I’m on a spouse visa. I’ve been working here for years for a large Japanese company. I’m planning to change job this year but I’m not sure if due to my visa being non work related I’d need to tell immigration? When I made the switch from English teacher to this new job I didn’t tell anyone and I still got a new visa with no issue.
‘GOOGLE IT!!!!’
I did. I tried. I TRIED. The information is conflicting and just to be 100% I thought I’d ask in the hope of getting a human response from someone with experience. I hope you don’t mind.
If you do have to tell immigration, is this when you quit or after you start the new job? It seems weird that you’d need to on a visa that’s not related to work. I understand needing to tell the city office but why immigration?
Thank you!
6 comments
You don’t need to tell immigration. Whether you work or not isn’t their business on a spouse visa. It’s whether you’re married or not.
100% no, you don’t.
I think only work visas require you to inform immigration as that is the main purpose for your stay in Japan. A person on an instructors visa who switches command/schools needs to inform immigration that they’re still doing the same type of work and not violating their visa. On a spouse visa or PR visa, you don’t need to inform them as that’s not the main purpose of the visa.
Only work/student visa holders are required to comply with Article 19-16 (item 1): https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/applications/procedures/nyuukokukanri10_00014.html)
And Article 19-16 (item 2): https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/applications/procedures/nyuukokukanri10_00015.html
Spouse visa holders and dependent visa holders need comply with Article 19-16 (item 3): https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/applications/procedures/nyuukokukanri10_00016.html which basically means you only need to notify immigration within 14 days after divorce or death of your visa sponsoring spouse.
Edit: if you have a pending PR application then you need to notify immigration of a job change, even on a spouse visa though. Because you would have signed to agree to on the “letter of understanding” you submitted with your PR application: https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/content/001355579.pdf
here’s the cheat code
work visa/status : anything work related
spouse visa/status : anything spouse/marriage related
[https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/publications/materials/newimmiact_4_q-and-a_page3.html](https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/publications/materials/newimmiact_4_q-and-a_page3.html)
You can see in the link it clearly states: 「また、『日本人の配偶者等』等の身分・地位に基づく在留資格を有する方は、所属機関の変更を届け出る必要はありません。」
So you definitely don’t need to notify the immigration.