Third Party Inspection Services
This article provides information about Third Party Inspection
Services. These companies provide a variety of inspection services such as Pre-Shipment inspection, shop inspection, site inspection and Price Verification.
You may need to review this article in conjunction with the following articles to get a full understanding:
Third Party Independent Inspection
Third Party Quality Inspection
The I4I Academy API Source Inspector training course covers third party inspection requirements.
Third Party Inspection Services for Shop Inspection Purposes
This is called Third Party Vendor Inspection or Third Party Shop Inspection. The purchaser is either the end-user or the engineering company under contract with an end-user. They may make a contract with a third party inspection company to do inspection work based on an agreed inspection and test plan.
For more information, please review the Inspection and Test Plan article.
Generally, the third party inspection company receives inspection notification, and carries out inspection and supplies the purchaser with an inspection report.
Several inspection visits might be needed for each type of equipment depending on the equipment type and complexity.
The inspection company controls the project through inspection and test plan, and when all tasks are fulfilled by the manufacturer, they will issue an inspection release note and the manufacturer can organize for packing, marking and shipment.
For more information, please review the Shop Inspection article. This article provides you the links inside of this site for most of the oil and gas equipment third party inspection guidelines.
Third Party Inspection Services for Site Inspection Purposes
Third party inspection companies are hired for site inspection for industrial projects. These companies are used for process and power piping, storage tanks, steel structures and pipeline inspection in their construction process.
Third Party Inspection Companies are not involved in the installation; the supervision normally is done by engineering company.
Contrary to shop inspection, the site inspection projects use the resident inspectors, which normally accommodated near the construction site.
Third Party Inspection Services for Pre-Shipment Inspection Purposes
Pre-Shipment inspection has a commercial approach. Pre-Shipment inspection is mandatory in some countries.
When the buyer opens a Letter of Credit (LC) at the bank, and the funds are transferred through the buyer and seller banks, then a third party inspection agency might be necessary, and the name of this company will be stated on the LC, which is needed to certify the goods.
Without the third party inspection company certificate, funds will not be transferred between buyer's and seller's banks.
The scope of third party inspection services for Pre-shipment inspection is visual quality, quantity, packing, marking and loading inspection.
There is clause in the LC as to the “conclusion,” which should be stated in the inspection certificate exactly.
For more detail on the Preshipment Inspection review following articles:
Third Party Inspection Services for Price Verification:
The price verification is mandatory in some countries. This service supports the customs authority to make sure the prices stated in declaration document are the real value agreed upon between buyers and sellers.
The service is sometimes required by banks to approve proforma invoices.
Some importers try to deceive customs by declaring the goods with a lower price so they pay less to import duties. A Third Party Inspection Company helps the customs authority to indicate the international price of the imported goods. This service is named third party inspection for customs.