Quality & compliance
Quality Control and Social Compliance
We place orders only with factories holding current BSCI, WRAP or Sedex certification, and we inspect every order to AQL 2.5 at four stages of production. Audit certificates are available to review before you commit to an order, not after.
Addressing it directly
Why This Page Exists
Bangladesh’s garment industry carries a reputation problem that predates most of the factories now operating in it. We would rather raise it than have you wonder.
After the Rana Plaza collapse in 2013, two large inspection programmes — the Accord on Fire and Building Safety, backed largely by European brands, and the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety, backed by North American ones — inspected several thousand export factories between them. Structural, fire and electrical remediation followed, and factories that could not or would not remediate lost their export business. Oversight has since passed to the RMG Sustainability Council and the national regulator, and independent auditing continues.
That is the industry-level answer, and it is genuinely better than it was. But the variance between individual factories remains wide, and a certificate is a snapshot of one day. So what we verify before placing an order is this: that the certification is current, that it was issued by the body it claims to come from, and that the floor we walked matches the floor that was audited. We check the first two with the issuing body directly. We check the third in person.
What the standards mean
Certifications Our Factories Hold
In plain language, because half the buyers who ask us about these are hearing the acronyms for the first time.
BSCI
amfori Business Social Compliance Initiative
BSCI is a European social auditing standard covering working hours, fair wages, workplace safety, freedom of association and child labour prevention. Factories are graded A to E; we work with A and B rated units. For EU buyers, BSCI documentation is increasingly a purchasing requirement rather than a preference, particularly under supply chain due diligence legislation.
WRAP
Worldwide Responsible Accredited Production
WRAP is the equivalent standard most requested by US buyers, certifying lawful, humane and ethical manufacturing across twelve principles. Certification is issued as Platinum, Gold or Silver depending on audit performance and validity period.
Sedex / SMETA
Supplier Ethical Data Exchange
Sedex is a shared database of ethical audit data; SMETA is the audit methodology behind it. UK and EU retailers commonly require suppliers to hold a current SMETA report and share it through the Sedex platform.
OEKO-TEX Standard 100
Product-level chemical safety
A product-level certification confirming that fabric and trims have been tested for harmful substances. This matters for childrenswear, for skin-contact garments, and for meeting EU REACH chemical restrictions.
GOTS and GRS
Organic and recycled chain of custody
GOTS certifies organic fibre content and processing; GRS certifies recycled content. Both are chain-of-custody standards, meaning the certification must be unbroken from fibre to finished garment. If you are making sustainability claims to consumers, you need the transaction certificates, not just a factory that says it uses organic cotton.
Our inspection protocol
Certification tells you a factory is fit to work with
It does not tell you the order in front of you is correct. That requires inspection, and we run four stages on every order.
Pre-production meeting
Before cutting begins, we confirm the approved sample, fabric lot, trims and measurement chart with the factory in person. Most bulk failures trace back to something agreed loosely at this stage.
Inline inspection at 20% completion
The first finished pieces are measured and checked against the approved sample. Catching a construction fault here affects a fifth of the order instead of all of it.
Midline inspection at 50–60%
Confirms measurement consistency across sizes and colours as the run progresses, and verifies that fabric from a second dye lot has not shifted in shade.
Final random inspection to AQL 2.5
Statistical sampling of the finished, packed order following ISO 2859-1. We inspect measurements, workmanship, colour, labelling, packing and carton marking. You receive a photographic report before shipment is authorised.
No vagueness here
What Happens If an Order Fails Inspection
- Rework is at the factory’s costNot yours, and not ours. This is written into our terms with every unit in the network.
- We re-inspect before anything shipsA failed lot is re-presented and inspected again to the same AQL, not waved through.
- You are told the same dayWith the inspection report and photographs, and a revised date if the delivery is at risk.
- We refuse the shipment outrightIf a lot fails twice, or if the defect is one that rework cannot fix, we stop it and tell you rather than shipping and hoping.
Paperwork
Documentation We Provide
Everything your compliance team, your retailer or your customs broker is going to ask for.
- Factory audit certificates (BSCI / WRAP / Sedex), current at time of order
- Inline and final inspection reports with photographs
- AQL inspection certificate
- Test reports where required — fabric composition, shrinkage, colourfastness
- OEKO-TEX or GOTS transaction certificates where applicable
Frequently asked questions
Frequently Asked Questions
It means the factory has been independently audited against European social compliance standards covering wages, working hours, safety and workers’ rights, and has been graded on the result. For EU importers it increasingly forms part of mandatory supply chain due diligence.
AQL 2.5 is the general standard for apparel and is what most brands and retailers specify. Tighter levels such as AQL 1.5 are used for premium products; AQL 4.0 for promotional or low-value goods. We can inspect to whichever level you require.
Yes. We provide current certificates for the specific factory assigned to your order before you confirm it.
Yes. Many buyers use SGS, Intertek or Bureau Veritas alongside our internal QC, and we coordinate factory access for them.
The certified segment of the industry has changed substantially since 2013, with structural, fire and electrical remediation across thousands of export factories and ongoing independent auditing. The variance between factories remains wide, which is why we verify certification independently rather than relying on a factory’s own claims.
Want to review a factory’s audit documentation before you commit?
Ask us for it with your quote request and we will send it with the quotation.