Any way to verify if a business in Japan is registered/legitimate?

[TrevorDunn]

Hi, on top of contacting through email and phone, is there any way I can verify if a business in Japan is legitimate or registered, and basically trustworthy?

 

[Toritoribe]

You can check if a company is registered for the National Tax Agency in the following page.

National Tax Agency Corporate Number Publication Site(NTA-CNPS)

National Tax Agency Corporate Number Publication Site

www.houjin-bangou.nta.go.jp

 

[TrevorDunn]

You can check if a company is registered for the National Tax Agency in the following page.

National Tax Agency Corporate Number Publication Site(NTA-CNPS)

National Tax Agency Corporate Number Publication Site

www.houjin-bangou.nta.go.jp

Thanks, I did actually already try that. I don't have the corporate number so I tried searching by name but just get a 'No Data' response. But is that site for corporations only? How about non-incorporated businesses?

 

[Toritoribe]

If you know the address of the company, you can check the external appearance of the building/house via Google Street View. We had a case in this forum where the address of a company was actually just an (old) apartment, and there was no sign outside (i.e., seemed unreliable).