Nobody likes red tape when it comes to getting things done in a timely efficient manner and if you’ve ever done business with or within China or Hong Kong you’ll know all too well about the use of Company Chops, those seal/stamps used in place of signatures in business.

It’s a very fascinating experience to witness (or wait on) and you soon learn quickly there’s a “chop” for everything.
Contracts, finance even special digital chops for purely electronic based transactions and usually there’s a designated individual in the company assigned to do the stamping. Many documents and contracts would be considered void without that seal in plain view. Usually the seal is accompanied with a signature as well so it’s really just an extra level of protection. Think of it like a blockchain transaction confirmation with cryptocurrency.

So as said they act very much like signatures and just like if the individual isn’t around to sign right away (digitally or otherwise) you’re very much stuck waiting until whoever is assigned is available.

There were many domain name transactions I assisted with for clients in China and Hong Kong for many years and we couldn’t even close the deals on contracts without those seals. Didn’t matter if the money was ready, did not matter if the merchandise was ready to go. Like in any deal, the paper work must be watertight.

As you can imagine nobody wants to come back and find out everything they just spent months negotiating wasn’t actually finalised due to incorrect authority signing off.

I was always fascinated with the process of chops and the power of the company chop (which is is usually the highest authority chop for an organisation). In the west usually just the signature is enough and you’re good to go and while that’s all dandy there is of course all kinds of cases of possible fraud with signatures alone. That’s not to say the same doesn’t happen with chops there’s just more culture behind the importance of their use and who gets to use them.

Today we have many methods to “confirm” transactions and deals out there, especially digitally. I however quite enjoy the human element.

Regards,

Alexander/Zenchi