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Hokkaido Designates 13 Companies as Official Payment Agents for Administrative Fees

The Hokkaido Prefectural Government has designated 13 companies, including PayPay, Rakuten Group and Amazon Japan, as official payment agents under the Local Autonomy Act, with several address updates also noted.

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Key Points

  • • Hokkaido designated 13 companies as official payment agents under the Local Autonomy Act
  • • Designated firms include PayPay, Rakuten Group, KDDI, Amazon Japan and Credit Saison
  • • Several companies had address updates recorded in 2024 alongside their original designations
  • • Notice is listed alongside furusato nozei (hometown tax) program information on Hokkaido's website

The Hokkaido Prefectural Government announced on November 4, 2026, that it has designated a group of companies as "designated payment agents" (指定納付受託者) under Article 231-2-3, Paragraph 1 of the Local Autonomy Act [1].

The companies named in the notice are Trust Bank Co., Ltd.; Rakuten Group, Inc.; Sapporo Hokuyo Card Co., Ltd.; Toyota Finance Corporation; DG Financial Technology Co., Ltd.; JALUX Inc.; Credit Saison Co., Ltd.; i-mobile Co., Ltd.; PayPay Corporation; KDDI Corporation; Satofuru Co., Ltd.; JR East Net Station Co., Ltd.; and Amazon Japan G.K. [1]. Each company's registered address was listed in the notice, along with accompanying official designation documents [1].

The notice also records subsequent address changes for several of the designated firms. Trust Bank's address was updated as of January 16, 2024 (Reiwa 6), moving to Kami-Osaki, Shinagawa Ward, Tokyo [1]. Sapporo Hokuyo Card's address was changed as of February 26, 2024, to Minami 8-jo Nishi, Chuo Ward, Sapporo [1]. i-mobile's address was changed as of July 17, 2024, to Shibuya, Shibuya Ward, Tokyo [1]. Amazon Japan's address was also updated, per a separate address-change notice included with its original designation document [1].

The Hokkaido government's notice page groups this announcement alongside information on the furusato nozei (hometown tax donation) program, including general guidance on the furusato nozei system and links to municipal-level furusato nozei pages within Hokkaido [1]. However, the notice itself does not specify which particular administrative fees or payments these designated agents will handle, nor does it state an effective date for when the designations took effect or details on how residents should use these payment channels [1].

Foreign residents of Hokkaido who make payments to the prefectural government, including those who use furusato nozei donation services, may wish to check the official Hokkaido government notice and the linked designation documents for further details on which services these companies support [1].

Source credit 出典：「指定納付受託者の指定について【告示】」（北海道）（https://www.pref.hokkaido.lg.jp/ss/krs/shiteinoufu_furusatonouzei.html）、CC BY 4.0（https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/deed.ja）を加工してJapan News (j.apan.news)が作成 This article is Japan News's own English summary of the Japanese original. It has been translated and edited by Japan News; it is not an official translation, and the Hokkaido Prefectural Government did not write or review it.

Sources

This article was written by AI from these Japanese-language reports. Check them before acting on anything here.

  1. [1] pref.hokkaido.lg.jp — original report (Japanese)

AI-written summary of Japanese reports; not human-reviewed; check the linked sources. How we write articles