COLUMN
Column
Useful information on social insurance, subsidies, and labor management.
Delivered in an easy-to-understand manner from the perspective of a labor consultant.
When a worker transfers, what happens to social and employment insurance?
Seen from the labour side, a transfer is a separation and a hire happening at once. The old employer files losses of insured status, the new employer files acquisitions, and the foreign worker employment status notification is required on both sides. Relocation costs are a matter to be explained in writing at the application stage. We lay out both sides with deadlines.
Staffing standards and labour for child development support and after-school day services — employment contracts and the wages behind the treatment-improvement addition
The staffing standard for child development support and after-school day services is not simply "how many people" but "how many full-time-equivalent hours are met". So working-time management and employment-contract design tie directly to keeping the designation. Child instructors or nursery teachers must number two or more for up to ten children with disabilities, adding one more for every five beyond ten, and at least one must be full-time. To draw the treatment-improvement addition, wage-improvement plans, the career-path requirement and the workplace-environment requirement must be met and written into the work rules and wage rules. Part-time and short-hour staff acquire a social-insurance duty once certain requirements are met. Designation applications go to a Gyoseishoshi, premises to real estate, accounting and tax to a tax accountant.
What happens to employees when a company is sold or taken over? Labor and social insurance to check in business succession and M&A
Whether employees' labor contracts and social insurance/employment insurance are affected when a company is sold or taken over depends on the type of M&A transaction. A share transfer leaves them in principle unchanged, a business transfer requires the individual consent of each employee, a company split follows notification and objection procedures under the Act on Succession to Labor Contracts upon Company Split, and a merger succeeds them comprehensively. This article explains the "labor review (labor due diligence)" of employment contracts, work rules, Article 36 agreements, attendance, unpaid overtime, annual paid leave, social insurance, employment insurance, labor insurance, payroll, retirement benefits and labor-management agreements that should be done before selling or buying.
Joseikin or hojokin — which one, and who do you ask?
Broadly, money for hiring people and changing how they work is a joseikin (employment-related subsidy), and that is the shakai hoken roumushi's field; money for starting a business or installing equipment is a hojokin (grant), and that is the gyoseishoshi's field. The funding source and the way applications are assessed both differ. Starting from Article 62 of the Employment Insurance Act, we set out why the person you ask changes.
If you are aiming for a subsidy, the form of the first contract decides it
Under the Regular Employment Conversion Course of the Career Up Subsidy, the amount changes according to whether you converted a fixed-term contract worker or an indefinite-term contract worker into a regular employee. Which of the two you choose at the moment you take a part-timer on decides the amount a year later. And if the Career Up Plan is not submitted by the day before the conversion is carried out, nothing is paid at all.
An Overseas Business Trip and an Overseas Posting Are Completely Different for Workers' Accident Compensation
Workers' accident compensation insurance follows the territoriality principle. On an overseas business trip, benefits come from the insurance of the establishment in Japan; an overseas posting is outside that, and without special enrollment no benefits can be received. The dividing line is not the length of the stay but where the direction and orders come from. This article also sets out the certificate of coverage under the Japan-China Social Security Agreement.
The care worker treatment-improvement addition — how do you revise the wage rules? The line between the addition and labour
The care worker treatment-improvement addition cannot be maintained just by drawing down the money. You must write into the wage rules and work rules "which wage, to whom, and how much" the increased funds are distributed as, and only when you can show the plan and the results can it be claimed and maintained. Designing the wage system is for the Shakai Hoken Roumushi, filing the plan and result reports to the designating authority is for the Gyoseishoshi, and tax is for the tax accountant. Whether you raise base pay or pay a lump sum changes both where it is written in the work rules and how it feeds through to social-insurance premiums.
Hiring a Specified Skilled Worker (Care) foreign national in care and disability welfare — the key points of labor and social insurance
A Specified Skilled Worker (i) "Care" foreign national enters after passing the Care Skills Evaluation Test and the Care Japanese Evaluation Test, so in principle they can be counted in the care-insurance staffing standard from the start of employment (technical intern trainees and EPA candidates in principle after six months). Working conditions must be equal to or better than for a Japanese person, and social insurance applies compulsorily regardless of nationality when the requirements are met. The residence-status application and support plan are the work of a Gyoseishoshi; labor management, social insurance, and the lump-sum withdrawal payment are the work of a Shakai Hoken Roumushi.
When you have to part ways with an employee, do you ask a shakai hoken roumushi or an attorney?
We tell our clients: "Unless there is a very good reason, we do not recommend dismissal." Still, there are cases where dismissal becomes unavoidable, and cases that general principles alone cannot settle do happen in practice. This page explains the framework for judging dismissal, the procedures that remain afterwards, and where a shakai hoken roumushi's work ends and an attorney's begins.
Once you have set up a company, what has to be filed and by when
A corporation becomes a covered workplace for social insurance even with a single representative director. Hire anyone and labor insurance is required as well. The item most easily overlooked is the labor insurance estimated premium declaration, which carries a separate deadline of 50 days from the day the insurance relationship is established. The names, destinations and deadlines of every filing are set out in a table.
Winding up a company — what to do about social insurance and labour insurance
When you wind up a company you need three things: the notification of total loss of covered workplace status for social insurance, the notification of abolition of a covered workplace for employment insurance, and the final insurance premium return for labour insurance. Notifications of loss of insured status are filed separately, one per person. There is no such notification as a "labour insurance notification of extinction of the insurance relationship." The names, filing destinations and deadlines are set out in a table.
Customer harassment prevention becomes mandatory from October 2026
Customer harassment prevention becomes a legal obligation for every employer from October 1, 2026, regardless of company size. Measures to prevent sexual harassment against job applicants and others also become mandatory at the same time. The required measures are the same as for power harassment: a clear policy, a consultation system, and follow-up after incidents. This page explains what customer harassment is, what exactly you must do, how it differs from ordinary complaints, and whom to consult.
Three things that trip you up when you put a family member on the payroll
Before you put a family member on the payroll, check three things — whether they live in the same household, whether you will make them a director, and whether you are hoping to claim a subsidy. A relative living in the same household is as a rule not an insured person under employment insurance, but where the requirements can be shown to be met, they are treated as an insured person. A table sets out employment insurance and social insurance for each position.
When a sole proprietor dies and the heir continues the business, what happens to the employees' social insurance
When a sole proprietor dies and the heir continues the business, the treatment is fundamentally different from when a company's representative director dies. In a sole proprietorship the proprietor is a natural person, so when the proprietor dies, the social- and labour-insurance applicable workplace that had them as proprietor comes to a stop, and the successor takes over as a new proprietor. In practice it moves as a combination of "closure (extinction) of the applicable workplace under the former proprietor" and "new application (new establishment) with the successor as proprietor". The employment contract is with the sole proprietor personally and is not automatically succeeded; the successor re-concludes it. Paid leave is a matter of continuous service (Labor Standards Act Article 39), and where the relation substantively continues it is generally aggregated. The quasi-final tax return (Income Tax Act Article 125) and inheritance tax go to a tax accountant, succession of permits to a Gyoseishoshi, and inheritance registration to a judicial scrivener.
The Older Worker Continued Employment Benefit was reduced in 2025 — how should you review wage design?
From 1 April 2025, the maximum rate of the Older Worker Continued Employment Benefit was cut from 15% to 10%. It applies to those who newly reach age 60 on or after 1 April 2025; those who reached 60 by 31 March 2025 keep the former maximum of 15%. Workplaces that set post-60 wages low on the assumption of the benefit need to review re-employment wages to absorb the thinner benefit. Calculating the rate and filing claims is the work of a Shakai Hoken Roumushi; the final decision on whether the system applies is made by Hello Work.
What a job posting must state
At the recruiting stage there is already a duty to state the work, pay, hours and other conditions (Employment Security Act, Article 5-3) — separate from the disclosure at hiring under Article 15 of the Labor Standards Act. We list the required items, what happens when the posting and the real conditions diverge, and what was added from April 2024.
We want to run payroll in-house on freee — what do we ask a shakai hoken roumushi for?
Compare in-house payroll with outsourcing by the work that remains with the company, software costs and support scope. 四葉's HR Outsourcing Plan starts at 33,000 yen per month plus initial setup from 88,000 yen, both including tax. In-house support and transition fees require individual confirmation; there is no automatic fixed discount.
What does it cost to have a shakai hoken roumushi run your payroll?
Outsourced payroll is usually priced as a base fee plus an amount per employee. This article explains how to compare outsourcing and in-house support. 四葉's HR Outsourcing Plan starts at 33,000 yen per month for 1–3 people, plus initial setup and workflow design from 88,000 yen, both including tax.
When an employee takes leave for mental health reasons — injury and sickness allowance, handling the leave period, and returning to work
When a medical certificate citing mental health problems arrives, the first thing to check is the leave-of-absence provisions in your work rules. Leave of absence is not a nationwide statutory scheme; much of it depends on what the company has laid down. During the leave you organize the treatment of wages, social insurance premiums, the injury and sickness allowance, contact with the employee, and the handling of health information. On return, the attending physician's certificate alone does not decide the matter: the company checks work performance capacity against actual duties, hours and commuting, and the workplace's readiness. This article organizes what a company checks from the start of leave through the return to work.
With the shift to the My Number health card, what does the company do? The qualification-confirmation certificate and dependent procedures
The conventional health insurance card stopped being newly issued on 2 December 2024. Already-issued cards were usable for up to one year, but that period has now passed. Employees who do not hold a My Number health card (a My Number Card registered for health-insurance use) are issued a "qualification-confirmation certificate" by the insurer, and by presenting it they can receive insured medical care as before. All the company can do is correctly file the acquisition and dependent notifications; the qualification decision is made by the insurer.
Shall we start by reviewing how you work?
四葉社会保険労務士事務所 (Kohinata, Bunkyo-ku; a 5-minute walk from Myogadani Station on the Tokyo Metro Marunouchi Line) helps you, starting with a review of your current labour practices.
LINE connects you directly to our representative, Joji Uramatsu. Messages are accepted 24/7 and answered in order.
5 min walk from Myogadani Sta. (Tokyo Metro Marunouchi Line)｜Tue & Wed 10:00–19:00 / Mon, Thu–Sun 18:00–19:00