Hello everyone! I am currently a ‘freelance’ for a Japanese company (computer graphics related), and I got a pre-offer from a company outside Japan to start a project soon.
I have a few concerns regarding my regular working visa (no PR yet, not married to a japanese national):
– As long as I have a valid working Visa, is it ok to work for a foreign company exclusively?
– My wife has her dependant Visa renewal in less than a month, so I am guessing I have to hold unto my current job until she gets her new Gaijin Card…
– What would an invoice from Japan to, let’s say, Ireland have to include? Wittholding tax, Consumer tax, currency?
Anyway a few questions I had, I will keep searching on my own, but I found this particular situation hard to pinpoint on the Internet. Thanks!!
4 comments
>As long as I have a valid working Visa, is it ok to work for a foreign company exclusively?
Unless you are on a spousal visa or PR, your main job has to be a Japanese company, so no.
>My wife has her dependant Visa renewal in less than a month, so I am guessing I have to hold unto my current job until she gets her new Gaijin Card…
You have to hold unto your current job in order to maintain your regular working visa (and your wife’s dependent visa).
>What would an invoice from Japan to, let’s say, Ireland have to include? Wittholding tax, Consumer tax, currency?
Can’t give you anything on this one, the people of r/JapanFinance should know more.
There’s this thread [0] over on tokyo dev on the same topic. The TLDR sounds like you _can_ transition to freelnace on your existing visa, really when you renew you want to have enough Japanese companies as clients to get a successful renewal.
As for taxation, you don’t need to collect withhholding or consumption tax to a foreign company. For book keeping you’re expected to do JPY-only, so each transaction you just look at the daily exchange rate JPY <-> EUR/whatever and book that (even if you actually are getting paid in Euros!)
If you’re a “real” company you’re meant to bookkeep by currency (and thus book exchange rate fluxuation-incurring revenue as revenue), but for individuals you just do JPY-based book-keeping and sometimes get lucky with the exchange rate and get “free money”
[0]: [https://discuss.tokyodev.com/t/going-freelance-with-an-engineering-visa/164/3](https://discuss.tokyodev.com/t/going-freelance-with-an-engineering-visa/164/3)
>>As long as I have a valid working Visa, is it ok to work for a foreign company exclusively?
I’m a bit unclear on the details. If you’re a freelance worker, you’re never considered ‘exclusive’ to any one company. You just take on additional clients.
Which is to say, unless you’re formally ending your freelance contract with the Japanese company, taking on the new foreign project shouldn’t impact your status with the J company.
This question comes up in some form basically every week, so I doubt it’s “hard to pinpoint on the internet”.
But, as a non-lawyer:
– Yes you can work solely for foreign companies on a work visa, but depending on its exact terms you might need to ask immigration for permission first
– Yes that would be safest
– If you’re freelancing, it only has to include the price (actually even if you were an employee it’d be the same in this case). You’ll probably price in their currency. You’ll then take care of anything else on your end as part of your business tax return. They don’t have any other obligations, and exports don’t get consumption taxed.
The guy in JapanFinance, I think he’s called “StarkImpossibility”, is an ace in this stuff though, so could cross-post there.