements failed, how many units carried each defect, which SKU and lot the sample came from, what the photos show, and what the inspector noted.
The first moves are administrative. Loading stops. The balance stays where it is. The failed units come out of finished goods and get their own space. Ask for the original report, not a summary, and the full photo set, not two images in an email. Then count the lot by SKU against the packing list. A report built on an inspection sample describes only that sample. Know which one you are holding before anyone argues about the rest.
Two references decide what counts as a defect. One is the approved sample; the other is the specification written on the order. Two signed and stamped samples are sealed before the line starts, one copy staying with the factory and one in our office, so the conversation has an anchor. Before shipment, we compare material, dimensions, appearance, PCBA solder joints, and the plug and accessory specifications, item by item, against both references.
We do not accept a verbal promise here. The defect list comes by SKU, in writing, with a count for each defect and a photo reference beside it.
Supplier registry checks, in-line patrols, pre-shipment inspection and loading supervision are the service line behind the order, set out on the sourcing page (/b2b-sourcing).
Warehouse-side inbound QC, once the goods reach the warehouse, is a different gate and a different file.
Sort the Defects by Consequence, Then by Pattern
A failed report can arrive as a single number, the least useful thing on the page until the defects behind it are sorted twice.
Sort by consequence first. A safety or regulatory failure cannot be sold as new, and no discount repairs it. Those units leave the sellable pool. A functional failure is the next tier: the unit may look right and fail in use, which becomes a return, a service claim, or a customer who stops buying. The last tier covers what cannot be sold as new: visible marks, missing accessories, the wrong variant. Those units can often be completed or exchanged, if the missing part exists and the swap is real.
Then sort by pattern. Isolated defects scattered across a lot tell a different story from a cluster on one shift, one machine or one material batch. A cluster points at a cause and often at a boundary, since units after a certain lot code may all carry it. A random spread across the run says the process is the problem, not the batch.
Pattern picks the route. Rework suits isolated, reversible defects. Sorting and replacement suit a cluster you can bound. A remake conversation opens when the pattern covers the lot.
A defect list used this way is a routing table. Used as a bargaining sheet, it produces the move hardest to undo: pull the worst units, blend the rest back into the lot, ship a batch that is quieter but not clean. The signed sample and the order's written specification stay on the table, because they are the references we measure a defect against.
Rework, Replace, or Split the Lot
Once the defects are sorted, the routes are easier to name: rework, replacement, a split, or a remake. The defect decides which is open.
Factory rework is the most overused. It fits a defect that can be reversed without hiding it: a fitting re-seated, a missing accessory added, a label replaced. It does not fit a repair that closes a gap over a crack and hides it. A bench that opens a unit can scratch it, fit the wrong part, or send it back in a mismatched shade.
Replacement fits a cluster you can bound, a lot you no longer trust, or a rework scope that covers most of the batch. The order names the quantity, the lot, and the committed date. A date without a lot number sends whatever is on the floor.
A split suits a partly clean lot and a buyer who can take a partial shipment. The good units ship; the failed ones stay at the factory. A partial release covers the units named in it. It does not release the lot, and it does not release the balance.
Remake or scrap is the route for safety and regulatory failures, wrong material, and repairs that change what the product is. A discount on a unit that should not exist is not a compromise. It sells the problem to someone who cannot see it.
Someone pays for the rework labor, the replacement, the second inspection, the storage, and the sailing that gets pushed. The purchase order should name those lines. Assume the supplier absorbs everything, and a settled defect becomes a dispute.
The 70% is the pressure point here. It is not working capital, and it does not move while the lot is unresolved.
A failure that crosses two processes has its own claim file, which is not this one.
The Second Inspection Has a Wider Job
The second inspection is not the first one run again. Its report should be built around the questions the first one left open.
Start with the original findings. Each failed requirement gets a line with a status: closed, still open, or not applicable because the unit was replaced. A re-inspection that reports a new pass number with no reference to the earlier findings has not answered anything. It has restarted the conversation.
Then the units. We check reworked units individually when the defect was isolated, because each repair is its own claim. When the defect came in a cluster, the re-inspection covers the cluster and its boundary, including units made just before and just after the affected run. Units that were never reworked do not get a free pass.
The part most reports miss is the damage the fix may have done. Rework moves a unit through a bench it was not designed to revisit: a housing opened and closed, a connector re-seated, a label replaced. Appearance, fit, color and packing need a line in the re-inspection, or the fix becomes the next defect.
Then the arithmetic. Good units plus failed plus short should equal what the supplier says it produced. When it does not, we ask about the gap first.
Factory photos do not replace this. A photo set shows what someone chose to photograph, in the light they chose. In-line patrols (IPQC) are where a drift should have been caught, and the re-inspection confirms it on finished goods. The balance waits for that report.
The 70% Stays Where It Is Until the Record Says Otherwise
The balance is not a tip for good behavior. It is the only hold a buyer has, and it stays until the record clears.
Our terms are short to state and slow to bend. A 30% deposit starts the order. The 70% that remains is released only when the inspection result clears, and we do not run credit terms. In the order's sequence, the balance sits between the inspection and the loading, so a failed inspection holds it.
The release decision belongs in writing. It should name the report, the SKU and lot, the passed and failed counts, who signs, and who approves a deviation. A release note carries the purchase order, lot, SKU, counts, rework or replacement status, the report reference, any accepted deviation, the decision maker and the date. That is not a company form, but it is what makes the decision readable later.
A partial release needs its own line. It names the units and quantities it covers and states plainly that the rest stays blocked. A partial release that reads like a whole-lot release is how a failed batch ends up on a vessel with a signature on it.
The same file supports a claim later. The inspection report, the defect list by SKU, the photos, the rework record, the re-inspection report and the quantity reconciliation are the evidence set. Whether a claim succeeds is a matter for the contract and, if it comes to that, for lawyers. We do not give legal advice. A claim built on that file is a different conversation from one built on an email.
We do not route payment through a private account, and we do not ask a buyer to prepay a whole order. After release, loading is the next gate: the loading record lists cartons, pallets, shipping marks, piece counts, the container's condition and the seal, with video on file.
What the Failed Order Changes in the Next PO
The next purchase order is where this failure either repeats or gets designed out.
Start with the reference. The next order should name which of the two sealed samples is the acceptance reference, and who holds it. How that sample is sealed and kept is a procedure of its own (/knowledge-hub/golden-sample-benchmark-prevent-quality-defects).
Then the inspection scope. Name the requirements that failed, the ones the last inspection never covered, and anything the re-inspection had to add. A check invented to catch one defect falls out of the next order unless someone writes it in.
Responsibility belongs in the same document. Who reworks, who replaces, who pays for the second inspection, and what happens if the rework fails again. An order that names the remedy but not the cost moves the argument later. Also in the order: after any rework, a second inspection, and no release without its report.
Then the production watch. In-line patrols belong at the stages where a drifting process shows up first, and the next order should name those stages and what gets looked at there. A patrol with no defined check is a walk through a factory.
The supplier's corrective action closes it: the cause, the lots it touched, the containment that stops it spreading, the correction, the verification, and what the next lot will be checked for. We ask for it as a document, not a paragraph in an email.
The balance gate goes into the same document. The 70% releases when the inspection clears, and release and loading stay separate signatures. That is how the next order starts with the last failure already inside it.
A first PCBA run has its own pre-production gate, a separate piece of work from this cleanup.
The Report and the Order Behind It
The report and the order are enough. Send both (/contact-us), with the defect list, the lot status and the approved sample reference. We read the failed findings against the quantity map and come back with a lot decision, a re-inspection plan and a scoped quote. Our B2B work is for distributors, brands and importers whose annual purchases start at USD 10,000, and Dore Technology Co., Ltd. is the entity on the contract.
