My contract says that my employer pays half my pension. I started work in late September and received my paycheck for the month of September and October in November (which is standard). My pension was only deducted for the month of October so now I have a bill from the Japanese Pension Service to pay a premium for the time I was working in September. My boss is shady and when I asked them about it, they said to just ignore it. Something is telling me that I should keep pressing and that they have to pay half of the premium because I was working at the time and that’s what the contract says. I want to avoid as much uncomfortable talks as possible so I need advice, are they suppose to pay for half or should I pay for all of it?
5 comments
Well don’t listen to the boss. You’re required to pay into the pension if you’re already enrolled in Shakai Hoken. Are you enrolled?
If you are receiving a bill from the government, so I wouldn’t ignore it. I would contact the pension system and explain the situation that your company is supposed to be withholding and paying on your behalf. In the future, if you wanted permanent resident visa they will deny your PR visa application for non payment of the pension system.
Well, there is not really enough information here to be able to offer you anything other than supposition. However, what I will suggest is this:
1. Unless you work for a small company, your ‘boss’ is not human resources and/or payroll and this issue doesn’t fall under his/her purview. You should contact HR.
2. Without having actually seen the bill it is difficult to say, ~~but my guess is that the bill that you are getting is for your portion of the pension. The pension agency is not asking for you to pay both contributions.~~ [EDIT: It seems that you are getting a bill for the Kokumin pension because your were not enrolled in the Shakai until October 1.] Contact the agency who sent you the bill ~~to find out if this is true or not~~. Alternatively, contact HR.
3. Again, without seeing the bill I can’t talk definitively, ~~but are you sure that this isn’t for the period in September before you starting working at your current employer?~~ [EDIT: This is sort of the case. Because you were not enrolled in the Shakai pension until October 1, the pension agency is sending you a bill for the Kokumin pension.] About eight years ago I switched jobs. My previous employment ended on (ironically) mid September and my new employment started on October 1st. The pension system sent me a bill for the gap between the two, it was for something like ¥5000. I think it was something like ten days worth of kokumin pension and neither of my employers were required to pay half of it.
4. We are talking about the period from September 23 to September 30, so seven days. How much is the bill for? A couple of thousand Yen? If I were you, I would just pay it. Unless it is a huge amount of money that you cannot afford, this is the easiest solution. Pressing this issue with your ‘boss’ is might to go your way ~~(if they are in fact obligated to pay half of the bill you were sent, see number 2 above)~~ but it is also likely to create some negative feelings that may cause you other issues later. The old expression is: “choose your battles wisely.” Is this something that you really, really care about?
5. Finally, the pension agency is not going to stop sending you this bill. Every time you ignore it, they will add a fee and send it again. The longer you wait to pay the bill, the bigger it is going to get. Eventually, they will just take the money out of your bank account.
Good luck!
EDIT: Rereading your post I see now that I read it wrong. You started work on September 23, but your employer didn’t enroll you in the pension until October 1. As far as I know, there is no reason why this should have happened. I think your employer was capable of enrolling you from September 23. However, I don’t work in HR, so it might in fact be the case that you couldn’t be enrolled until the beginning of the month, or the pay period, or whatever. Maybe you were technically classified as part-time in September or something. Again, I think that this is a question for HR.
To be honest though, it may not be possible for them at this point to adjust your ‘start’ date backwards to September 23. You may just have to pay this bill.
Do not ignore it. Have them give you that in writing, and go to your local International Association.
Go and talk to them at city hall. I had the same thing, a gap between my pension payments. They were very helpful and I resolved it easily