I’m surprised you have anything positive to say about Y-mobile. Watch out for their huge cancellation fees and auto-renewals. You should take their refusal to renew your contract as a blessing - they have terrible terms if you ever want to get out of your contract - although no different to the other big mobile providers. The beauty of the MVNOs is that there is so much choice that you can shop around for terms - like Mineo - which has no fixed contract length and no cancellation fees.
Personally my experience with Y-mobile wasn’t too bad. It was a bit of a hassle to cancel because I had to sign a contract with both E-mobile and Wilcom, and then there were some options that were free at first but would be charged after a certain amount of time. I feel like they try to earn money by making their contracts so complicated that customers don’t know when to cancel what part of the service, but when signing the contract I made the staff write down for me by which date to cancel which service, so I was able to get out of the contract without paying any additional fees
But yeah, MVNOs sound like a much better deal! Haven’t been able to make up my mind which one to use yet…
If you’re in Japan and happen to speak Japanese (or your Google-Fu is decent), I’d recommend this site
And, even though I big them up so much that you might think I work for them (I genuinely don’t), BICSIM has access to Wi2 WiFi points around the country, as well as a good family plan that allows voice and up to 10GB of data, as well as multiple sim cards attached to the same account, so you can have one in your tablet for data, one in your phone etc. They’re killin it right now!
I have just been through all this poop. I had an iphone with Hong Kong sim, tried everything to get a Japanese one with voice. Ended up at BIC-Camera and only 2gb data, which only lasted 1 month. My HK sim contract has ceased. Luckily I got a voice sim from a friend who was leaving Japan. I do have a near new Lumia 640 XL Dual Windows 10 phone I can sell you if you wish. I bought this soI could have dual sims, one of which was going to be for Japan; but do not need now. I have multiply sims as I worked in HK, live in Ho Chi Minh and work in Tokyo and am Australian. My next step is to go for a WORLD SIM for permanent use as I am Asia centric. You get a US and UK number and can global roam for about 75% off the usual charges. Anyway if you are interested in my simless phone give me a call (Wayne +81 70 4200 1665)
I asked a Japanese friend for help, and tried to register with U-mobile. My friend was able to sign up with his debit card, but for some reason my MUFJ debit card was declined.
Has anyone had any luck using a Japanese debit card at any MVNO?
I prefer not to use my foreign credit card because my salary is paid to my Japanese bank account.
For the moment I tried applying for a Japanese credit card, but I heard applications by foreigners often get declined.
Secondly, the “I can’t get a credit card as I am a foreigner” is for bitter people who have just arrived and have applied for some ridiculous AMEX centurion card expecting to be treated like the Emperor. If you have a salary that is regularly paid into a bank account, your first port of call will be your banks credit card. If you have zero credit rating in Japan, then the Amazon.jp VISA card and the Rakuten card are very hard to be refused from. The Amazon one can be received in one week!
We came here with a yearlong visa and before coming we suspended our AT&T contract iphones (have to either pass the two-year mark or pay off the phone before leaving). (Just set it up with phone carrier before you leave.) We had AT&T suspend our numbers so we can reclaim them when we’re back in the US. That costs us about $30/month to save two phone numbers saved. Then when we got to Japan, we went to a BIC store and bought their SIM (which they installed into our US phone) and signed up for a month-by-month contract with them. It only costs about $20US a month to have a Japanese number and then we are using our US phone over here. They have different plans. Just show up in Japan with a phone that is suspended and then go to BIC for a month-by-month plan. Your US phone then becomes a Japanese phone for as long as you need it.
That doesn’t sound too bad, but I’m guessing that the cost of the calls is pretty high? You don’t usually get something for nothing (or nearly nothing) when it comes to phones in Japan!
For the people who still use telephone calls that aren’t VOIP, uMobile now offers 10 mins free per call.
They also offer an all you can eat data for just under ¥3000, which allows me to call in to a long webEx meeting via the app for all my conference calls, with higher quality voice than over the rubbishy old phone lines.
Number porting from your horrific S**tBank account included
But you still need a visa to make a contract, don’t you? I have a WiMax
Wifi Router with no need for a visa (I only use tourist visas when I visit
Japan), but, as far as I know, you can’t get a contract with a Japanese
phone number without a visa. Isn’t that right?
I’m a little confused about your requirements.
If you don’t need voice calling, then the many data sims out there are the best value for tourists, which don’t need a visa.
If you need to set up a contract, then yes, you will need identification and a Japanese address to send bills to, depending on provider. Some also do credit checks too if there is any discount handset involved.
If you are visiting from a country with a network provider with a roaming partner, check that out as you may find that it is included in your monthly fee for certain networks without any extra charge to you.
For Voice SIM options, you’d be looking at rentals, e.g.
That’s the problem! Japan seems to be the only country in the world where
you can’t get a SIM with a phone number without having the equivalent of a
gaijin card. You can get very temporary ones (designed for short-term
visitors), but the cost is crazy (about Y450/day plus calling charges).
I used to live here for a long time and suffered with Docomo and Softbank.
Now waiting to get a new longer-term visa, and wondering what is the
cheapest/best provider to go for.
Many thanks! However, this is another example of rip-off prices in Japan. I
was in Bangkok last week and bought a 7 day voice (up to 100 baht free
calling) and unlimited data SIM card for around Yen 950. And in virtually
every other country in the world you can buy SIM cards in multiple
locations and charge them online or in convenience stores. The big
companies have a monopoly here (even the smaller ones have to piggyback on
the big company networks).
Not sure, why this one-year old thread wasn’t closed.
It’s the law in Japan, that mobile number can only be sold to residents.
Anyway, I highly recommend OCN. I use them for my wife’s phone. Monthly fee is less than 2000 yen for a voice sim card and 3GB of data. The leftover data can also carried over to the next month, so you can have up to 6GB per month.
You can also get additional SIM cards (voice or data only) to share the data plan. This is very useful if you have multiple devices. OCN also give a few hundreds yen discount if you use OCN Hikari as your home internet.
I myself use Docomo, cause I need kakehodai for work. It’s not cheap, but company pays for it.
