angra

All,

I need to make a 100KY furikomi while visiting Japan. Destination bank is UFJ. I'll be staying in Shinjuku. I have a US, chipped Schwab ATM card. My ability to speak Japanese is very low, and my ability to read Kanji is about that of a Japense 2nd or 3rd grader.

I seek advice on the easiest/simplest/most-likely-for-baka-gaijin-not-to-screw-it-up path.

Should I go to a UFJ ATM and try a card furikomi?

Should I get 100K cash from a 7-11 and then do a cash furikomi at a UFJ branch?

Some other combination?

Edit to Add: all the advice I can find on the internet and here is old enough that I am unsure that they still apply to current conditions. Would greatly welcome anyone with recent experience/advice.

jamar

UFJ ATMs only take UnionPay, JCB, or Discover. Withdraw your cash at an ATM that will accept your card and bring it to the UFJ ATM to try a cash furikomi is the way I would do it.

angra

Thanks, that is HUGELY helpful information to get me started!

angra

How difficult will a cash furikomi be for a non-speaker? I can preprint the kanji I'm likely to encounter, just not sure how simple/complex the process at the ATM will be.

mjm

Get the cash, go to a branch, the service staff will walk you through it and the ATM is in English (up to a point). Not even remotely an issue.

All you need is the acct. #, the type of account, the account name and branch and away you go.

nishimark

Yes, go to a branch, not an ATM only place, and ask someone to help you. They will be very helpful, I'm sure. For destination you will need bank name, branch name, account number, and type of account (normal account, etc.). Name on receiving account will be helpful to confirm that you've entered all the information correctly. If you can supply all of that information in Japanese on a piece of paper, it will help the bank staff who are helping you.

angra

Awesome, thanks everyone! For timing reasons, ATM would be nice, but it sounds like the whole transaction will become basically foolproof if I get a human involved. I will go that route.

nishimark

The human will likely take you to the ATM and walk through the steps with you. Remember that you will need a few hundred yen for the transfer fee.

angra

Thanks to everyone who chimed in! This was the winning outcome.

I had some awkward timing issues as I wanted to get this done before the Tokyo DO event on Friday. That meant being a ten minute walk away from the closest branch of the bank I needed to use, 40 minutes after banks open.

So, I pulled cash on Thursday, and attempted to manage an atm furikomi myself (because it opened at 7, rather than 9 as branches do), and completley failed. The english menus didn't have furikomi as an option, and the Japanese menus were sufficiently different form any walkthroughs I found on the web. So, I went back to my hotel and waited until I could head back out and be at the bank at opening.

I said "Furikomi. help" and that did the job. Nice lady assisting customers did not speak an appreciable amount of english, but that was enough to get us started. She walked me through the process, entering pretty much all of the non-numeric data on my behalf. I was pleasantly surprised that instead of deducting the few hundred yen fee from my transfer, it asked for that on top of the transfered amount. This was better for me.

Everything went super smoothly and I was out the door of the bank by 9:05.