Terminology

• 帰化申請【きかしんせい】
  • 帰化【Kika】: means naturalization
  • 申請【Shinsei】: means application
  • 帰化申請【Kikashinsei】: means “naturalization application”
• 法務局【ほうむきょく】: means “Legal Affairs Bureau”
• 行政書士【ぎょうせいしょし】
  • 行政【Gyōsei】: means Executive / Administrative
  • 書士【Shoshi】: means “Scrivener” (a clerk who deals with ofiicial/formal documents)
  • 行政書士【Gyōsei shoshi】: Administrative scrivener
• 源泉徴収票 (げんせんちょうしゅうひょう)
  • 源泉徴収【Genzenchōshū】: Tax withheld by your company
  • 源泉徴収票【Genzenchōshū-hyō】: Withholding tax certificate (tax certificate slip)
• 国籍証明書【国籍証明書】: Nationality Certificate
• 動機書【Dōki-sho】: Motivation letter
• 帰化者の証明書【きかしゃのしょうめいしょ】
  • 帰化者【Kika-sha】: Naturalized person
  • 証明書【shōmei-sho】: Certificate
  • 帰化者の証明書【Kika-sha no shōmei-sho】: Naturalized person’s certificate
• 帰化届【Kikatodoke】: Naturalization notification (informing city office that you have been naturalisated)
• 戸籍謄本【Kosekitōhon】: Official copy of the family register

About Kikashinsei

“帰化申請【きかしんせい】” is the process of submitting application for “Naturalization” in Japan.

Definition of Naturalization:
Naturalization (or naturalisation) is the legal act or process by which a non-national of a country acquires the nationality of that country.

In Japan, you can submit Naturalization application to “法務局” in following ways:

• Method-1: All by yourself
  • Prepare all documents
  • All documents (English & Non-English) must be translated to Japanese. In case of Non-English document, it must be translated into English first and then translate it from English to Japanese
  • Call regional “法務局” office and schedule application submission date
  • Send addtional documents if asked (after application submission)
• Method-2: Paid service
  • Hire 行政書士
  • Hire Lawyer (FYI, not all lawyer deal with 帰化申請) or contact a Law Firm

Required document list

(Note) On the day of application submission

• All the documents of which photocopies are being submitted
  • Bring original documents, bring ID Cards (residence card, driving licence etc.)
  • The staff will verify all photocopies by comparing with original documents / cards
• All the documents that are not in Japanese
  • All Non-English documents (in my case, documents written in Bengali) must be translated to English (in my case, I did it)
  • All English documents must be translated to Japanese (in my case, Administrative scrivener did it)

Documents collect from Japan:

• Residence card copy (both sides)
  • Your residence card
  • Spouse’s residence card
• Passport copy (all pages, front & back too)
  • Your passport (both current & old, if you have more than one passport)
  • Spouse’s passport (both current & old)
• Withholding tax certificate copy
  • 源泉徴収票 will be given by the employeer/company every year (ask HR to get it)
  • Make sure your “Withholding tax certificate” is clean (in my case there was some missing year-end-adjustment, therefore I had to file “Kakuteishinkoku (Tax return)” by myself to fix my tax certificate issue)
• Certificate of Nationality (国籍証明書)
  • Contact your embassy to get it
  • You must sumbit the original document (not photocopy)
• A copy of your most recent pension newsletter (最新の年金定期便のコピー)
  • You can download it from myna Portal (https://myna.go.jp/)
  • By default, it arrives to your address once a year around your birthday month (In my case, I stopped the delivery in myna portal setting. Whenever I need it, I just download it from myna portal)
• Copy of qualification certificate (公的な資格を持っている場合は)
  • In my case, I submitted JLPT N3 certificate
  • If you have any professional certification (other than educcational institute certificate), you can submit that as well
• Copy of your house rental agreement (ご自宅の賃貸借契約書のコピー)
  • All pages of rental agreement document
  • Example: UR Danchi contract
• Health insurance card (both sides)
  • Your health insurance card
  • Spouse’s health insurance card
• Pictures
  • ID Photo
    • Taken within 6 months
    • Size: 50cm x 50cm
    • Number: 2 photos
  • Snapshot pictures (recent photos of family, friends, and colleagues, 3 types, 1 of each)
    • Family pictures (both your family & your spouse’s family)
      • 1 picture - You & Spouce with your whole family
      • 1 picture - You & Spouce with spouse’s whole family
    • Friends: 1 picture - you with your close friends
    • Colleagues: 1 picture - you with your Colleagues (i.e., any company event, meetup etc.)
• Certificate of employment and salary
  • There is a format that needs to be filled & signed by HR. In my case I got the format from 行政書士
  • Original document (not photocopy)
• Copy of bankbook
  • All the bankbooks - all accounts which haave balance
  • All pages (including front & back cover page)
  • Both yours & your spouse’s bankbooks
• Remittance statement (if you are sending money to family)
  • Documents related to remittances to dependent relatives residing overseas
  • If you send money to family (i.e. parent), then get remittance statement from the remittance service you use (you can email the remittance service to get the statement)
  • Example: Kyodai remittance statement
• Motivation letter (動機書)
  • Handwritten by you
  • In my case, the 行政書士 gave me a document regarding what to write

Documents collect from your own country (in my case Bangladesh):

• Graduation certificate of highest level of education (i.e., BSc. Certificate)
  • Photocopy of original certificate (if you have original certificate)
  • If you don’t have original certificate, photocopy of provisional certificate is ok
• Your marriage certificate (ご本人の婚姻証明書)
• Parents’ marriage certificate (ご両親の婚姻証明書)
• Your birth certificate (ご本人の出生証明書)
• Birth certificate of all siblings
  • Each of your brother
  • Each of your sister
• Family Certificates (two types)
  • 1 certificate (you as a family head): You and your spouse only
  • 1 certifiate (family relationship): Including your parents, yourself, two brothers, and sisters (exclude your spouse)
  • You can get it from city office / Union Porishod
• Mother’s statement (申述書・Shinjutsu-sho)
  • Hand written by your mother (yours only, not your spouse’s)
  • Written in your native language. In my case, it was in Bengali language, so I translated it to English & 行政書士 translated that English document to Japanese
  • 行政書士 gave me a sample document regarding what my mother should write in the statement document (the sample was in Japanese, so I translated it to Bengali language & sent it to my mother)

Procedure

Flow:

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Prepare the list of required documents.
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Fillup set of application documents
(in my case, Administrative scrivener did it).
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Call Legal Affairs Bureau office to schedule application submission date & time.
(In my case, Legal Affairs Bureau office location is kudanshita, Tokyo)
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Naturalization application submission to the Legal Affairs Bureau
(on scheduled date & time).
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Interview at the Legal Affairs Bureau (about 5 or 6 months after application).
Bring your spouse on the interview day.
(interview questions: just basic questions regarding you and the document you submitted).
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Call from Legal Affairs Bureau
(in case additional documents are required).
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Result announcement: Call from Legal Affairs Bureau
(about few months after the interview).
Will inform you about the result (i.e. おめでとうございます・congratulations), 
also will explain the next things to do.

Legal Affairs Bureau will send "帰化者証明書・Kika-sha shōmei-sho" Naturalization certificate to your address.
(will arrive within few days after the result announcement)
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Notes:

• Legal Affairs Bureau will send “帰化届・Kikatodoke” Naturalization notification document
• Fill up Naturalization notification document and submit it to City Office

How I did it

• Signed contract with a Law Firm (hired Administrative scrivener)
  • Went to the Law Firm office
  • Filled up a form
  • Lawyer would ask questions (i.e. job history, dependency, any law violations etc.)
  • Lawyer explained to me: plans, fess, application procedure & flow etc.
  • Cloudsign email came & signed it (cloudsign is a Cloud-based electronic contract service)
  • Received invoice PDF (first payment, half of total cost), and paid by furikomi
  • Once payment is confirmed, application procedure started
• Application procedure together with 行政書士 (Administrative scrivener)
  • All communication with Administrative scrivener were email based (I did not have to go to Law Firm office except the very first visit)
  • Administrative scrivener sent me two documents
    • Questionaire document (word file): need to fill up by yourself
    • Required document list (PDF file)
  • I gathered all the documents and sent it to Administrative scrivener (Law Firm office) by post mail
    • I translated Non-English documents (in my case documents in Bengali language) to English
    • Administrative scrivener translated all English documents to Japanese
  • Administrative scrivener scheduled application submission date by calling the Legal Affairs Bureau office
  • Administrative scrivener & me (together) went to the Legal Affairs Bureau office on schedule date
    • I brought original documents, ID Card etc. (i.e., Residence Card, Health Insurance Card, Passport)
    • The staff will check every photocopy and will ask for main document, ID Card etc. to verify
    • In my case there was an issue with my withholding tax certificate, so I was told to file tax return by myself and send the copy of tax return document (the staff gave an envelop to send the document). After filing tax return, I sent the document to Administrative scrivener (Administrative scrivener sent it to Legal Affairs Bureau office on be-half of me)
  • Additional documents (after application submission)
    • If there is any change (i.e., Residence Card update, new withholding tax certificate etc.), you must submit new documents
    • In my case I submitted following documents (few months later after the application submission):
      • Copy of new Residence Card (self & spouse)
      • Copy of withholding tax certificate
      • Copy of Driving Licence & Driving record certificate (運転記録証明書・Unten kiroku shōmei-sho). I got my driving licence after application submission, but if you already have driving licence then submit licence copy & Driving record certificate (together with other documents) on the application submission date
• Interview
  • Got call from Legal Affairs Bureau office. The staff gave me three dates to choose from for interview
  • I & my spouse went to Legal Affairs Bureau office on scheduled date
  • The staff asked questions
• Home visit (Legal Affairs Bureau staff came to my house)
  • The staff came to my house in the same date of interview (around 17:00)
  • The staff inspected my rental mansion (even checked my bathroom & refrigerator, LoL)
• Result announcement
  • One month after the interview, received call Legal Affairs Bureau office
  • The staff asked me if there is any change from my side (i.e. address change)
  • The staff mentioned that, within next 1 month (approximately), the result will be announced
  • 2 weeks after that call, got another call from Legal Affairs Bureau office and this time “おめでとうございます (congratulations)” :)

Law firm that I used

Samurai Administrative Scrivener Corporation (さむらい行政書士法人)

Website: https://samurai-law.com/en/
Call to schedaule initial discussion session: TEL (English) 080-4941-0978

Ueno office address:
【返送先】
〒110-0005
東京都台東区上野7-4-7 VORT上野4階
さむらい行政書士法人

Sample documents

[coming soon…]

Things to do after being naturalized

Notification to city office

• Fill up 帰化届【Kikatodoke】form document (this file will be sent to you by 法務局 together with 帰化者の証明書【Kika-sha no shōmei-sho】)
• Go to city office and submit 帰化届 & 帰化者の証明書
  • You have to submit original copy (原本) of 帰化者の証明書 (make copies of 帰化者の証明書 before submitting the original)
  • Tell the staff that you need 戸籍謄本【Kosekitōhon】
  • The staff will say “it will take few days to reflect new information to city’s information system (in my case, the staff told me it will take 3 days)

Get 戸籍謄本【Kosekitōhon】& 住民票【Jūmin-hyō】

• After few days go to city office and get 戸籍謄本 & 住民票
• Get many copies, because you need to submit thsese two documents in many places, for example:
  • To update driving licence, you need to submit 戸籍謄本 & 住民票 (original, not photocopy)
  • To apply for passport you need 戸籍謄本 & 住民票

Update/Re-issue MyNumber Card

• Go to city office, get ticket related to “MyNumber Card Matter” (go to the assigned counter when your ticket number is called)
• Explain the staff that you have been naturalized and your name has changed, you need to update MyNumber Card
• Updating will keep the old name and write new name in the memo section
• In my case, MyNumber card did not have enough space in memo section, so the staff told me to apply for re-issuing MyNumber Card
  • The staff asked me how I would like to apply? paper or online
  • I choose online method
  • The staff gave me a document, I scanned it using camera app, openned the link, filled up and submitted

Update driving licence

• Go to nearest police station (not koban)
• Fill up a form (there will be a dedicated section for driving licence where form and pen are available)
• Go to designated counter (written on top of the counter, there is dedicated counter for handling driving licence matters)
• Submit the form, 戸籍謄本 & 住民票

Apply for passport

• After my number card is re-issued / updated login to myna portal
• Fill up the form and submit