Hello folks!
I’ve done a ton of reading and Googling but I’m really struggling to get the answer to a question I have.
In short, my wife and I (same-sex marriage) are both Canadian, and we want to move to Japan. I’m a software engineer, she’s a CPA. I make a good salary, and so we thought the easiest way to get into Japan would be to sell the house for a big profit, and for her to get a job in Japan and for me to continue working for my company remotely. Everything I can find says I can’t work in Japan on a dependent visa, but does that include remote work for a foreign company? Would it be possible to get a work visa instead of a dependent visa if I’m looking to work for a foreign company?
I’m so utterly lost. Any guidance would be greatly appreciated!
Edit: Our level of Japanese right now is: able to carry a conversation with the locals while drunk, but nowhere near good enough to hold our own in a corporate setting, yet. Obviously we’d want to study while we’re there and work hard on improving it.
Another edit: My company does not have a presence in Japan. We are entirely Canadian, and work with American clients.
6 comments
You can request permission to work 28h on a dependent visa and that’s it. No work visa for remote work only possible way would be a global employment agency (that will take 20%ish of your income).
Also if I remember correctly Japan still does not issue dependent visas for same sex couples. Someone correct me please if that changed.
With a work visa, you would be limited to certain job types. Working online for a non Japanese company would not get you a work visa unfortunately. Also I searched on Google and it looks like Japan doesn’t issue dependant visas for same sex couples
>Everything I can find says I can’t work in Japan on a dependent visa,
You can request blanket permission to work for up to 28 hours per week
>does that include remote work for a foreign company?
The location of your employer does not matter. The important thing is where you are.
>My company does not have a presence in Japan.
If you remain employed directly by your company and move to Japan then they will be opening a representative office by virtue of you being here. This means they’d be liable to Japanese labour laws (as they apply to you) and potentially to tax events. They may prefer to employee you as a contractor instead of a direct hire to limit their liabilities.
>my wife and I (same-sex marriage)
If you’re legally married in Canada then you should be able to score a designated activities visa to be with your spouse, assuming they’ve got their own visa. You’d want to work with an immigration lawyer though, it’s not exactly straight forward. Remember that part about dependants being restricted to 28 hours? Well, designated activities means all bets are off. Pretty much everything is case by case.
The easiest (and most expensive) option for you would be to have your company start a contract with a GEO who would then hire you and be your employer of record in Japan. That can get pretty expensive though.
This is not legal advice and is also 3rd person info from a friend who asked something similar on a different forum, but FWIW – a woman in Japan had a similar concern for their husband and called the immigration bureau and was told that it was fine given that its remote.
1) Digital Nomads aren’t a thing in Japan
2) The Dependent visa allows you to work, but limit hours. Also, you can’t both move together if you’re getting a dependent visa (your wife would have to move first and then you would have to wait for the visa to be processed as your wife needs to be in Japan and use her tax code to get you a dependent visa).
​
My husband and I are moving to Japan in the next month. I have a job, I am getting a work visa. He has to get a working holiday visa in order to move with me. If he wants to continue work in software dev the only way would be to find a company and for them pay for his working holiday visa to be changed over to a work visa. We hope he will be able to do this at some point but, for now, the immediate plan is for him to just work a working holiday visa. Hope that makes sense.
https://www.tn-office.jp/14011707019948
I found this and sounds like for certain fields (including technology) it may be possible to work over 28hours. The spouse needs to be on a highly professional visa, not just a working visa. The part of it that’s not totally clear to me though is whether one must then work for a Japanese company or not. I think a foreign company might still have the issue of “doing business” in Japan.