Is this Korean company legitimate? Five checks in ten minutes

Someone has emailed you an offer, or you found a supplier online, and you want to know whether they are real before you invest any more time. This is the fast version: five checks, ordered so the ones that catch the most problems for the least effort come first.

None of this requires Korean, a paid service, or a lawyer. If a company fails any of the first three, stop — you do not need the rest.

Check 1 — Does the registration number exist and is it trading?

Ask for the ten-digit 사업자등록번호, or take it from the business registration certificate if they sent one, and check its status. You are looking for an actively trading business.

A number that returns nothing is the strongest signal you will get. It means no such registration exists — not that the company is small or new. A number that returns 폐업 means the business is closed, whatever its website says.

Check 2 — Does the name on the record match the name on the invoice?

The status lookup returns the registered business. Compare it with what is on the documents you were sent. Watch for the case where the number is real and belongs to a genuine company — but a different company from the one writing to you. Someone copying a legitimate number into their own paperwork is the most common pattern in Korean supplier fraud, and it survives a careless check precisely because the number is valid.

Expect the legal name to be in Hangul and to differ from the English trading name. That alone is normal. What is not normal is a legal name that belongs to an unrelated business in an unrelated industry.

Check 3 — Does the bank account belong to the same entity?

This is where money is actually lost. The account name must match the registered business name. If you are asked to pay an individual’s personal account, a differently-named company, or an account in a third country, stop and resolve it before transferring anything.

There are legitimate reasons for some of these — a sole trader banking personally is normal, for instance. The point is to make it an explicit conversation rather than an assumption. The guide on personal accounts covers which situations are ordinary and which are not.

Check 4 — Can they issue a proper tax invoice?

A supplier’s VAT category determines whether it can issue a 세금계산서, and that category comes back with the status lookup. A company presenting itself as a substantial manufacturer while registered in a category that cannot issue tax invoices is describing itself as something it is not.

This check is quietly powerful because it is hard to fake and easy to run — it is part of the same lookup. The guide to VAT categories explains what each one implies about size and formality.

Check 5 — Does the company do what it says it does?

Every Korean registration carries an industry classification, the 업태 and 종목. A company registered purely as a wholesaler is not a factory, whatever the photographs on its website show. That distinction changes your price, your lead time and who is accountable when a batch is wrong.

See factory or trading company for how to read this, and if you are sourcing cosmetics, a manufacturer will also appear in the MFDS GMP compliance list while a reseller will not.

What a clean pass does and does not mean

Passing all five means the company exists, is trading, is who it says it is on paper, and is registered to do roughly what it claims. That rules out most of the ways buyers lose money outright.

It does not mean the company is financially sound, will meet your deadline, or will make your product well. Those are questions about capacity and solvency — start with its filed financials and with references from buyers in your own market.

For the longer, more careful sequence before a large first order, see verifying a Korean supplier. For the full map of which registry holds what, see how to verify a Korean company.