The treatment-improvement add-on: do you ask a shakai hoken roumushi or a gyoseishoshi?

In short: The treatment-improvement add-on splits by stage. Designing the wage system — work rules, wage regulations, career-path requirements — and calculating the wage-improvement amount is work for a shakai hoken roumushi (Certified Social Insurance and Labor Consultant). Preparing the documents filed with the designating authority (the municipality) — the add-on structure notification, the plan, the performance report — is work for a gyoseishoshi (Certified Administrative Procedures Legal Specialist). One office cannot hold itself out as both, so the work is divided into two contracts.

"Should we ask a shakai hoken roumushi or a gyoseishoshi about the treatment-improvement add-on?" We hear this often from disability-welfare and long-term-care providers. Search the web and you will find that social insurance and labor consultant offices and gyoseishoshi offices both say they "handle the treatment-improvement add-on." It looks contradictory, but in fact each is simply pointing at a different stage.

Why does a single add-on involve two qualifications?

The treatment-improvement add-on consists of two things: raising wages, and reporting that you raised them. Those two fall under different statutes.

Article 2, paragraph 1 of the Certified Social Insurance and Labor Consultant Act (社会保険労務士法, Act No. 89 of 1968) sets out the work of a shakai hoken roumushi item by item. Item 1 covers preparing applications and other documents under the labor and social insurance laws and filing them on the client's behalf; item 3 covers consultation and guidance on labor management and other labor-related matters. Designing a wage system falls under item 3.

Article 1-2, paragraph 1 of the Certified Administrative Procedures Legal Specialist Act (行政書士法, Act No. 4 of 1951), on the other hand, defines the work of a gyoseishoshi as preparing, at another person's request, documents to be submitted to public agencies. The plan and the performance report filed with the designating authority — the municipality — belong here.

In other words, within the same add-on, the "wage side" and the "filing side" rest on different statutes.

How far does the shakai hoken roumushi's part go?

Stage	What it covers
Designing the wage system	Revising the work rules and the wage regulations; the grade and evaluation framework that satisfies the career-path requirements
Calculating the wage-improvement amount	Designing who receives how much against the expected add-on amount, and reconciling the two
Reflecting it in monthly wages	Sorting out whether it goes into base pay or into allowances, and reflecting that in the written notice of working conditions
Checking the effect on labor and social insurance	Whether the standard monthly remuneration has to be revised (an occasional revision) because wages went up

The last row is the one most often missed. When wages rise, social insurance premiums change. Unless you look at how much the employer's share increases out of the funds the add-on brings in, the real improvement in take-home pay comes out smaller than expected.

Where does the gyoseishoshi's part begin?

Stage	What it covers
Add-on structure notification	Notifying which add-on category you will claim
Plan	The treatment-improvement plan filed with the designating authority at the start of the fiscal year
Performance report	The report on results after the fiscal year ends
Notification of changes	The notification filed when the plan changes

Forms, filing deadlines and attachments are operated differently by each designating authority (municipality). Even for a provider in Bunkyo City, some documents go to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government and others to the ward.

If the work is split, do you pay twice?

The stages are different, so you are not paying twice for the same thing. You will, however, have two contracts.

The fees at Yotsuba are as follows.

Stage	Who handles it	Fee (tax incl.)
Designing the wage requirements and calculating the wage-improvement amount	四葉社会保険労務士事務所	Individual estimate
Treatment-improvement add-on: the plan (filing)	四葉行政書士事務所	66,000 yen
Treatment-improvement add-on: the performance report	四葉行政書士事務所	55,000 yen

The wage side is quoted individually because the volume of work varies greatly with the number of employees and the wage structure already in place. The same word "design" means something quite different at a provider whose wage regulations are already in order and at one that is building them from scratch.

How does Yotsuba take this on?

四葉社会保険労務士事務所 and 四葉行政書士事務所 are separate businesses. The same person, Joji Uramatsu, represents both, but the contracts, the invoices and the payments are separate: each accepts work separately, under a separate contract. No referral fees are exchanged in either direction.

You are welcome to ask for only one of the two. Some providers design the wages in-house and ask only for the filing; others do the reverse.

What the wage side involves is set out in the wage requirements of the treatment-improvement add-on, and the fees as a whole are on the fee schedule.

For the designation application itself, see designation applications for disability-welfare services; for the overall picture of group-home revenue and add-ons, see Opening a group home: the revenue structure and the basics of add-ons.

Frequently asked questions

Q. We already have a retained shakai hoken roumushi. May we ask a different office for the filing alone?
A. That is perfectly acceptable. Filing is gyoseishoshi work, so it is a stage a social insurance and labor consultant's office cannot take on in the first place. Having your retained shakai hoken roumushi look after the wage side while a gyoseishoshi handles the filing alone is a common combination.

Q. If we ask someone who holds both qualifications, can it be a single contract?
A. No. Even when one person holds both qualifications, the work is carried out under separate registrations and as separate offices, so the contracts are separate. It is the same at Yotsuba: our representative is registered both as a shakai hoken roumushi and as a gyoseishoshi, but each office accepts the work separately.

Q. Does the wage design have to be finished before the plan is filed?
A. In that order, yes. The plan states the method and the expected amount of the wage improvement, so the wage side has to be settled first. To be in time for the change of fiscal year, we recommend working backwards from the deadline and starting with room to spare.

Q. If we claim the add-on, will social insurance premiums rise as well?
A. If wages rise, the standard monthly remuneration may change. Where there is a change in fixed wages and certain requirements are met, an occasional revision applies, and the employer's share of the premiums increases as well. We recommend checking in advance how much of the funds the add-on brings in actually reaches take-home pay. The judgment in a specific case is made after we have seen the breakdown of the wages.

Sources for this article

• 社会保険労務士法 (Act No. 89 of 1968), Article 2, paragraph 1, items 1 and 3; Article 27
• 行政書士法 (Act No. 4 of 1951), Article 1-2, paragraph 1; Article 19, paragraph 1
• The requirements, forms and filing deadlines for the treatment-improvement add-on for welfare and care workers follow notices of the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare and the practice of each designating authority (municipality). They are revised each fiscal year, so please check the latest forms. This article does not state add-on rates or form numbers for any particular fiscal year.

This article is general information. A judgment on your individual circumstances is made by a qualified professional after a consultation. Written by Joji Uramatsu (Shakai Hoken Roumushi, Gyoseishoshi, Registered Real Estate Transaction Specialist).