Been awhile now but I’ve received and signed a job offer letter from a company in Japan stating a lot of the conditions (pay, contract type in English, benefits, etc.). It’s been some weeks now and I’ve been requesting for the job contract to review and sign, as where I’m from the offer letter is not legally binding and contract always has more details to be negotiated. From what they replied, it seems that they want me to be in Japan before signing the contract, or as they said it, after I “join the company”, however that works. They are not providing relocation support, so it adds to my worry – otherwise I wouldn’t care.
Is this normal? Do Japanese companies expect people to relocate with just an offer letter? Could they deny me the job or change contract conditions after I move?
https://www.reddit.com/r/japan/comments/x0otkr/moving_to_japan_with_offer_letter_only_no_contract/
4 comments
Certainly gives them an upper hand in negotiations if they do that. Pretty fucked.
What are you doing for a visa? This sounds worrying that you wouldn’t yet be part of the company when you arrive.
In Japan offer letters (and even verbal offers) are legally binding, but I don’t know that I’d risk moving and bearing the cost if I’d immediately have to find a lawyer and start litigation to get them to honour it. I have never experienced this for any Japanese company I’ve worked for, so it’s certainly not normal. Perhaps try to explain your concerns given the cost element and see how they respond.
Generally Japanese companies aren’t that shady. I did the whole relocation on the offer letter thing and it worked out fine. I did have to do the oh so popular jump to Korea for a few days to finalize my visa since it can’t be done inside the country, which is a pain. If you can get your visa sorted before you go, I recommend that as the superior option.