Before you receive a single yen in Japan, you need a bank account. Before you can open a bank account, you need a Japanese address. Before you have a Japanese address, you need to register at your local city office.
Everything in Japan’s administrative system connects to everything else, and it all has to happen in a specific order. Here is the sequence that actually works.
City Office First — Everything Else Depends on It
The moment you have your residence card and a place to stay, go to your local city office (Shiyakusho) and complete your residency registration (Jūminhyō). This triggers two things: your address gets printed on the back of your residence card, and you become eligible to open a bank account.
Without that address on your residence card, no bank in Japan will process your application. This is not a technicality — it is a hard stop.
While you are at the city office, sort out your National Health Insurance registration at the same time. You are already there, the counter is the same building, and it saves a separate trip.
Go Straight to the Post Office After That
After the city office, your next stop is the nearest post office to open a Japan Post Bank (Yucho) account. This is the account your dispatch company will use to pay your salary, and it is the most straightforward option for newly arrived foreign teachers.
Many post offices now operate on an appointment system. If you walk in without a booking, you may be turned away and asked to come back another day. Check whether your local branch requires an appointment — or book in advance if you can. If you have an appointment, the process takes roughly one hour. You will leave with a passbook in hand. The cash card is mailed to your registered address and arrives about two weeks later. You cannot use ATMs until the card arrives, so plan for that gap.
The katakana problem — and why it matters more than you think
Every Japanese bank requires your name in katakana. At the post office, staff will help you transliterate your name, but the exact version they register — every character, in exact order — becomes your permanent account name.
This sounds minor until the first time you need to verify your identity at a branch window and your katakana name does not match what is on file. One character off and the staff will not process your request. Write down your registered katakana name immediately after opening the account and keep it somewhere accessible. Do not rely on memory.
What to Bring
Your residence card and passport are the baseline — every bank needs both. If you have your My Number card or notification slip, bring that too.
The one document that people underestimate is the employment contract or certificate of employment from your company. For teachers who have been in Japan less than six months, Japanese banks are required under foreign exchange law to verify that you have legitimate income before opening an account. Your company’s paperwork is the only thing that satisfies that requirement. Forget it and you will be making a second trip. Treat it as the most important item in the folder.
Yucho is for salary. Wise is for everything else.
Yucho is where your paycheck lands. It is not where you want your money sitting long-term, and it is definitely not how you want to send money home.
Japanese banks charge ¥3,000 or more per international transfer, and on top of that they give you a worse exchange rate than the real one — typically 2–3% off — without telling you. On a regular monthly transfer, that quietly costs you ¥5,000 or more every single time.
Wise uses the real mid-market rate — the same number you see on Google — with a transparent fee shown upfront before you confirm. Your first transfer is free. Set it up before you arrive, not after, so it is ready the moment your first paycheck hits Yucho.
If You Want a Private Bank Account
For most teachers in their first year, Yucho for salary and Wise for transfers covers everything they actually need. A private bank account can wait until you are settled.
When you are ready, the choice comes down to one question: how comfortable are you navigating in Japanese?
If the answer is “not very” — Sony Bank is the only major Japanese bank where the entire application and account management experience is available in English. Start there.
If you are comfortable enough with Japanese apps, SBI Sumishin Net Bank has the most polished smartphone experience of any Japanese bank and processes applications fully online in about a week. PayPay Bank is a reasonable fallback if the others do not work out — the application barrier is lower, though the features are more basic.
The teachers who get through this process without losing a day to it are almost always the ones who booked the post office appointment before leaving the city office, brought their employment paperwork, and wrote down their katakana name on the spot. Everything else follows from those three things.
→ How to Get a SIM Card and Phone Number Before You Arrive
→ How to Stop Losing Money on Every Transfer Home
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