Getting a Working Holiday Visa for Japan

My husband, Jason gets to have a very different experience in Japan, as he is currently looking for work.

 My next post will be all about finding work in Japan, but before you do that, you need a visa. 

Jason got himself a working holiday visa before we left for Japan. If you have a job organised before  you come, you might be able to get a standard working visa, but if not, then working holiday is probably the easiest visa to get.

To do this, he had to fill out an application form from the Australian Japanese Embassy Perth website, attach a passport photo, write a letter about his reasons for wanting this visa, and he also had to include evidence of the following:

1. A valid Australian Passport (you actually have to post or bring this in with your application. If you live in Perth city, you must go in in person, but if youre outside the metro area you have to physically post your passport with a seperqte registered envelope with your passport so they can attach the visa to your passport and send it back to you).
2. Your resume in English
3. Your flight details, either return or one way. If you book only one way, you do have to show evidence of having extra money on top of the money already neccessary for the visa. 
4. Proof of funds- You need to be able to show proof of having saved 2500 Australian dollars to qualify for the working holiday Visa. This amount increases to 3500 if you apply as a couple. If you dont have flights booked and fully paid for, thus increases to 4000 and 6500 respectively. Evidence of this is shown in the form of printed bank statements.
5. Proposed schedule for first six months. The Embassy reccommends and encourages people to not stay in same place for more than 3 months, as you are there to travel. Jason and I will, of course, be staying in our apartment for a whole year. So to get around this, we listed our short holidays as "living somewhere". The itinerary needed is quite vague. So, for example, in February, Jason and I are travelling to Sapporo for a short weekend holiday, but each month on the itinerary you are just expected to list one place, so for that month he listed Sapporo. Then the month after, he listed that he'd be back in our area of Akashi. Hence, he has travelled. The month after, he might list Osaka, as we will definitely stay there a little bit.

The working holiday visa only lasts for 6 months, but you can easily get it restamped whilst in Japan by submiting your next 6 month plan.  Link to the embassy's working holiday info:  http://www.perth.au.emb-japan.go.jp/en/visiting_japan/visa_info/working_holiday_visa/index.html

If you send in all your information and application with your passport and a registered envelope, processing is usually pretty quick. I got mine back in 10 days. I think its a maximum of 2 weeks, unless theres something missing, in which case they'll call you (I reccommend calling them after a few days anyway just to check they've recieved it).

The visa itself is just a small passport sized paper glued into the passport. On arrival in Japan, they then take your passport at the airport and make your a residence card quickly while you stand at the arrival desk.

 You won't need to find this desk or anything, everyone goes through it to get into the country, your process might just be a little longer than your usual holiday process of getting your passport stamped.

All in all, it was a much less painful process than we imagined and the residence cards are pretty cool. One thing I reccommend is having your address in Japan written down because you will be asked to fill this out on entry cards.