Icoca on Apple Pay with foreign credit card

Are there any problems with Icoca on Apple Pay with foriegn credit cards? Charging, topping up and refunds. I have heard you can charge but not top up.

Yes, lots of problems have been occuring with foreign credit cards, especially Visa. But some sources claim that the situation has started to improve recently.

As above. Friends have commented that many cards don't work and minimal do.

I don't know about Icoca, but I have Suica in my iPhone wallet, and was able to use my US based Mastercard to add funds on the fly while I was in Japan in November. I made sure to let the credit card company know ahead of time I would be there so they wouldn't block the charges, and never ran into any problems.

This is very helpful, as I also plan to use ApplePay.

Can someone clarify one thing that I am a little confused about after reading all over this site?

For Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka….(and maybe a side trip to Kobe for a meal):
Will one card work in all of these cities? Like if I add the ICOCA card to my ApplePay wallet, can I use this in all three? Or will I need different passes for each city?

I understand that the ICOCA will work for the Shinkasen as we travel between cities, but we will probably pre-book those tickets anyways with reserved seats.

Thank you!

@BrianEats
will I need different passes for each city?

Have you really read the website?
https://www.japan-guide.com/e/e2359_003.html

The first sentence is literally:
"Suica, Pasmo, Icoca and seven more of Japan's most popular IC cards were made compatible with each other in 2013, making it possible to travel on almost all trains, subways and buses in most of Japan's largest cities with just a single of these cards."

About using the shinkansen with these IC cards, it is detailed in the same page.

By the way, they are not "passes" but prepaid cards, same as London's Oyster card, Singapore's EZ-Link or Sydney's Opal, for example, if you have visited one of these cities.

@Mellye

Thanks for the clarification. Information overload so I think I just kept getting deeper into the reading. Appreciate it!