I’m a new ALT who’s only been living in Japan for a few months, and when I arrived my Board of Education set me up with a JCB bank account and debit card. Now I’m having some problems because it seems that there aren’t any apps that allow international money transfers using a JCB card, at least from what I’ve been able to find. I can’t use my JCB card with my PayPal or many subscription services I use, so I was hoping to transfer money from my new card to my American bank account. Does anyone have recommendations for how to go about this? I saw a post saying someone used Mizuho online banking to transfer money to Wise and then to their own bank account, but I’m at a loss for how to go about this. My Japanese is at a passable level conversationally but when it comes to reading I have a very hard time with kanji. Does anyone have any recommendations for this, or can help me figure out how to get set up with Mizuho and Wise? I downloaded the Mizuho global banking app but I keep failing the sign up check, and I don’t know why.
2 comments
I didn’t realize JCB had bank accounts. I have a JCB card through Mizuho (like getting a visa or Mastercard from banks in other countries).
I linked my JCB card to my Japanese PayPal, no problem.
Are you trying to use the JCB card with foreign subscriptions? I don’t think that works in most cases. I have a subscription to a book box I pay for with my JCB card, but I do it via PayPal.
Look at Wise (Transferwise) to transfer from your Japanese to US bank account. You can do the sign up in English.
You downloaded the Mizuho app? Mizuho is a bank. Do you already have an account with them? Did Mizuho give you the JCB card?
Do you mean a Mizuho bank account? The Mizuho cash card does function as a JCB debit card but that’s a minor point.
> there aren’t any apps that allow international money transfers using a JCB card, at least from what I’ve been able to find.
JCB uses the Discover network, so if you can find somewhere that takes Discover that might work.
> I saw a post saying someone used Mizuho online banking to transfer money to Wise and then to their own bank account, but I’m at a loss for how to go about this.
That sounds right. What did your try and where did you get stuck?
> Does anyone have any recommendations for this, or can help me figure out how to get set up with Mizuho and Wise?
https://wise.com/help/articles/2559761/how-to-pay-by-bank-transfer is their guide.
> I downloaded the Mizuho global banking app but I keep failing the sign up check, and I don’t know why.
Well without more details none of the rest of us can help with that. If your written Japanese is poor then the website will probably be easier than the app since you can use translation tools. Worst case you can do the transfer to wise in the branch at the counter, although that will be more expensive and less convenient.