Alibaba’s recent efforts to ease friction in cross-border B2B commerce included the launch of its Trade Assurance program, a venture that sees Alibaba vet international suppliers to strengthen business buyers’ confidence in their online purchases from China.
Last week, the eCommerce site announced an extension of that service. According to reports in Internet Retailer published Friday (Aug. 21), Alibaba will extend coverage of the Trade Assurance program, once applicable only to transactions made via bank transfer, to purchases made with a credit card.
Further, the program will now also seek to improve confidence in purchases from suppliers in nations other than China, as manufacturers and distributors working through the platform in other jurisdictions will soon be added under the initiative. Alibaba will reportedly first add suppliers from India to the program.
Reports said the news was revealed at the ThinkGlobal Retail conference last week by Alibaba.com Marketing and Business Development Executive Sunny Chhabra.
The Trade Assurance program, which includes a reported 54,000 Chinese suppliers, sees Alibaba subsidiary OneTouch review participating vendors, with the platform refunding corporate buyers’ money if the standards of a purchase, like quality or delivery time, are not met.
“If the supplier is at fault, the buyer gets their money back,” said Chhabra. “You’ll be covered by Alibaba. We’ll go after the supplier to recoup our losses.”
The program allows corporate buyers to filter out potential supplier partners by whether or not they participate in the voluntary venture.
According to reports, Alibaba also revealed that it will soon be allowing non-Chinese suppliers to sell products on 1688.com, another Alibaba unit. Earlier reports said the corporation was eyeing the launch of 1688.com in Brazil.
Alibaba has launched several initiatives this year alone aimed at boosting sales from Chinese suppliers to international buyers. But the expansion of the program hints at the company’s additional focus on facilitating cross-border B2B trade overall, regardless of whether it initiates in China.
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