Change working visa from 1 to 3 years

I have a working visa as specialist in humanities/international services for 1 year length stay and already renewed it once. I wonder is it possible to get the 3 year length visa in order to avoid the renewal process each year (it turns to be rather time consuming...). What should I do?

Thanks for the answer in advance!

It is up to the discretion of Japan Immigration whether you get a 1-year or 3-year visa when you renew. You can ask for 3 years at renewal time but there is no guarantee you'll get it.

It's not possible to change your current visa from one to 3 years.

Some people get 3 year visas from the beginning, others spend years having to renew every year.

All you can do is write "3 years" on the form where you have to specify the desired length of extension next time you renew. You may then be given 3 years, or you may end up with one year again.

Thank you very much for your kind attention. If possible, I would like to know what their decision is based upon? I am graduated from the linguistic university (major in Japanese), first time when I came to Japan I was a monbukagakusyou scholarship student and notwithstanding it I am not able to get a long-stay visa? What do they take into consideration then? (Maybe the problem is that I have once changed the place of work?)

I have seen/heard this discussed a lot and the consensus is that no-one knows but Immigration. It seems to be quite arbitrary- for all we know it may be based on how the Immigration officer who looks at your application is feeling that day- whether he/she is in a good mood or a bad mood!

My first two visas were for one year and after that I got 3 year visas.

I know people who have stayed in the same job and continued to get one year visas, and people who changed jobs but got 3 year visas.

If your original visa was 1 year, that is what your renewal will be. I tried to change from 1 year to 3 years and was told it was impossible to change due to the original visa and I had a 3 year contract to back it up.

It is possible to change, because I and a lot of other people also started off on a one year visa and then were suddenly given 3 year visas at renewal time. Immigration has its own reasons for giving you one or 3 year visas, and they don't usually give accurate answers on why they give you one or the other.

As some of the others have said, there doesn't seem to be any particular reason why. I was on a 1-year visa my first year and have been on 3 year visas ever since, so it is possible to chanage. I have had friends go from 1-year to 3-year then back to 1-year visas. I often wonder if they have a quota to fill for monetary reasons, as it costs money each time to renew it.