Deposit cash to the university: Fee

Hi,
I plan to visit my son who will study at the university in Tokyo in this coming October. It is the first time for both of us.

I will arrive in Tokyo a week after the school opening. I plan to carry with me the cash to pay his tuition fee because the transfer fee for the money transfer to Japan in our country is unreasonably high.

I understand that the university prefers the money transfer to their account via electronic as they give us all detail of the bank account. Their bank account is Sumitomo Mitsui Bank Corp (SMBP).
My questions:
(1), Can I do the cash deposit to the SMBP bank account at any bank or it must be SMBP?
(2). What is the ballpark figure of fee? The tuition is around YEN 300,000 (three hundred thousand YENs)
(3). What is the bank office hour?

Appreciate your kind help. Thanks,

John

Your son will probably have his own bank account, so you should deposit the cash on your son's account and do the transfer from it.

Note: this will not work if your son's account is with Japan Post Bank. (With JP Bank, foreigners need to have lived in Japan for 6 months before they can make transfers to accounts at other banks.)

also, your son may not open a bank account at other banks , when his resident term (in Japan) is less than 6 months.
the regulation has changed and becomes more strict.

Correct me if I am wrong, but as far as I know even if you don't have a bank account you can send money from bank A to bank B. The fee is in most case 864 yen for more than 30,000 yen. Transfer with in the same bank is somewhat cheaper (540 yen, maybe). You can ask the staff for detail.

Correct me if I am wrong, but as far as I know even if you don't have a bank account you can send money from bank A to bank B.

Yes, but such transfers are limited to 100,000 yen, so in OP's case that means at least three transfers and thus three times the fees. (Though fees are not as high as I thought; 432 yen per transfer if done from an SMBC ATM.)

Yes, but such transfers are limited to 100,000 yen, so in OP's case that means at least three transfers and thus three times the fees. (Though fees are not as high as I thought; 432 yen per transfer if done from an SMBC ATM.)

Thank you for your reply. I am not familiar with this so I googled and found Mizuho bank's webpage.

https://www.mizuhobank.co.jp/retail/help/furikomi_kaisei.html

It states that you can't transfer more than 100,000 yen via ATM machine. It seems it is possible to transfer more at the manned casher window. At this time you have to carry your ID (for a foreigner, passport is OK, I think) with you.

Ah, yes, I had forgotten about the counters since I always use the ATMs... A foreign passport probably wouldn't be accepted as ID; foreign residents can use residence cards.

new regulation is here.
https://www.bk.mufg.jp/info/20190418_furikomi.html

The above link is about MUFG; I don't see that SMBC has anything similar.

All,
Thanks for all the kind comments.

After reading through the thread, I make the decision to go to the bank personally and will do the cash deposit thru the bank cashier.

From the thread, please correct me if I get it wrongly that:
(1). I can do it on behalf of my son.
(2). There is no limit of cash deposit since this will be done face-to-face.
(3). There is a fee for it and it should be less than 1,000 yen, give or take , for the cash deposit of 300,000 yen.

If you would correct anything stated above, I will highly appreciate it.

Thanks.

John

(1) Unclear whether, as a foreign non-resident, you will have any ID that will be accepted. Why can't your son do it himself with his residence card?

Note also that this could require significant Japanese language skills.

Note also that this could require significant Japanese language skills.

Well, I am not sure, but I don't think so. The OP should bring some documents that the school provides so if the OP shows it to the staff, he/she will know what to do.

Bank transfers at the counter are done with a standardized form, which either is pre-filled by the recipient, or must be filled manually by the sender, all in Japanese. I'd be surprised if the bank staff agreed to fill it in place of the sender (and take responsibility for any mistakes).