Refund JapanThis page is written for English-speaking travellers going to Japan.
After you fly home
How the money reaches you, what can be deducted from it, and what we are measuring from the first day the system runs.
Covers: How the money reaches you · what a handling fee can take · currency and your card's exchange rate · what we measure from November 1
Start here
How the money reaches you
The Japan Tax-free Shop Association lists the routes the money can take: cash, a credit card, a smartphone payment app, or a transfer handled by an approved operator. Which of these you get is settled with the shop at the time of purchase, not at the airport.
One caution. Whether cash is actually handed over at departure has not been published, so do not build a plan around walking out of the terminal with yen.
The routes, and what is still open about each of them
What can come off the top
Every amount on this site is the maximum before any handling fee, because the fee has not been published — not the rate, not whether there is one at all on every route. That is the single biggest unknown for anyone working out whether a purchase is worth the trouble.
Currency, if your card is not in yen
The refund is a Japanese consumption tax amount, so it is a figure in yen. What lands in your account is that figure after your card issuer converts it, at a rate we cannot know and do not publish. If you want to compare what you got against what you expected, compare the yen figure on your receipt with the yen figure on your statement, not the converted totals.
What we measure from November 1
From the first day the system runs, this site publishes what it observes: the fee actually deducted, the number of days between the customs step and the money arriving, and how long the step took at Narita, Haneda and Kansai. Measurements, not projections.
Common questions at this stage
How long does the refund take?
Not published. Pages quoting one to two weeks, or two to six weeks, are estimating. We will publish measured figures once there are any.
How much will the fee be?
Not published. Treat every figure here as the ceiling.
Will it come back in my own currency?
The amount is set in yen. The conversion is your card issuer’s, at your card issuer’s rate.
The amount is smaller than I calculated. Why?
The most likely explanations are a handling fee and the exchange rate. Neither is something this site can look up for you, but stage 5 sets out what to check and who to ask.