TsukuBlog » Banking http://blog.alientimes.org A Local Perspective on Life in Tsukuba, Ibaraki, Japan. Sat, 11 Feb 2012 10:12:08 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1.2 Accessing Your Money During Golden Week http://blog.alientimes.org/2010/05/accessing-your-money-during-golden-week/ http://blog.alientimes.org/2010/05/accessing-your-money-during-golden-week/#comments Sat, 01 May 2010 00:50:37 +0000 Shaney http://blog.alientimes.org/?p=7514 Joyo Bank branches are basically closed from May 1 to May 5. Most ATMs will be in operation, but many of them will be operating under "holiday" hours, so they may close early. Holiday service fees will also apply. Also, sometimes it will be impossible to get money out of bank machines from banks other than Joyo (this will probably only be an issue if you travel out of Ibaraki). When in doubt, try the ATMs at 7-11s as they tend to be open the longest (usually 8:00am to 9:00pm). You can also use your Joyo card in postal ATMs (but only from about 9am to 5pm), which can help if you are travelling.

Here is a link to the information (in Japanese) about accessing your money at Joyo Bank branches/ATMs during Golden Week.
http://www.joyobank.co.jp/top/atm_gw.html

If you think you are going to need extra money during the holidays, plan ahead carefully!

]]> http://blog.alientimes.org/2010/05/accessing-your-money-during-golden-week/feed/ 0 Closed for the Holidays http://blog.alientimes.org/2008/12/closed-for-the-holidays/ http://blog.alientimes.org/2008/12/closed-for-the-holidays/#comments Sun, 28 Dec 2008 10:54:50 +0000 Shaney http://blog.alientimes.org/?p=2562 For those of you who are spending your first new year's in Tsukuba, please note that MANY businesses and services are closed during this holiday.

The most important things to remember are (1) to withdraw some money before the banks and ATMs close and (2) to make sure you take your garbage out before the trucks stop coming!

Garbage

The last day of garbage collection is tomorrow (Monday, December 29). The next garbage day will be Saturday, January 3 and burnable garbage will be collected on that day in all parts of Tsukuba. The Clean Center is also closed from December 30 to January 2 so if tomorrow is not a burnable garbage day in your area and you cannot take your garbage to the Clean Center, you have to keep it until January 3.
Source: http://www.city.tsukuba.ibaraki.jp/266/003391.html

Joyo Bank

Every bank is different, so I will just mention the situation for Joyo. The banks will be operating pretty much as normal on Monday (29) and Tuesday (30). They will then be closed from the 31 to the 4th and open up again on the 5th.

ATMs will have limited or no service between December 30 and January 4. All ATMs will be closed on January 1. This includes accessing your Joyo account through an ATM at 7-11. Some ATMs will be in operation on the other dates, but not all, and the ones that are in operation will mostly be on "holiday" hours. Regular ATM service will resume on Monday, January 5.

Online banking will be completely unavailable on January 1 and will have limited availability on December 31, and January 2 to 4th. All online transactions that occur after December 30 will not be processed until January 5. (So if you want to send money to someone by online furikomi and you want it to arrive before January 5, you will have to send it on December 30 at the latest.)
Sources: http://www.joyobank.co.jp/top/20081217.html and http://www.joyobank.co.jp/access-j/info.html

Postal Banking

Postal banking will be available as usual on Monday (29) and Tuesday (30). Teller services will not be available between December 31 and January 4. Regular teller services will resume on January 5.

Postal ATMs will be available as usual on Monday (29) and Tuesday (30) and they will close early (between 5pm and 8pm) on Wednesday (31). ATMs will not be available between January 1 and 3. They will open again between 7am and 9am on January 4. They will operate as usual on January 5.

Online banking will not be available from 11:50pm on December 31 to 6:30am on January 4.
Source: http://www.jp-bank.japanpost.jp/news/2008/news_id000345.html

City Hall

Tsukuba City Hall is closed from December 27 to January 4. The Sakura Branch office will be open on Sunday January 4 for limited services relating to issuing certificates such as inkan certificates or certificates of registered matters for foreigners. All branches will resume normal operations on January 5.
Source: http://www.city.tsukuba.ibaraki.jp/266/003391.html

Library

Tsukuba Public Library is closed from December 28 to January 5.
Source: http://www.city.tsukuba.ibaraki.jp/266/003391.html

Community Centers

All community centers (公民館, kominkan) will be closed from December 29 to January 3.
Source: http://www.city.tsukuba.ibaraki.jp/266/003391.html

Children's Centers

All children's centers (児童館, jidokan) will be closed from December 27 to January 4.
Source: http://www.city.tsukuba.ibaraki.jp/266/003391.html

Tsukuba Express

The trains will continue to run throughout the holidays, but will be on "holiday" schedules from December 30 to January 4.

Some extra trains have been scheduled on December 31. The last train that will reach Tsukuba on the night of December 31 will leave at 12:40am from Akihabara and arrive in Tsukuba at 1:37am. It will stop at every station. (Three trains will leave after that time, but they will all terminate at Moriya and will not come to Tsukuba.)

The last train to leave Tsukuba will be at 11:47pm and it will arrive in Akihabara at 12:45am, stopping at every station.

Source: https://www.mir.co.jp/uploads/20081211092155.pdf

TsukuBus

TsukuBus will run as usual.
Source: http://www.city.tsukuba.ibaraki.jp/266/003391.html

Emergency Services

Call an ambulance (119) if there is an emergency where time is of the essence. In case you ever need to call an ambulance, you should memorize how to say your address in Japanese, and keep a copy of your address in romaji posted near the phone or on the refrigerator so others can call from your house.

Call 029-241-4199 to find out where to bring a sick person whose condition is not in need of urgent attention.

There is also a hotline to call for advice about whether your sick child needs immediate medical care or not: 029-254-9900 (or #8000 from a regular phone or cellphone).

In all cases, you will most likely have to speak Japanese.

The following hospitals will have some services available on the following days (but it is probably better to call 029-241-4199 to find out where to bring a person first).

December 30: Tsukuba Kinen Hospital
January 1: Tsukuba Soai Hospital
January 2: Tsukuba Gakuen Hospital, Tsukuba Kinen Hospital
January 3: Tsukuba Chuo Hospital
January 4: Tsukuba Soai Hospital

Source: http://www.city.tsukuba.ibaraki.jp/266/003391.html

I hope you have a very happy holiday! (Just don't forget to get some money out before the banks close!!!)

]]> http://blog.alientimes.org/2008/12/closed-for-the-holidays/feed/ 0 Days with Fives and Zeros http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/03/days-with-fives-and-zeros/ http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/03/days-with-fives-and-zeros/#comments Mon, 05 Mar 2007 12:09:00 +0000 Shaney http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/03/days-with-fives-and-zeros/ I figure that unless I am being held hostage as part of a bank heist, I should never have to spend more than 15 minutes in a bank. However, today, despite the noticeable lack of masked hoodlums in my local branch, I spent over one hour trying to get my bankbooks updated.

When I complained about this to one of my colleagues, she said:

五十日だからじゃない？
ごとおび　だから　じゃない？
gotoobi dakara ja nai
It's probably because today is a day that has a five or a zero in it.

To which I said, "huh?".

It seems that the days that end in zeros and fives (5th, 10th, 15th, 20th, 25th, 30th) tend to make for good deadlines for a variety of things, and payments in particular. This means that banks and, since people need to get to banks, roads tend to be busier on these days than the other days, and the earlier in the month they are, the more likely they are to be busy. The rather efficient way to refer to these days in Japanese is 五十日, or literally 5&10 days (五=5, 十=10, 日=day).

So, I learned this lesson a bit late this time, but I will remember it the next time I need to update my bankbooks. From now on, I am only going to do things on days that include sevens. (Sevens are lucky, right?)

1 Comments

  • At April 10, 2007, Laura H... wrote:

    Ah, Shaney, you're hilarious AND informative! A fantastic combination!! :D It's actually great to know this. Now I can avoid those hour plus standoffs, too... ;)

    Laura H...

]]> http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/03/days-with-fives-and-zeros/feed/ 1 Getting a Japanese Credit Card http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/03/getting-a-japanese-credit-card/ http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/03/getting-a-japanese-credit-card/#comments Thu, 29 Mar 2007 22:44:48 +0000 Shaney http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/03/getting-a-japanese-credit-card/ Getting a credit card in Japan can be a tricky proposition. If you have just arrived from another country and have only just opened your bank account, it can be almost impossible.

If you are a student, you may be able to get a "student credit card" (available at Joyo, at least in 2002 when I applied). Student cards typically have low limits (about 100,000 yen to start off with) and sometimes have annual fees waived for the first couple of years. If you are a good little creditor, your limit will gradually go up.

If you are not a student, your next best bet is to try to get a card from a bank where you have an account. It will probably help your application if you have your salary deposited directly into an account -- and probably even better if that salary comes from a large organization like a research institute. You might want to wait a few months before applying so that you can show the bank that you have a regular income.

If your bank won't give you a credit card, you can try to open a banking account at the post office and then apply for a postal credit card. Postal banking accounts have the additional benefit of being accessible from some ATMs overseas, so it might be a good idea to open one anyway.

If you get no love from your bank or the post office, your next option is to try department stores or grocery stores. In Tsukuba, you can apply for cards from Seibu or Kasumi for example. I have heard some people say Seibu cards are easier to get than bank or post office credit cards, but I don't have any personal experience in this matter. I do know of at least one person who was rejected by Kasumi despite having credit cards in good standing with both the bank and the post office.

If you are fairly certain that your application will be approved (if, for example, you have lived here for a long time, better yet, you have lived at the same address in Japan for a long time, and you have a regular salary), you might want to do some research into which cards offer the best benefits in terms of points or other kinds of perqs.

New credit cards are popping up all the time, so it is hard to stay on top of all of your options. However, you can get some idea of what to look for by reading the following two articles:

(1) Credit Cards in Japan: Cracking the Code from the Frugal Japan website

(2) Credit Cards category on the Frugal Japan wiki

Payment Options

There are a number of different ways to pay off your balance.

1. Pay in full each month.

2. Pay a certain set amount each month and carry the rest of the balance forward. (This is called "revolving payment" [リボ払い = ribo barai]). You can set your monthly amount at 50,000 yen, for example, and you will only ever be charged that much (plus interest, I think) per month, no matter how much you put on your card that month. Of course, you will have to pay a lot of interest on the balance that is carried over, so it is not a good idea to go over your set amount very often. However, this can be a good way to do it if you have a limited monthly budget and your expenses fluctuate a lot from month to month. It can also be good as a temporary measure to get yourself through a rough period when you know that you will be in better financial shape in a few months' time.

3. You can also transfer money from your bank account into the credit card account if you want to pay off the remainder of your revolving balance.

At the point of sale, they may ask you how many payments you want to split it into (this is called split payment [分割払い=bunkatsu barai]). Sometimes your credit card will allow this and sometimes it won't. This means that the store may offer it, but your specific credit card may not. In some cases, the store won't allow it. The number of payments you can split the purchase into also depends on the store and the card. The standard is two payments, but sometimes you will get other options. If you decide to pay it in two, you will be charged half this month and half the next, but the way that you pay your credit card balance will not change. If you use a regular card, you will have to pay off half this month and half the next. If you use a revolving card, half will be applied to this month's amount and half will be applied to next month's amount, but you will still only pay the amount that you set per month.

When you get a Joyo credit card, you will be asked if you want a revolving account. If you do, you will get two cards in the mail, a regular one and a revolving one. Use the regular one when you want to pay off the full amount the following month and use the revolving one when only want to pay a certain set amount per month. Of course, if you use both in one month, you will have to pay both the set amount for purchases that were made with the revolving card and the total amount for purchases that were made with the regular card.

Using a Credit Card in Tsukuba

It is possible to use your credit card for many purchases in Tsukuba, but you may have to do a bit of detective work to figure out which companies accept them (some examples: Jusco, Seibu, Gran Stage, most of the stores in LaLa Garden except for Grand Plechef which only accepts its proprietary card, Car Dock [mechanic], Tsukuba Jui Shinryo Center [veterinarian], etc.).

Benefits of Using a Credit Card in Japan

Using a credit card can help you keep track of your expenses more easily. It is also a better option than carrying around a huge amount of cash (or making a lot of trips to the ATM). I think many credit cards also offer point systems that let you trade in points for products. (I recently traded in my points for a new vacuum cleaner.)

]]> http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/03/getting-a-japanese-credit-card/feed/ 0 Getting a New Bankbook http://blog.alientimes.org/2006/11/getting-a-new-bankbook/ http://blog.alientimes.org/2006/11/getting-a-new-bankbook/#comments Fri, 24 Nov 2006 14:45:00 +0000 Shaney http://blog.alientimes.org/2006/11/getting-a-new-bankbook/ In Canada, we don't use bankbooks very much anymore. Most of our banking is done online, so we can see our transactions whenever we want. Also, if we get any notification of our transactions, it is usually in the form of a monthly statement, not a bankbook.

However, the bankbook system is alive and well in Japan. Because I have a special "integrated account", I tend to go through bankbooks fairly quickly -- which is rather annoying. Anyway, someone asked me recently about the procedure for getting a new bankbook, so I thought I would give you an example of how it is done at Joyo Bank.

Keep in mind that you cannot get a new bankbook until your old one is COMPLETELY full. Don't bother trying to convince the teller or the ATM to give you a new book before the old one has run out of space.

There are two ways to get a new bankbook: either ask a teller to do it, or do it yourself at a special ATM. If you show the last (completely full) page to a teller, he or she will be able to figure out what you want without you having to say anything. If you prefer to do it yourself, see the handy photo guide below.

Here is the machine you need to use. It is a bit different from a regular ATM.

You are given two options. The first one is 「通帳　記入」and the second one is 「通帳　繰越　発行」. (You thought I was going to give you the readings, but I am not! Please take a minute and look up the readings and the meanings on Goo Jisho. Aren't I nice to give them to you in word-sized chunks?? I think that by looking them up rather than just being given the meanings, it will help you to remember them. If you don't use your kanji, you will lose your kanji!!)

Choose the second option (but you already know that now because you looked it up, you clever thing) and insert your bankbook.

You will then be given two more options: 「繰越　する」 or 「繰越　しない」. This part is just making sure that you really, really want to get a new bankbook. They ask you this because the process for making a new book takes a bit of time, especially if you have an integrated account like mine (because there are many different pages that need to be created throughout the book) or if you haven't updated your bankbook in a long time.

If you decide that you don't really have enough time to complete the process, choose the one that ends in しない. If you really, really do want a new bankbook, and you are willing to invest the time and energy into this important task, choose the one that ends in する.

Et voila, in five or ten minutes, you will be the proud owner of a new, sparkly bankbook. Fun, eh?

1 Comments

  • At November 25, 2006, Shaney wrote:

    Japanese words that appeared in this post:

    1. 通帳
    2. 記入
    3. 繰越
    4. 発行
    5. する
    6. しない

]]> http://blog.alientimes.org/2006/11/getting-a-new-bankbook/feed/ 1 ID required for Bank Transfer of over 100,000yen http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/01/id-required-for-bank-transfer-of-over-100000yen/ http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/01/id-required-for-bank-transfer-of-over-100000yen/#comments Wed, 17 Jan 2007 06:36:00 +0000 kateneath http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/01/id-required-for-bank-transfer-of-over-100000yen/ Due to the identification law amendment from 4th Jan, 2007, you cannot use the ATM anymore for sending more than 100,000 yen worth of cash, and you have to show your ID at the counter of banks and post offices when you do it. Note: this requirement is only for sending CASH. If you use a bank transfer from your own bank account, you can still transfer more than 100,000yen, and ID is not required because it was already checked when you opened the account.
-> For detailed information, please refer to this site:
http://www.fsa.go.jp/policy/honninkakunin/index.html

Happy banking!

Kate

]]> http://blog.alientimes.org/2007/01/id-required-for-bank-transfer-of-over-100000yen/feed/ 0 New Laws about Transfering Money http://blog.alientimes.org/2006/11/new-laws-about-transfering-money/ http://blog.alientimes.org/2006/11/new-laws-about-transfering-money/#comments Tue, 21 Nov 2006 12:08:00 +0000 Shaney http://blog.alientimes.org/2006/11/new-laws-about-transfering-money/ From January 4, 2007, it will no longer be possible to send sums larger than 100,000 yen in cash by "furikomi" (bank transfer) at the bank machine (ATM). If you want to send amounts larger than that, you will have to use your bank card. The banks are trying to prevent money laundering and other criminal activities, so they are limiting the amount of money that can be sent anonymously through the furikomi system. (If you send cash by furikomi, there is no official record of who sent the money.) So, if you want to send larger amounts of money, first deposit the amount into your account and then transfer the money from your account to the recipient.

Source: Japan Times (unfortunately, you have to register to view the article)

]]> http://blog.alientimes.org/2006/11/new-laws-about-transfering-money/feed/ 0 Sending Money Between Banks and Postal Bank Accounts http://blog.alientimes.org/2008/11/sending-money-between-banks-and-postal-bank-accounts/ http://blog.alientimes.org/2008/11/sending-money-between-banks-and-postal-bank-accounts/#comments Wed, 12 Nov 2008 21:00:24 +0000 Shaney http://blog.alientimes.org/?p=1956 From January 1, 2009, it will become possible to send money (by furikomi) between banks and postal bank accounts.

In order to do this, you have to find out the branch number and account number that has been assigned to your postal account. There are two ways of doing this.

1. Go to the post office and hand in your postal bank account book. They will then print your new branch code and account number on the first page of your account book.

2. Fill in the form on the following page.

https://wwws.jp-bank.japanpost.jp/cgi-bin/kouza.cgi

If your current postal account number doesn't have enough numbers to fill all of the sections, leave the middle section blank. Click the green button when you are done. You will be brought to a confirmation screen. Click OK and then you will be shown your new bank code (four digits), branch code (three digits), and account number (seven digits). Copy the information down somewhere for future reference.

Please note that this service will not be available through the post office's online banking system (Yucho Direct, ゆうちょダイレクト) until later in the spring of 2009.

Source: http://www.jp-bank.japanpost.jp/kojin/tukau/sokin/koza/kj_tk_sk_kz_furikomi.html

4 Comments

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