On Aug 29, 3:19 pm, "Sigi Rindler" <srind...@da2.so-net.ne.jp> wrote:
> Short question concerning people on a "working holiday visa".
>
> An Australian works at a Tokyo restaurant. The owner asked the office which
> handles working holiday visa holders (in  Nakano) whether the tax for this
> kind of work is 10% as usual. She was told that she has to deduct 20%...
>
> Does anybody know about this regulation? Any other registered resident in
> Japan with a different visa status pays 10% as I know.
> The restaurant owner called the local tax office as well. The answers depend
> on who picks up the phone, and no printed statement is available!
> Anybody knows more on this subject?

I don't know if it's an actual regulation, but a friend who won a
large cash prize when here in Japan as a visitor encountered the same
20% tax at source. He was told it's just a provisional assessment,
based on the reasoning that the tax office does not yet know how much
more he'd be earning in that tax year, and he'll be leaving the
country before the end of the fiscal year anyway so it'd be difficult
for them to claim off him later. He was assured that *all* he'd have
to do was request a refund when he filed his next tax claim in Japan,
or ask his own country's tax office to file a claim on his behalf.

I think he decided to cut his losses with that--there was no way to
argue it since the money had already been deducted.

--
The email address I use is just a spam-trap. Don't write to it if you
want a reply.