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thegenius1
22nd November 2012, 06:25 PM
I think I've seen it referenced here before about possibly knowing how to obtain a Japanese Bank account fairly easy. Has anyone had any success or have any suggestion trying to obtain this ?

I have found some techniques and tips but it seems like I'm going to need to fly to Japan to complete this task.

I'll Share what i have found thus far.


If you will be in Japan on a tourist visa for an extended period of time, it is indeed possible, at least with some banks; I did it last year.

I used e-Bank (now Rakuten Bank), which has no physical branches, but lets you use ATMs at the post office and 7-Eleven. You also get a Visa debit card. As a warning, they have no English website, and no English-speaking staff that I'm aware of, so you'll need to be able to read/write Japanese to open the account.

For Rakuten Bank, you will first need to get a 外国人登録証明書 (the "gaijin card" -- it is possible to do on a tourist visa if you push the issue and have a non-hotel address to give them). Then, after you get your card, you can go to the ward office and get a 外国人登録原票記載事証明書 (it's a piece of paper that confirms your status as a properly registered foreigner), which you can then send to the bank.

In a week or so, they'll mail you your debit card; it works fine outside Japan for both ATMs and Visa transactions, as well. The hardest part for me to figure out was how to get money into the account from outside the country -- they don't accept incoming wire transfers, and US banks don't like furikomi. I finally figured out that I could use a Japanese PayPal account to funnel the money through...

In any case, there's more info here on what they require from foreigners here:
http://www.rakuten-bank.co.jp/accoun...#account-id-06