The questions we hear most — about getting started, finding suppliers, samples, payment protection, shipping, customs, fees and everything in between. If yours is not on the list, an Afrikoni trade specialist answers directly.
What is Afrikoni? Afrikoni is an AI-native platform for African B2B trade - the whole trade, not just a place to find a supplier. It sources and ranks suppliers, drafts your request, prices the landed cost, prepares the documents, protects the payment and follows the shipment. You describe what you need in your own language; the money only reaches the supplier once you confirm what you ordered arrived. What does "AI-native" actually mean here? That the AI does the work, not just answers questions about it. Describe a brief and it finds and ranks real suppliers. Photograph a product and it writes the listing. Open a quote and it computes landed cost and duty for your corridor. Upload a document and it reads it and flags what is missing. Write to a supplier and it translates both ways. Every surface has it built in - it is not a chatbot bolted onto a directory. What are you building, ultimately? A trade system where a buyer anywhere can describe a need in plain language and have the whole trade run itself - sourcing, verification, pricing, compliance, payment and freight - across every African corridor. Today the sourcing, matching, pricing, documents and messaging are live and the payment rails are finishing during private beta, with our trade team closing each deal by hand in the meantime. We would rather tell you exactly where that line is than pretend it is not there. Is Afrikoni just another marketplace? No. A marketplace ends at the listing. Afrikoni carries the trade itself - quotes, documents, payment protection, shipping and dispute resolution - so nothing important happens in a private chat we cannot help you with. Who is Afrikoni for? Businesses buying from Africa - importers, distributors, brands and diaspora entrepreneurs - and African suppliers who want to sell across borders without chasing payment. Which countries do you cover? Afrikoni is built for all 54 African countries. Coverage deepens by demand as suppliers onboard, so some corridors are richer than others today - ask us about yours and we will tell you the truth about it. Do I need an account to browse? No. You can browse the marketplace, open any product page and read supplier profiles without signing up. You need an account to request quotes, message suppliers or place an order. How do I create an account? Sign up with your phone number or email, tell us whether you are buying, selling or both, and add your company. You can start requesting quotes straight away. Can I buy and sell on the same account? Yes. Many members do both. Add the second role in your dashboard settings at any time - you do not need a second account. What does it cost to join? Nothing. There is no subscription, no listing fee and no monthly charge. Afrikoni only earns when a trade completes. What does a first trade actually look like? Post what you need, receive quotes from matched suppliers, compare them side by side, accept one, pay into protected payment, track the shipment, then confirm delivery to release the money. Can a human help me through the first one? Yes. Ask for sourcing assistance and a specialist takes your brief, shortlists suppliers and stays with the trade until it lands.
How do I find the right supplier? Search or browse by product, country and category, then filter by what matters to you - certification, order size, response speed. Every supplier card shows what we can actually prove about that company. How do I get quotes from several suppliers at once? Post a request describing the product, quantity, destination and deadline. Matched suppliers reply with quotes you can compare on one screen. What does "verified" mean on Afrikoni? It means the company passed a business identity check - registration documents reviewed and matched to the company behind the listing. Suppliers we onboarded personally are labelled as founder-curated, which is a different and weaker claim, and we never blur the two. Who checks the suppliers? Our team. Business registration, contactability and product claims are reviewed before a supplier can trade, and the badge on the profile tells you which checks were passed. Should I avoid a supplier without a badge? Not necessarily - it means the checks are not complete yet, not that the company is bad. Payment protection covers you either way; the badge tells you how much homework has already been done. Can I contact a supplier directly? You message them through Afrikoni. That keeps the whole trade - terms, files, promises - in one thread you can point to if anything goes wrong. Why are there no phone numbers on listings? Because a deal that leaves the platform leaves its protection behind. Once the trade is agreed, we introduce the parties properly and everything stays recorded. How quickly do suppliers respond? Most active suppliers reply within a working day. Supplier profiles show a real 30-day reply rate where we have enough messages to measure one honestly. What if I cannot find what I need? Use "Source it for me". Describe the product and our team goes out to find suppliers who are not yet listed, then brings you verified options. Can I bring a supplier I already work with? Yes. Invite them, and once they are onboarded you can run your existing relationship through Afrikoni for the payment protection, documents and records.
What information does a product page show? Specification, packaging, minimum order, lead time, price tiers, origin and the customs classification code - everything you need to compare offers and estimate duty. Why does every product show a customs code? Because that code decides your import duty. Showing it up front means you can price the landed cost before you commit, instead of discovering it at the border. Can I order a sample first? Yes, and we recommend it for a first trade. Request a sample from the product page; the supplier quotes the sample and its shipping separately. Who pays for samples? The buyer normally pays for the sample and its courier cost. Some suppliers credit it back against a first full order - ask before you pay. What is the smallest order I can place? It depends on the product; each listing shows its minimum. Protected trades start at {{min_order}}, because below that the protection costs more than it is worth. Can I have goods inspected before they ship? Yes. Book an inspection and an independent inspector checks the goods against your specification before the shipment leaves. What if the goods are not what I ordered? Do not confirm delivery. Open a dispute with photos and your specification, and the money stays protected while we resolve it. Can suppliers provide certificates? Many can - organic, fair trade, phytosanitary, certificate of origin and lab analysis are the common ones. Ask for the certificate in the quote so it becomes part of the agreed terms. Can I order custom specification or private label? Often yes. Put the specification, artwork and packaging in your request so quotes come back priced for the real job rather than the catalogue version. Are catalogue prices final? They are a guide. The quote is the price - it accounts for your quantity, packaging, delivery terms and the current cost of the goods.
How can I pay? Card, bank transfer, and local settlement rails where they are live in your corridor. The available options are shown at checkout for your country. What is protected payment? Your money is held by our licensed payment provider instead of going straight to the supplier. It is released when you confirm the goods arrived as agreed. Does Afrikoni hold my money? No. Afrikoni never takes custody of your funds. They sit with a licensed payment provider, and Afrikoni only instructs the release once the conditions of the trade are met. When is the supplier paid? When you confirm delivery, or when the protection window closes without a dispute. A supplier cannot pull the money forward. Can I pay a deposit and the balance later? Yes on many trades - a deposit to start production and the balance before shipment. Both parts stay under the same protection. How do I get my money back? If the trade fails or a dispute is decided in your favour, the funds are refunded to the method you paid with. Nothing has to be recovered from the supplier. How do disputes work? Open a dispute from the order, upload your evidence, and both sides state their case. Afrikoni resolves every dispute within 14 days. What happens on a large disputed order? High-value cases do not auto-resolve. Above the large-settlement ceiling a dispute goes to manual review by the Afrikoni team before any money moves. Afrikoni does not inspect the goods itself - the inspection that carries weight is the independent pre-shipment inspection you commission (roughly $150-$300 from SGS, Bureau Veritas, Intertek or Cotecna). What if I raise a chargeback with my card issuer? The card network has jurisdiction and its decision stands - we pause our own clocks so you are never refunded twice or judged twice for the same order. A supplier asked me to pay them directly. What do I do? Refuse, and report it. A payment made outside Afrikoni has no protection, and asking for one is grounds for removal from the platform.
Who arranges the shipping? Either the supplier quotes delivered, or our freight desk arranges it. The quote states which, so nobody assumes the other side booked the vessel. What shipping methods are available? Air for small and urgent, sea for volume, and road for regional African corridors. The right one depends on weight, value and how fast you need it. Can I get a freight quote before I commit? Yes. Ask the freight desk with the product, weight, volume and destination, and you get a rate before you accept the supplier quote. What delivery terms do you support? The full set of Incoterms 2020 rules. The one you pick decides who books freight, who clears customs and who pays import duty - so it is agreed in the quote, not afterwards. Can I see the total landed cost? Use the landed-cost calculator: goods, freight, insurance, duty and fees in one number, so you can compare an African supplier against your current one honestly. How do I track a shipment? The order page carries the milestones - booked, collected, departed, arrived, cleared, delivered - and notifies you on each one. Is the cargo insured? Cargo insurance is arranged per shipment, not assumed. Ask for it in the quote for anything valuable or fragile. What if the shipment is late? Your payment stays protected. Late beyond the agreed terms is grounds for a dispute, and the clock does not run out while goods are in transit. What if goods arrive damaged? Photograph everything before unpacking further, do not confirm delivery, and open a dispute the same day. Evidence taken at the door decides these cases. Do you mark up freight? When our freight desk books the shipment, the rate you see includes a small handling margin, applied identically everywhere. Nothing is added after you accept a rate.
Who pays the import duty? The importer of record, which the agreed delivery term decides. If you buy on terms where the supplier delivers duty paid, they carry it; otherwise you do. Does AfCFTA reduce my duty? For trade between African countries it can, when the goods meet the rules of origin and the paperwork proves it. We check eligibility per shipment rather than promising it. What about AGOA for imports into the US? AGOA preferences run on a legislated timetable and eligibility changes by country and product, so we check the current position for your corridor instead of quoting last year's. Can you help with EU deforestation rules? Yes for the products it covers - cocoa, coffee, palm, rubber, timber, cattle and soy. Origin evidence is collected from the supplier as part of the trade, not chased afterwards. What documents come with a shipment? Commercial invoice, packing list, transport document and certificate of origin as standard, plus whatever your product needs - health, phytosanitary or lab certificates. Can you check my documents before I ship? Yes. Document check reviews the pack for the errors that hold shipments at the border - mismatched quantities, wrong classification codes, missing signatures. Do you issue official documents? No. Certificates of origin, phytosanitary and health certificates are issued by the competent authority in the exporting country. We prepare, check and chase them - we never produce them ourselves. I do not know my product's customs code. Can you help? Yes. Describe the product and we classify it against the Harmonized System, then show the duty that code attracts in your destination. Are some products not allowed? Yes. Weapons, wildlife, counterfeits, narcotics and anything sanctioned are refused, and listings are screened automatically before they go live. What about import VAT? Import VAT is charged by your own tax authority on the landed value and is usually reclaimable if you are registered. It is shown separately in the landed-cost breakdown.
What does the AI actually do here? It does things, rather than answering questions about them. On a brief it finds and ranks real suppliers and drafts your request. On a photo of a product it writes the listing and its specification. On a quote it computes landed cost, duty and the rules of origin for your corridor. On a document it reads the file and flags what is missing or inconsistent. On a message it translates both directions. On a negotiation it prepares and counters offers inside limits you set. Every one of those is a surface you can point at, not a promise. Where is the AI in the product? In the search box, on every product page, in your inbox, on the quote comparison, in the document pack and in the seller dashboard. There is one assistant across all of them and it carries the context of the trade you are in - you never re-explain yourself to a new window. Can my own AI agent use Afrikoni? Yes. Afrikoni is callable by external agents through a published manifest and an MCP server, so your assistant can search suppliers, read a product and check a regulation directly. Anything that commits you - creating a buying request, moving money - stops for a human to approve. No agent trades on your behalf unattended. Can I just describe what I need in plain language? Yes - that is the front door. Type or speak what you are looking for and you get suppliers, prices and a next step rather than a page of search results. Can I trust what the AI tells me? Every supplier, product and price it shows is a real row from the platform - answers that cannot be grounded in real data are withheld rather than invented. Does it work in my language? Afrikoni runs in 28 languages, including French, Portuguese, Arabic, Swahili, Hausa, Yoruba and Amharic. Ask in yours. Does the AI negotiate for me? It can prepare and counter offers within limits you set, and every commitment still waits for your approval. Nothing is agreed on your behalf without you. Can it prepare my trade documents? It drafts the pack from the trade data and flags what is missing or inconsistent. A human reviews anything that leaves the platform. Can it warn me about changes in my corridor? Yes. Duty changes, regime deadlines and settlement corridor updates are tracked, and you are told when one affects a trade you have open. Is my data used to train models? No. Your trade data is not sold and is not used to train models. Can I get a person instead? Always. Every AI conversation can be handed to a trade specialist, and nothing about your trade is locked inside the chat. What if the AI gets something wrong? Tell us in the conversation. Answers are checked against outcomes and corrections feed back into the system - an unreported wrong answer is the only expensive one.
How do I start selling? Create a supplier account, add your company, and list your products with real photos, specification and price tiers. You can receive buyer requests as soon as your profile is complete. What does it cost a supplier? Nothing. No subscription, no listing fee, and {{seller_pct}} of the platform fee - the fee sits with the buyer. How do I get verified? Upload your business registration and the certificates you hold. Verification is normally reviewed within a few working days, and the badge on your profile reflects exactly which checks passed. How and when do I get paid? Payment is confirmed and protected before you ship, and released to your account once the buyer confirms delivery. You never ship against a promise. How do I win buyer requests? Answer fast, quote the exact specification asked for, and state your lead time honestly. Reply speed and completeness decide most of these. Why do I have to state a lead time? Because buyers compare on it. A lead time in days makes your quote comparable and stops the arguments that start when "soon" means different things. What can get my listing rejected? Stock photos that are not your goods, prices that do not match the specification, contact details in the description, and prohibited products. Can my team have their own logins? Yes. Invite colleagues to your company account with their own access rather than sharing one password. I have no website or export experience. Can I still sell? Yes. Your Afrikoni profile is your export shopfront, and payment, documents and shipping are carried by the platform. What protects me from a buyer who refuses to pay? The money is protected before you ship, so the question is never whether the buyer has it. If they dispute unfairly, you present evidence and we decide within 14 days.
What does Afrikoni charge? A single success fee of {{pct}} on a completed trade, paid by the buyer. Nothing is charged if the trade does not complete. Does the rate ever come down? Yes. Reorder from a supplier you have already traded with and the rate drops to {{shield_pct}} - the Afrikoni Shield. What lowers your rate is coming back, not ordering more. Do suppliers pay a commission? No. The supplier pays {{seller_pct}} of the platform fee. Is there a minimum fee? Yes, {{min_fee}} per protected trade, and the smallest order we protect is {{min_order}}. Is there a currency charge? Cross-border legs carry a currency charge of {{fx_pct}}, shown as its own line rather than hidden in the exchange rate. How are services priced? Service trades use their own scale - {{services_range}} - because a service has no freight, no duty and a different risk shape from goods. Is there a subscription? No. No monthly plan, no seats, no listing fees. Afrikoni earns when your trade completes and not before. What does the fee include? Supplier verification, payment protection, document checking, the trade record and dispute resolution. Freight and inspection are quoted separately because they are real third-party costs. Are there hidden fees? No. The fee, the currency charge and any freight are itemised before you pay, and the total you approve is the total you are charged. Do I get an invoice? Yes, for every completed trade, with the fee shown as its own line for your accounts.
Is Afrikoni GDPR compliant? Yes. Afrikoni operates from Belgium under EU data protection law, with a published privacy policy and a current list of subprocessors. Where is my data stored? In the EU, on managed infrastructure with encryption in transit and at rest. Who owns my data? You do. It is exportable at any time, never sold, and never used to train models. Do you store my card details? No. Card details go directly to our PCI-compliant payment provider and never touch Afrikoni's systems. Can I add two-factor authentication? Yes, and it is required for anyone with access to money-moving actions on a company account. Who can see my trades? Only the two companies in the trade and the Afrikoni staff handling it. Buyers never see each other's requests, and suppliers never see competing quotes. Is there a record of what happened? Yes. Every step of a trade is written to an append-only record, so what was agreed and when is never a matter of memory. How do you handle fraud? Listings are screened before they go live, suspicious accounts are held, and payment stays protected. Fraud reports are actioned and can end in permanent removal. Can I delete my account? Yes. Ask and we close it, keeping only the records that trade and tax law require us to keep. What happens if Afrikoni is unavailable? Money in protection is with the licensed payment provider, not with us, and every trade record is backed up. An outage delays a screen, not your funds.