How to pay for things in Japan
Card? IC? Touch? Suica? Cash?
For foreign tourists: in short, most places accept credit card in chip form (insert), but not many accept contactless, so bring the physical card. Carry some cash for smaller shops or rural places. Keep on hand some 100 yen coins for vending machines, laundry machines and shrines.
Payment methods
Credit cards
The most common form of cashless payment available for foreign tourists is a Visa/Mastercard credit card, specifically when using the chip.
Contactless credit card payment, aka “Paywave” or “tap”, exists but is still relatively rare (usually found in larger department stores such as Marui). If contactless payment is available, you can use either the card or mobile wallet (ApplePay) to tap. Contactless is called “touch” (タッチ/“tacchi”) here, so “Visa Paywave” is “Visa Touch” (ビザ タッチ/“biza tacchi”) or just “Card Touch” (カード タッチ/“kaado tacchi”). Unfortunately, because contactless card payment is still being taken up here, not all cashiers know about it even if it is available, so sometimes it’s better to simply check for it yourself.
How to check for the available payment methods? Luckily the symbol for “contactless” is the same. Most cashiers also display a “payment method” sign that looks like this:
If you see the Visa/Mastercard logo, it means the chip/insert method is supported. If you see the Visa/Mastercard logo near to a contactless logo (or near to the ApplePay logo), it means that contactless is supported. Note that the presence of the ApplePay logo alone does not mean Visa via ApplePay is supported — it just means that we can use transit and other e-money cards via ApplePay.
IC cards
Another common way for cashless payment is IC cards: Suica, Pasmo, ICOCA etc. They all refer to differently branded stored-value transit cards mainly used for trains and busses but also for retail stalls and vending machines.
The most common IC card is Suica, you can get one at train stations and recharge with cash. You can also add a Suica to ApplePay and recharge using a credit card, but it’s doesn’t seem to work for all foreign credit cards. It’s mainly useful for small purchases so you don’t have to fiddle with coins. There are many almost-interchangeable IC card variants so you may also come across Pasmo, ICOCA etc.
IC cards are usually accepted, but you can look for “e-money” (電子マネー/“denshi manee”) or for the logo that matches the card you’re holding.
Cash
When all else fails, cash is always reliable. Some places only accept cash, you can tell if they have a sign that says (or if the cashier tells you) 現金のみ “genkin nomi”. If you don’t see the payment method sign anywhere, it’s probably cash-only, but it doesn’t hurt to try with a card first.
At the cashier
After a few standard questions about the purchase (“do you need a bag” etc), the cashier will state the amount to pay and ask for the payment method おしはらいほうほう “oshiharai houhou”. Usually showing the card, Suica or cash works, or say “<method> de onegaishimasu” with <method> being:
- For contactless credit card:
カード タッチ“kaado tacchi” - For credit card via chip/insert:
カード“kaado” - For Suica or IC cards whether on phone or with a physical card:
スイカ“Suica” orアイシー“aishii” - For cash:
げんきん“genkin”
For contactless credit card, tap the card or phone on the terminal. For credit card, insert into the terminal, wait for the cashier to signal it’s done, then remove the card. In some cases you need to sign but it’s usually not needed, and sometimes you’ll be prompted to enter the PIN. With credit card, the cashier may ask the number of installments you want いっかつですか? “ikkatsu desu ka?” “single payment?” or なんかいですか? “nankai desu ka?” “how many payments?”, in which case just reply いっかつです “ikkatsu desu” “single payment”.
For Suica, tap the card or phone on the terminal.
For cash, put the cash into the tray or cash machine.
Instead of the cashier asking, you might instead be sent to a screen to choose the payment method (notably in 7–11 and supermarkets with self-payment kiosks). If so, select the payment method from the screen:
- クレジットカード for credit card
- 電子マネー for IC, then choose suica or your IC card
- 現金 for cash
An aside for residents
Japanese-issued credit cards
Most Japanese issued credit card are also either iD アイディ“aidi” or QuicPay クイックペイ “kuikkupei” cards (it’s one or the other).
Both iD and QuicPay are contactless payment methods, and fall under the e-money section. A Japanese-issued credit card could support both Visa contactless and iD at the same time, so choose either when making payment, though iD/QuickPay tend to be more widely supported.
QR payment
The category of QR code payment goes by different names: スマホ決済 “sumaho kessai’ “smartphone payment”, バーコード決済 “baakoodo kessai” “barcode payment”, QRコード決済 “kyuuaaru koodo kessai” “QR code payment”, or simply コード決済 “koodo kessai” “code payment”.
Within this category are many different providers such as Rakuten Pay, Paypay, LINE pay, etc. To pay using QR code, just mention the provider name. Following which, there are three ways to proceed depending on the cashier:
- If there is a QR code displayed, scan it with the app and input the amount. Show it to the cashier before clicking proceeding to pay.
- If there is no QR code but there is a barcode scanner or camera terminal, present the app’s QR code to the terminal. There’s no need to input payment amount.
- Otherwise, the cashier will scan your app’s QR code. There’s no need to input payment amount.
Other e-money cards
For every new chain store you visit chances are they have their own branded e-money (stored-value) card. The common ones are Waon, Nanaco, Rakuten Edy. To pay using these cards, just state the card name.
Real-life Examples
Here’re some more IRL payment method signs. As a fun challenge, for each of these figure out:
- Can we pay by Suica?
- What about Visa contactless?
- Is Rakuten Pay available?
- Is the 7–11 branded stored-value card supported?
