Editorial policy

Who is responsible

Charlie Simmon is the founder and editor of First Stop China. Charlie sets the editorial direction, reviews the published pages and answers corrections. There is no anonymous content team and no outsourced sales desk: the same person is accountable for what the site says.

What we check, and against what

Pages are written for a first-time visitor with no Mandarin, no Chinese bank account and no local phone number. Anything that can change — visas, entry and transit, payment limits, rail booking windows, attraction ticketing — is checked against the authority or operator behind it, and the page links that source next to the claim.

• Visa and entry: National Immigration Administration and the relevant Chinese embassy.
• Rail: China Railway's 12306.
• Payments: Alipay and WeChat Pay international-card documentation.
• Attractions: the attraction's own ticketing channel, not a reseller.

Each page shows a review date. If a page disagrees with the official source, the official source wins; send us the link and we will update the page and its date.

How AI is used

AI tools help with drafting, translation, code and routine editing. A human editor reviews every published page; policy and price claims are checked against the linked official source before publication. AI is not listed as an author and is not used to invent a source, a price or a first-hand experience.

If an AI-assisted passage is wrong, it is still our error. Tell us and we will correct it rather than defending the draft.

Corrections

Email [email protected] with the page URL, the official source and the date you checked it. Substantive corrections update the page and its review date. We do not quietly change a claim and leave the old date in place.

Independence and funding

We do not sell tours, tickets or hotels, and we do not rank a hotel or attraction by commission. The tools and guides are free. The site is funded by the optional trip-planning service: a reader can ask for help with dates and cities, a human replies within one working day, and nothing is charged for that reply.

Contact

Editorial questions and corrections: [email protected]. For a trip plan, use the planner.