Visa requirements for working remotely from Japan

[nutts]

Hi everybody,

Hopefully somebody can shed some light on this for me.
I'm thinking strongly of moving to Japan next year. I already have a full-time job in the UK that allows me to work remotely, and I plan to take this with me.
So if I were to work from there with my UK job, does anybody know what visa I would need, or which would be best?
With my English passport I get 90 days on a tourist visa, so this isn't enough. I plan to live there for at least 1 year, and hopefully more.
I'm due to have my 30th birthday before I go, so I'll just be at the end of the working holiday visa application from what I understand, so that's one option.

Anyway the options I've found by reading so far are:
- working holiday visa
- long-term resident visa
- renew tourist visa every 90 days (if this is even possible)

I'm not sure a straight (non-holiday) working visa is applicable as I won't actually be getting a Japanese job whilst there.

Does anybody have any information or can give advice on what would be best?
My next step I guess would be to speak to somebody at the Japanese embassy in London.

Many thanks!

[Solvi]

A Norwegian guy I know lives in Malaysia, and he leaves the country every 90 days to get a new 90 day visum. That could be a possibility, but the other options may be better. Don't know much about it though.

[tiroth2]

You cannot work on a tourist visa. I don't know how the laws characterize working remotely, since my guess is you are being paid in the UK by a company based in the UK, but I would strongly suspect it isn't kosher. I'd be very interested to know for sure though.

[Bueller_007]

You cannot work on a tourist visa. I don't know how the laws characterize working remotely, since my guess is you are being paid in the UK by a company based in the UK, but I would strongly suspect it isn't kosher. I'd be very interested to know for sure though.

I would guess that there is absolutely no problem working remotely on a tourist visa.

You're not taking jobs from Japanese people, or money from their economy. You're effectively a "tourist" who has a steady source of income.

I don't see any difference between working remotely and making money that way as opposed to being a rich punk living in Japan off trust fund interest.

Working visas are about where the money comes from, not where you live.

[nutts]

Thanks guys. My logic has gone along with Bueller's so far. I'm pretty sure I *could* get by on a tourist visa as I wouldn't be officially working.

But then my issue becomes the length of tourist visa. Normally it's 90 days, in which case does that mean I have to leave (ie fly out of) the country every 3 months to renew it?

Or is there a way of getting an extra-long tourist visa if I can be seen to have money in my account and/or a steady stream of income without 'working' (in the Japanese economy/tax sense). Or perhaps just renew it over and over at an embassy?

Thanks again!

[Belton]

well I can see a couple of issues

You renew your visa at an immigration office in Japan, not your embassay. And this is at the discretion of the immigration office and is only for a further 90 days apparently. However to enter in the first place you need a return ticket with a fixed return date. which is a bit Catch 22!

So if you go this way you will probably have to exit and re-enter either every 90 or 180 days. And they're going to start asking questions sooner or later when this becomes a noticeable habit.
I'd also guess that it's very difficult to change your type of visa from within Japan.
check out the embassy website
http://www.uk.emb-japan.go.jp/en/visa/visa-main.html


The issue of working.
I don't think they care where the work is done/paid for, they'll just hear the word "work".
They'll probably see it as an economic activity and therefore you can't use a tourist visa. Beyond a purely bureaucratic mindset there may be a suspicion that if you can't bring in income from your remote work that you'll work in the black economy. Or that you really intend to be a permanent or semi-permanent resident.

But if you don't tell, I can't see how they'd find out, who in particular you'd harm (assuming your work can be done anywhere in the world), or any practical issue other than the problem of the 90 day limit, (assuming you don't need the trappings of existence like an apartment, bank account, utilities where your residency status is going to be looked at. so you'll be living out of hotels or hostels)

(It makes you wonder what all the immigrants lambasted in the British Press go through.)

[Bueller_007]

http://www.mofa.go.jp/j_info/visit/visa/04.html

Your best bet is to go with the 90-day tourist visa, or see if you can get the one-year cultural activities visa.

[nutts]

Thanks Belton, and again Bueller, for your posts.

Belton: If I'm staying for that long I will want an apartment. But possibly my girlfriend can help me with getting that, I'm not sure at the moment.
I've also been looking at Leopalace as a possibility for apartments: http://www.eg.leopalace21.com

Bueller: I didn't know about the cultural visa, I wonder if that counts for learning Japanese if I book on a part-time course (which I'm planning on doing once I'm there anyway). Nice idea!

I think I'll take this information I've gained and go along to the japanese embassy in London next week, and see if I can garner more information from them.

It's an interesting topic though, especially nowadays when more and more people are opting to work remotely where they're able.
Funny thing is that my passport, which I only got in January, already has 3 of the 90-day Japanese tourist visa stamps in it, so they may get funny anyway when I go in again (at Christmas) let alone next year

Cheers!

[DaiButsu]

Nutts,

A few years ago I spent a little over a year in Japan working for a non-Japanese company. For a variety of reasons I simply used the 90-day tourist visa. Belton is correct, every three months I would simply have to fly out of the country and then return. Upon my return, the Japanese immigration official at the airport would simply ask what I planned to do while in Japan and stamp my passport with a new 90-day visa.

The tourist visa technically allows you to attend meetings and do some short term work in Japan and I've heard stories of people using them to spend many years working there. However, things may be changing as I've also heard stories of people being told that they need to get a working visa or they wouldn't be allowed back in, which typically happened after about a year or so of quick re-entries.

If I remember correctly, the biggest problem with the working visa is that you need a "sponsor," essentially your employer, to fill out part of the paperwork explaining why you need to be there.

Good luck

[Bueller_007]

The tourist visa technically allows you to attend meetings and do some short term work in Japan and I've heard stories of people using them to spend many years working there.

It's strictly illegal to do any paid work for a Japan-based company on a tourist visa.

[Belton]

The other way of course is to just marry your Japanese girlfriend.

Not the most romantic reason but a fairly common way of overcoming visa problems and staying together in the face of international bureaucracy.

But perhaps I'm being too flippant.

Good luck in your search for a solution.

(out of curiosity I looked at the Leoplace21 site. On the face of it, in London terms that's a great price for a fully serviced apartment, maybe I should move to Japan. The commute would be a killer though! )

[DaiButsu]

It's strictly illegal to do any paid work for a Japan-based company on a tourist visa.

No doubt that business purposes on a temporary visa are limited, but some are allowed. And I would assume limitations would be even tighter for a Japan-based company.

According to the Embassy of Japan website (http://www.embjapan.org/english/html/travel_and_visa/visa/faq.htm), the following activities are permitted with a 90-day temporary visa:

Sightseeing; recreation; sports; visiting relatives, friends, or acquaintances; visiting a sick person; attending a wedding or funeral ceremony; participating in athletic tournaments, contests, etc. as an amateur; business purposes (such as market research, business liaison, business consultations, signing a contract, or providing after-sale service for imported machinery); inspecting or visiting plants, trade fairs, etc.; attending lectures, explanatory meetings, etc.; academic surveys or research presentations; religious pilgrimages or visits; friendship visits to sister cities, sister schools, etc.; or other similar activities during a short period of stay in Japan.

[Bueller_007]

It's strictly illegal to do any paid work for a Japan-based company on a tourist visa.

No doubt that business purposes on a temporary visa are limited, but some are allowed. And I would assume limitations would be even tighter for a Japan-based company.

According to the Embassy of Japan website (http://www.embjapan.org/english/html/travel_and_visa/visa/faq.htm), the following activities are permitted with a 90-day temporary visa:

Sightseeing; recreation; sports; visiting relatives, friends, or acquaintances; visiting a sick person; attending a wedding or funeral ceremony; participating in athletic tournaments, contests, etc. as an amateur; business purposes (such as market research, business liaison, business consultations, signing a contract, or providing after-sale service for imported machinery); inspecting or visiting plants, trade fairs, etc.; attending lectures, explanatory meetings, etc.; academic surveys or research presentations; religious pilgrimages or visits; friendship visits to sister cities, sister schools, etc.; or other similar activities during a short period of stay in Japan.

This is kind of moot... The title of the section that you copied is "(b) Statuses of residence not permitting work." All of the things that you listed are either unpaid, or work for which payment would be remitted by a foreign company. As I've said above, I personally see no problem with him doing paid work for a foreign company on a Japanese tourist visa, other than the inconvenience of having to leave every three months.

My reply was to something you posted where you said that you've heard of people spending years in Japan working on a tourist visa. I assumed that you meant fly-by-night English teachers, but if you meant lawyers working in Tokyo, getting paid by a company in America or something, then, yeah, that's possible, but it'd probably be easier on them if they just got the Intracompany Transferee visa.

Either way, it's strictly forbidden to do *any* paid work for a Japanese company on a tourist visa. You simply can't be employed by one.

[DaiButsu]

No disagreement with that. And yes, I was referring to foreign lawyers working in Japan, as opposed to a fly-by-night English teacher.

You are also absolutely correct regarding the inconvenience of having to travel every 90 days. The first couple of times is a nice little forced vacation, but it gets old very quickly.

[Bueller_007]

No disagreement with that. And yes, I was referring to foreign lawyers working in Japan, as opposed to a fly-by-night English teacher.

You are also absolutely correct regarding the inconvenience of having to travel every 90 days. The first couple of times is a nice little forced vacation, but it gets old very quickly.

Yeah, I had a fly-by-night English teacher friend who was doing this.

Had to fly to Korea every three months.

Wouldn't be such a bad restriction if Japan weren't an island country, but having to fly to another country every few months is certainly a pain in the butt, I'm sure. Would cut into your savings as well.