Your Korean importer raises a quality claim: how to tell if it is real and how to respond without giving the sale away
Published 2026-09-06
The quality claim is the most used instrument in commercial disputes with Korea. Not because Korean importers are more demanding than others, although they often are, but because a quality claim is the only socially acceptable way, inside a Korean company, to justify a withheld payment or a renegotiation.
That does not mean it is false. It means it has to be assessed with method before you react.
The four claims I see most
Temperature. The container data logger shows a deviation in transit, or the importer says the goods arrived with signs of thawing. The most common claim in meat, seafood and dairy.
Physical damage. Crushed cartons, unstable pallets, broken packaging. Usually real and usually minor. The problem is when it is used to reject the whole order.
Non-conforming product. Weight, cut, size, colour, a specification different from what was agreed. Here the contract and the product sheet decide, and the contract often does not say what the exporter thinks it says.
Shelf life. The product arrives with less remaining shelf life than the importer expected, even if it meets what was agreed. In Korean retail, remaining shelf life at delivery is a strict acceptance criterion, and exporters do not always know it.
How to tell if the claim is real
I always ask for the same elements. If the importer has them, the claim is probably real. If they do not, or are slow to send them, suspect something else.
- Dated photographs taken when the container was opened, not days later in a warehouse.
- The full data-logger read, not a partial screenshot.
- A third-party survey report, or at least a named and dated report from the importer's own QC.
- The affected quantity, separated from the total. A real claim distinguishes the 40 good pallets from the 6 damaged ones. A commercial claim talks about the whole order.
- The date of first notice relative to the date of receipt. A real claim arrives within hours or a few days. One that arrives three weeks later, coinciding with the invoice due date, says more about the importer's cash than about your product.
The response mistakes
The first mistake is denying everything. Replying that "our goods always leave in perfect condition" solves nothing and, in Korean business culture, reads as a supplier refusing responsibility. The importer escalates.
The second is accepting everything. Offering a discount or a credit note in the first email "to protect the relationship". It sets a precedent and confirms, inside the Korean company, that the foreign supplier gives way under pressure. The next order will come with another claim.
The third is letting the conversation stay at the purchasing manager's level. The person raising the claim is generally not the person who decides how much to pay. And often they have no interest in a quick resolution, because while the matter is open their company does not pay.
How to respond in the first days
Acknowledge the claim and ask, precisely and without a tone of suspicion, for the documentation behind it. A short message, specific, no adjectives.
Separate, in your own reply, the affected part from the unaffected part, and ask that the unaffected part follow its normal commercial course. This is what unblocks the most payments.
Offer a technical route to verification, with an independent surveyor if the value justifies it. An importer with a real claim accepts. One with a commercial claim usually starts talking about something else.
And decide, before writing anything else, what your real concession margin is if the claim turns out partly founded. That figure is not communicated. It is kept ready.
A composite case
A dairy exporter received a temperature claim on a EUR 95,000 order, three weeks after delivery and two days before the due date. The importer asked for a 40 percent credit note.
The full data-logger read showed a 40-minute deviation at the destination terminal, already in the importer's custody. With that evidence and a communication addressed to the right decision level, the claim closed with a 4 percent adjustment on the affected pallets and payment of the rest the following week.
Details of this case have been altered for confidentiality.
If you have a claim open
Before answering the importer, it pays to know what kind of claim it is and what it is really worth. I offer an urgent 50-minute call, with a prior review of up to five documents and a written summary of recommended steps. Fixed fee, USD 350, credited if the case continues to a full assessment within seven days.
I reply within one Korean business day.