What to Confirm Before Issuing a Certificate of Employment (Zaishoku Shomeisho) in Japan

Introduction

A Certificate of Employment — Zaishoku Shomeisho (在職証明書) — is a short document confirming that a named person works, or worked, at your company. Employees in Japan request one for visa and residence-status applications, mortgage and loan approvals, school admissions, apartment rentals, and new jobs. The document itself is simple. What makes it worth slowing down for is that whoever receives it will rely on it, and a detail that quietly contradicts your own HR records can stall someone's visa or loan application for weeks. This guide covers what to confirm before you sign one, and why each check matters.

First, Know Which Document You Are Being Asked For

This is the distinction that causes the most confusion in foreign-owned offices, because two different things are often called "certificate of employment" in English.

• A certificate for a current employee (zaishoku shomeisho) confirms ongoing employment. There is no single statutory form for it, no legally fixed validity period, and no nationwide template that every Japanese company must use. Practice is shaped by what the requesting organisation asks for — an immigration office, a bank and a landlord will each want slightly different details.
• A certificate on separation from employment is different, and it is addressed by law. Under Article 22 of the Labor Standards Act, when a worker who is leaving requests a certificate covering the period of employment, the kind of occupation, their position in the business, their wages, or the reason for separation, the employer must deliver one without delay.

Confirm which of the two you are producing before you open a template. The checks below apply to both, but the legal footing is not the same.

What to Confirm Before You Issue

Work through these one at a time. Each is a field that someone downstream will check against another document.

• The employee's legal name, exactly as it appears on official records. For foreign employees this is the single most common failure point: the name on the certificate should match the passport and residence card, including the order of given and family names and any middle name. A mismatch with the immigration file is enough to trigger a query.
• Current employment status. Confirm the person is actually employed on the date you sign — not on leave of absence, not mid-resignation, not already past their last working day. Certificates are sometimes requested weeks after the fact.
• Job title and department. Use the title your internal records hold, not an informal or translated-for-convenience version. If the employee has recently transferred or been promoted, check which title applies as at the date of the certificate.
• Employment period. The start date should match the employment contract and your social insurance enrolment records. Where the person was previously on a fixed-term contract that was renewed, be clear whether you are stating continuous service or only the current contract term.
• Employment type and working hours where relevant — permanent, fixed-term, part-time, seconded. A bank assessing a loan and an immigration office assessing a residence status both care about this, and guessing is worse than asking the requester.
• Company information. Legal company name (not the trading or English marketing name), registered address, representative's name and title, and the company seal or signature your organisation normally uses.
• Consistency with your own HR records. Before signing, put the draft next to the employment contract, the payroll record and the social insurance enrolment. If any two disagree, resolve that first — the certificate is not the place to settle an internal discrepancy.
• The date on the document. A certificate states a position as at a given date. Sign and date it when you issue it, not when it was requested.

Purpose, Recipient, and How Much to Include

Ask what the certificate is for and who will receive it. This is not an intrusive question — it is the only way to know which fields are needed and in what form. An immigration submission, a mortgage application and a rental agency each expect a different emphasis, and the requesting organisation frequently supplies its own form.

Then include what was asked for and little else. Salary information, reason for leaving, and evaluative comments about performance should appear only where they are genuinely required. This is a matter of basic personal-data handling, and for certificates on separation it is an explicit legal rule: Article 22 provides that the employer must not include in the certificate any item the worker did not request. The same provision bars an employer from using secret marks or advance communications about matters such as nationality, creed, social status or union activity with the intent of obstructing the person's future employment.

A Certificate of Employment confirms facts. It is not a reference letter, and adding unrequested praise or criticism changes what the document is.

Internal Approval and Records

Decide in advance who is authorised to sign, and route every certificate through that person rather than letting individual managers issue their own. A consistent signatory, a standard layout and a house seal make the document credible to the organisation receiving it.

Keep a copy of every certificate issued, with the date and the stated purpose. If a detail later turns out to be wrong, you need to know exactly what was issued and to whom before you can correct it — and the correct response to an error is to issue a corrected certificate promptly, not to amend a document already in someone else's hands.

Common Mistakes

• Copying the previous certificate. Titles, departments and contract terms change. Re-verify each time rather than editing last year's file.
• Using the English company name. The receiving organisation is usually matching against the commercial register, which holds the Japanese legal name.
• Stating continuous service when contracts were separate. Be precise about which period you are certifying.
• Including salary by default. Include it when it is needed, not as a habit.
• Issuing without checking status on the signing date. The employee's situation may have changed since the request.
• Assuming one format fits every recipient. Ask whether the requester has its own form before drafting your own.

FAQ

Can I issue a Certificate of Employment for a part-time employee? Yes. Part-time and fixed-term employees can request one in the same way. State the employment type and, where the recipient needs it, the contracted working hours — an accurate description is more useful to the employee than one that makes the role sound more permanent than it is.

What if a detail changes after the certificate is issued? Issue a corrected certificate with a current date and keep both on file. Tell the employee what changed, since they may need to resubmit it to whoever received the original.

Does a Certificate of Employment expire? There is no statutory expiry. In practice the receiving organisation sets the expectation — many ask for a certificate issued within the last one to three months. Ask the requester rather than assuming.