Quality & specification
Defined by documents.
Verified by process.
The commercial basis
A product name is not a specification.
Two parcels described by the same product name can be commercially different in ways that decide whether a transaction completes. What the buyer accepts, what the seller delivers and what an inspector measures all have to refer to the same agreed document.
Establishing that document — and the process that verifies it — is part of structuring the trade, not an administrative step afterwards.
What is agreed
Six points settled before the product moves.
- 01
Applicable product specification
The contractual specification, not a generic product description, defines what is being bought and sold.
- 02
Testing method and inspection point
The method and the physical point of determination are agreed before loading.
- 03
Quality and quantity determination
How each is established, by whom, and at which stage of the movement.
- 04
Supporting certificates and documentation
The documents that evidence the product and travel with the transaction.
- 05
Acceptance procedure
The agreed basis on which the receiving party accepts the delivered product.
- 06
Treatment of any discrepancy
The route agreed in advance for resolving a difference between expectation and result.
In practice
Determined at the agreed point, by the agreed method.
Quality and quantity are established where the contract says they are established — at loading, at a terminal, at discharge, or at more than one point — using the test method the contract names. Independent inspection is arranged where the structure calls for it.
Where a result differs from expectation, the treatment of that discrepancy has already been agreed, which is what keeps a technical difference from becoming a commercial dispute.
Final commercial acceptance is based on agreed specification and documentation.
Specification enquiries
Working to a specification we should see?
Send the specification, certificate of analysis or technical requirement with your enquiry. The desk will assess it against origin, route and destination acceptance.
- Trading desk
- trade@barrelsway.com
- General enquiries
- info@barrelsway.com