Hi, I’ve been recently told about this sub so I’m posting in case anyone have some input or can share their experience on the subject. Sorry in advance if it’s inappropriate thing to ask here.
I am (Male) married to Japanese for over 9 years. I am currenty living in Japan for about 4 and half years (haven’t left country at all during this period). Before, we lived in Japan for 1 year (about half of year on Spouse “Visa”), then we moved to my home country for 4 years, after which we moved back to Japan to present day. I currently have 3 year spouse “visa” and it expires in about 4 months. I was always told that I need to be 10 years in Japan to be able to apply for PR so I never really looked into that option too much since it seemed so far. Wife also never bothered to tell me that through marriage, there are different requirements (3 years of marriage, 1 year in Japan etc). Few months ago I got this information so we were planning to start application process soon.
Recently, my wife got diagnosed with some mental issues, and that pretty quickly led to her wanting a divorce. I respect her decision, however since this happened pretty much over night, this puts me in a very difficult postion right now. One moment you are building your life here and investing yourself in the place, and the next thing you know, you are getting “kicked out”.
Provided that she cooperates (hardly it seems), we could keep things “as is” for PR application purposes but there are 2 main problems. Separate address (she will move away), and pension.
When we moved to Japan, we temporarily moved to her parent’s place. Upon registering address at the ward office, my wife signed me up for pension, as you should, yes, however, nothing about pension was mentioned or explained to me really. Shortly after, we moved away and she apparently didn’t change the address for pension and such so all notifications and stuff were coming to her parent’s house. They are very old so they didn’t check much or notify us on that. When they eventually did, she changed that address to our one, I started receiving bills and amount I now needed to pay was substantial. Took me little while to collect the money, but I called them up, told them to send everything I need to pay and I’ve paid everything in bulk last month. I’ve checked with immigration lawyer and he says that chances of getting a PR are very slim since the pension was not paid on time, despite payments being made. Reading around net, it says that if some payments were skipped, it needs to be explained, not that it will automatically be rejected. Other than that, my “case” is pretty solid, with decent income, decent savings, no offences, tickets, anything etc. I was unemployed for 1st year in this 4.5 year period though.
​
So what are my options here now? Thanks
11 comments
I’ve never heard about late tax and social service payments being explained away. Only that they are an automatic rejection since the requirement changes in 2019. Can you link to discussions where you read they were? That might help clarify what happened.
PR takes time. So first look to renew your visa before the divorce happens or change to an employment visa
[removed]
Sorry for the situation you’re in, but don’t count on being able to explain away the late payments. We had _one_ payment on my wife’s health insurance (same scrutiny as pension) that was a few days late literally because the government sent the mail to the wrong address. Wasn’t our fault, and even with an immigration lawyer, my PR application was _still_ denied because of that late payment.
>wife also never bothered to tell me that through marriage there are different requirements (3 years of marriage, 1 year in Japan etc)
Does your wife work for immigration?, or is an immigration professional?, or at least an armchair immigration enthusiast?
If not, then How can you blame your wife for that!? Most Japanese have no idea about how Japan’s immigration works. Mostly because they don’t need to.
>separate address
A “Rocky marriage” is not an instant violation of the spouse visa, however, You’d technically be violating your spouse visa when she changes address. You’re supposed to be residing with your spouse on a spouse visa. So you need to inform immigration when she changes address and the reasons why she changes address. Usually they allow it, for things like moving within the country for work, or care for a sick relative etc but for a broken marriage… very unlikely.
So you should focus on the legitimacy of your spouse visa before PR.
Also when you submit PR application, along with all other documents, you will need to submit this: https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/content/001355579.pdf
(Notice the changes in family situation part)
>shortly after, we moved away and she apparently didn’t change the address for pension and such
Again, how is this your wife’s fault? Granted it would be her fault for not changing the address on HER pension, but not yours.
>recently, my wife got diagnosed with some mental issues, and that pretty quickly led to her wanting a divorce
No offense but it’s probably because based on some of your OP, you sound like an adult child. If I was your wife, I’d probably want a divorce too if you stared blaming me for all this stuff.
No idea of your Japanese ability, I’d argue that’s it’s fine (but obviously not ideal) for a Japanese spouse to help out their non-Japanese spouse with language related issues because the same would work vice versa if they were in the non-Japanese spouse home country too. but regardless of your Japanese language ability you should really research the laws and requirements, especially for a country you don’t hold citizenship in. in your case immigration, resident register (when changing address), and pension. A lot of this information is available in English too!…. No real excuses there.
well, your case is not that solid, because
1. you’re indicating the marriage is in shambles to the point where she’ll be at a separate address which undermines the ability to use the spousal route
2. you’ve got late payments (are they older than the window it looks at?)
>Wife also never bothered to tell me
>nothing about pension was mentioned or explained to me
>she apparently didn’t change the address for pension
It’s your responsibility to understand your civic duties and the laws of the country in which you reside.
I think getting a work visa would be the way since the PR chance is quite slim given the current situation
Perhaps the question to be asked is
Do you want PR ?
why ?
IMO there isn’t a magic formula for PR. You apply and hopefully you get it.
Tax deductions and pension are the two most predominant evidence during PR application
or asides for how much you are earning if you dont pay for Gov, they just treat it as a big red-flag. So really need a good excuse to explain
Yeah, PR is not happening. Late payments and separate address? Especially separate address. One time I was still happily married and I moved to Saitama because of work while my wife wanted to spend at least one more year at her previous company while taking care of her father and they HOUNDED us during the extension process. They approved it but reduced me to one year.
You’re gonna need a work visa. Or try to extend while you have the same address. If she’s not going to cooperate then yeah, work visa or go home.