1. If you are familiar with my posts in the main visa thread (can't fault you if you're not because they are surely deeply buried by now), you'll know that I'm generally averse to paying others for services that I could do myself. Furthermore, efforts have been made to make self service a little less daunting over the course of the past year. That having been said, I definitely recommend outsourcing this drill in spite of the high costs for renewals, let alone for first time applicants. Basically, there are lots of moving parts, all of which are easy to screw up, and with an agent, you don't have to worry about things like booking time at one of the designated hospitals for the health check.

2. My agent charges Y4500 (plus the Y1000 that goes directly to the government). I shopped around, and found a few other agents in the Y3000-3500 range who could also guarantee 5 year RPs, but I ended up sticking with my guy because doing so entailed almost no effort on my part (i.e. he already had all of my documents, so I just had to print and sign a few things). I did have to go to the entry/exit office in person for the "interview"; apparently, this is pretty much impossible to avoid. The most important factor for me in choosing an agent was making sure they had big companies as clients; this all but guarantees that they have decent guanxi with relevant bureaucrats.