Home › Field notes › Currency and Price Validity Terms: Why 30 Days and What Re-Quotes

Modular Bag Pro · 2026-10-11 · 3,417 words · 16 min read

Currency and price validity terms answer two questions that are almost never asked together: which currency the figure is stated in, and how long it remains true. A bag quotation is a claim about input costs — cloth, webbing, hardware, packaging, labour and inland haulage — and 30 days is the window within which those inputs can still be bought at the prices assumed. Quotations here are issued in one named currency on FOB Xiamen terms against a 500-unit order, with 6-10 working days for the confirmation sample and 35-50 days for the run that follows. This is general trade information, not legal or financial advice. Terms must be confirmed in the written contract.

What a Price Validity Window Is Actually Protecting

A quotation is a statement about the future, and the validity window is the period over which that statement remains honest. A figure issued for a 500-unit reference rests on input prices that were true on the day it was written: cloth from a mill, webbing at a stated width, hardware in a stated finish, thread, cartons, the labour content of the run and the haulage to the loading port. Each of those inputs was itself quoted to somebody, with its own expiry, and the shortest of them is the real constraint on the figure in front of the buyer.

That is why validity is not a negotiating posture. A supplier offering a long window on a made-to-order reference is either holding unusually stable input prices or is absorbing a risk that reappears later as a substitution request, a revision note or a schedule slip. A buyer who treats the window as a formality tends to discover its purpose at exactly the wrong moment, when the order is finally placed and the figure has quietly changed.

Three inputs move fastest in bag programmes and deserve to be named individually. Coated fabric moves with resin and energy costs and is quoted by the metre at a validity the mill sets. Metal hardware — buckles, hooks, sliders — moves with alloy prices and is quoted per piece. Freight moves on a cycle of its own, and on an FOB Xiamen quotation it is not in the figure at all, which matters for the currency discussion further down.

The remaining inputs are slower. Labour content is set by the construction, not by a market. Thread and packaging move, but slowly and in small absolute amounts on a 500-unit order. Validity wording and the sampling services behind it are described on the services page. The practical result is that the validity window is governed by the fastest input, not by the average of all of them, and the fastest input in most bag programmes is either the coated fabric or the hardware.

One further point about what validity does not protect: it does not fix a price against a change in the specification. A revised fabric, an extra colourway or a new logo placement is a new cost question regardless of whether the window is still open, and treating it as covered by an unexpired quotation is a common and entirely avoidable argument.

Verdict: Read a validity window as the shortest expiry among the mill quote, the hardware quote and the processing quote behind it, because that shortest date — not the date printed on the seller's letterhead — is the day the figure stops being reliable.

Why 30 Days Is the Working Validity Period for a Made-to-Order Reference

Thirty days is not a rule written anywhere; it is the period that three practical clocks happen to agree on. Understanding those clocks makes the number defensible in a negotiation rather than arbitrary.

The first clock is upstream. Mills and hardware suppliers quote their own validity, and in this industry it commonly sits at around a month. A quotation built on inputs that expire in 30 days cannot honestly be held open for longer without either re-buying the inputs or carrying the difference. Where a buyer asks for a longer window — 60 or 90 days for a budget cycle — the honest answer is a quotation valid for 30 days with a stated review date, not a longer figure with an unpriced risk inside it.

The second clock is the sampling round. A first sample is turned round in 6-10 working days, extending to 12-15 where the specification is intricate, and the buyer then needs time to approve it. Thirty days comfortably contains the sample, the approval and the start of purchasing. A shorter window creates a race in which the quotation expires while the sample is still being assessed, which is precisely the situation a validity clause exists to avoid.

The third clock is purchasing. Once the sample is approved, materials are bought against the order and production then runs 35-50 days. A quotation accepted on day 28 of a 30-day window still allows the buyer's order to reach the mill inside the original input validity. Accepted on day 45, it does not, and the difference has to be paid by someone.

Repeat programmes behave differently, and it is worth saying why. Where a reference runs every season with the same inputs, a longer agreement is possible because the inputs can be bought forward or covered by a standing arrangement with the mill. That is a different instrument from a spot quotation, and it should be written as one rather than as an extended validity on a spot figure.

Bottom line: Expect 30 days on a spot quotation for a 500-unit reference, because that is the span within which the 6-10 working day sampling allowance, the buyer's approval and the 35-50 day purchase-to-production sequence all still fit inside the upstream input validity.

Quotation Currency Compared: Where the Conversion Movement Lands

Currency choice is not a preference; it is an allocation of one specific risk. Every cross-border sale involves at least two currencies — the one the seller's costs are incurred in and the one the buyer's revenue is earned in — and the quotation currency decides which party holds the movement between them during the life of the order.

The mechanics are simple enough. If a quotation is issued in the buyer's currency, the seller carries the conversion movement from acceptance to settlement: costs are incurred in one currency, revenue arrives in another, and the difference is the seller's. If it is issued in the seller's operating currency, the buyer carries it and does the conversion at settlement. If it is issued in a third currency, both parties convert, and the cost of two conversions is usually higher than the cost of one.

The choice should follow the same logic as every other allocation in the contract: put the risk with the party best able to manage it. A buyer with a treasury function, a hedging policy and revenue in several currencies can carry conversion movement cheaply. A small brand with a single-market revenue stream generally cannot, and asking for the buyer's currency in that situation buys transparency at a price the buyer may not see until the rate moves.

Transparency is the real benefit of quoting in the buyer's currency. A figure in the buyer's own currency can be compared directly against a retail price, a margin model or a competing quotation without a conversion step, and that comparability is worth real money in a sourcing decision. The corresponding cost is that the seller builds a margin for the conversion risk into the figure, so the buyer pays for the transparency whether or not the rate moves.

Takeaway: Quote in the buyer's currency when the buyer needs a number that drops straight into a landed cost model, and quote in the seller's operating currency when the buyer can convert and would rather not pay for risk that may never materialise, since a third currency only adds a second conversion spread.

Writing an Exchange Clause Without Committing to Any Rate

An exchange clause fails in one of two ways. It either says nothing, in which case the first rate movement becomes an argument, or it commits to a number — a rate, a band, a formula — that one party spends the rest of the relationship trying to escape. What works is a clause that names the mechanism without fixing the outcome: the currency, the reference point, the trigger and the consequence.

Four elements do that job. Name the quotation currency and, separately, the settlement currency, because they are frequently different and conflating them causes more disputes than the rate itself. Name the reference point for any conversion — the date the order is accepted, the date the invoice is raised, or a published rate on a stated day — because without it each side will use whichever day suits. Name the trigger for re-pricing, as an event rather than a threshold. Name who bears the remittance and conversion charges, which on a 500-unit order are small but always contested.

What the clause should not do is promise a fixed rate for the life of a programme. Neither party can deliver that honestly across a 35-50 day production window plus transit, and a clause that pretends otherwise simply defers the argument. The defensible construction is a figure held for the validity window, with a stated mechanism for what happens when the window closes or when movement is material.

Two further items belong in the same clause. State the rounding convention, because a difference of a few units of currency per unit becomes a real number across 500 pieces. And state whether the price on the invoice is the price on the order or the price at settlement, which sounds pedantic until a rate moves between them.

Judgement: Write six elements — quotation currency, settlement currency, conversion reference point, re-pricing trigger, charge allocation and rounding — and commit to none of the numbers, because a clause that fixes a rate will be renegotiated while a clause that fixes a mechanism will not.

What Actually Triggers a Re-Quotation

Re-quotation is often received as a penalty, and it is not: it is a re-pricing against inputs that have changed. Separating the triggers makes it routine instead of confrontational, and there are five of them, only one of which is time.

Expiry is the first. When the validity window closes, the inputs behind the figure may no longer be available at the assumed prices, and the honest response is a new quotation rather than a silent adjustment. A buyer who knows this date in advance can place the order inside it and never see the mechanism at work.

Specification change is the second and the most common in practice. A different fabric, an extra shade, an additional logo placement or a hardware upgrade changes the cost structure outright, and no validity window covers it. Where a change is desirable but the budget is fixed, the useful conversation is about which element to give back, not about holding the original figure.

Quantity change is the third, and it cuts both ways. Setup content is fixed, so a smaller quantity spreads it across fewer units and a larger one spreads it across more; both directions can move the unit figure. This is the reason the minimum sits at 500 units and the reason an order placed at a different quantity is a different commercial proposition rather than the same one scaled.

Material substitution and shipping mode are the fourth and fifth. A substitute fabric requested because the original is unavailable carries its own price and should be quoted rather than absorbed. A switch from sea to air changes the freight leg, which on an FOB quotation is the buyer's own cost and sits outside the goods figure entirely.

One discipline makes all five painless: date every quotation, state the validity on its face, and record the specification revision it was built against. Three fields on a document, and every re-quotation afterwards becomes a factual question instead of a commercial one.

Spec rule: Require every quotation to carry its issue date, its validity period and the specification revision number on the same page, because a figure that cannot be tied to a revision cannot be defended when a change is requested.

How Currency Terms Meet Freight, Duty and the FOB Xiamen Baseline

The relationship between currency terms and the delivery term is closer than it looks, and FOB Xiamen makes it cleaner. Under FOB the seller's figure covers the goods to the point of loading, in the quotation currency. Freight is contracted by the buyer, usually with a forwarder who invoices in a currency of the forwarder's choosing. Duty and taxes are assessed by the destination authority in the destination currency at entry. Three legs, three possible currencies, and a currency clause on the goods figure governs only the first.

That separation is useful. It means a buyer can hold the goods figure in one currency for comparability and settle freight in another without disturbing the sourcing decision, and it means an exchange clause cannot be stretched to cover a freight increase. It also means a landed-cost model has to convert three figures rather than one, which is where most first-order budgets go wrong.

Timing matters as much as currency. Freight invoices typically arrive after the goods figure has been paid, and duty is assessed after arrival, which on a sea transit of 25-35 days can be two months or more after the order was placed. A buyer whose model uses a single conversion date for all three legs is modelling something that cannot happen.

Volume interacts with it too. A 20GP at roughly 28 CBM and a 40HQ at roughly 68 CBM produce freight figures in the hundreds or low thousands per container, against a goods figure that is larger by an order of magnitude on a 500-unit reference. That is why currency movement on the goods leg dominates the model, and why the freight leg is usually left to be settled at the rate prevailing when it is invoiced.

This is the point at which a buyer should decide deliberately whether to seek a single-currency landed price. It is available in principle and it is always more expensive, because it requires the party quoting it to price movement on three legs across two months rather than on one leg across thirty days.

Modelling note: Convert the goods figure, the freight invoice and the duty assessment at the dates each one arises rather than at a single modelling date, because on an FOB Xiamen order those three events can be 60 days apart and a single rate will misstate the landed cost.

How to Choose a Validity Structure for a Repeat Programme

A spot quotation and a programme price are different instruments and should be written as such. A spot figure answers "what does this cost if I order it now"; a programme price answers "what does this cost across the next few releases". Buyers who ask for the second while being quoted the first end up with a figure that is either renegotiated every release or quietly padded to survive one.

Three structures cover most programmes. A spot quotation per release, valid 30 days, suits buyers whose volumes and specifications vary by season. A framework price, reviewed at stated intervals against a named input, suits buyers with a stable specification and predictable volumes. A price held for a stated number of releases, with inputs bought forward, suits a promotional programme with a fixed sell price.

The second is the one most often wanted and least often written well, because the review mechanism is where it succeeds or fails. A review tied to a named input — a fabric price, an alloy price — with a stated frequency and a stated consequence is workable. A review described as "by mutual agreement" is a renegotiation with a delay.

Programme work is coordinated through a vetted partner facility of 4,950 m² holding 149 machines across 7 production lines, with 137 people and monthly output of 200,000 units; the founding team's bag production work reaches back to 2004, and the entity dates from 2014. A reference starts at 500 units, the confirmation sample is turned round in 6-10 working days, 12-15 where the specification is intricate, and production then runs 35-50 days. Inspection is drawn at AQL 2.5 to ISO 2859-1, set at Critical 0, 2.5 and 4.0 for critical, major and minor defects respectively. See the product range for the constructions these gates apply to, and the enquiry desk for how a quotation is issued against a specification.

Whichever structure is chosen, the same three fields belong on it: the currency, the period, and what happens at the end of the period. A programme price without the third field is a spot quotation wearing a longer date.

Selection rule: Choose a spot quotation valid 30 days where the specification changes by season, choose a framework price with a named input review where the specification is stable, and buy inputs forward only where a promotional sell price is fixed, because that is the only case where the cost of covering movement is justified.

What to Put in Writing Before the Quotation Expires

The practical failure mode in this area is not disagreement about the price; it is the absence of a record. Four documents, each short, remove almost all of it. A dated quotation stating the currency, the period and the specification revision. An order acknowledgement that repeats all three. A currency clause that names the mechanism rather than a rate. And a change log that records any revision with its date and its cost consequence.

The order acknowledgement is the one most often skipped and the one that does the most work. A buyer who places an order by email against a quotation and receives a one-line confirmation has no record of which revision was ordered. When the specification has moved twice during sampling — which it usually has — the acknowledgement is the only place that settles it.

Currency deserves one further line: state whether the figure on the invoice is the figure on the order or the figure at settlement. On a stable-rate order this is invisible. On an order placed across a rate movement it is the difference between a short payment and a clean close, and it costs one sentence to resolve in advance.

Reference material on trade, customs valuation and the documentation that accompanies cross-border sales is published by the WTO, and export documentation guidance is published at trade.gov. Neither substitutes for advice from the buyer's own adviser on a specific contract.

This is general trade information, not legal or financial advice. Terms must be confirmed in the written contract, and any currency or validity clause should be reviewed by the buyer's own legal adviser before it is signed. Figures on this site are indicative only, stated FOB Xiamen on a 500-unit reference.

Practical check: Hold four records — dated quotation, matching acknowledgement, mechanism-based currency clause and a change log — because every price dispute that reaches a lawyer started as one of those four documents being missing.