Getting an Inkan (Hanko) in Beppu

Spring is here! With the cherry blossoms at peak bloom, it resembles a new life to most graduating students.

As an International student in Japan, you might have heard of the complicated process of getting a phone SIM card, registering for a bank account, or getting a Hanko/Inkan.

In Japan, a Hanko/Inkan is a personal stamp that is used in lieu of a handwritten signature for official documents (I heard from a Taiwanese friend that they use personal stamps on official documents as well!). But as a person who basically uses handwritten signatures and has never had an Inkan, I’ve wondered, where should we get a customised Inkan in Beppu?

As Inkan is mandatory for contracts when renting a house in Japan, my friend and I headed to one of the Inkan stores in Beppu, キューイン別府 located near Wakakusacho.

On the desk of the counter, we saw a notice about customising an Inkan for foreigners. Since the Inkan is round-shaped with a small diameter, most of us can't customise our Inkan with our full name on it as it could only fit a maximum of 8 letters. We were able to choose to customise it with only our first name or surname.

At that moment, we were wondering, as foreigners with alphabet names, should we customise our Inkan with our alphabetical name? Katakana name? or just make up some favourite Kanji characters that resemble our name?

After discussing with the staff from the store, my friend decided to go with an Inkan with her name written in Katakana, as we thought that it might be difficult for the officials to pronounce or pronounce incorrectly if it is written in Roman letters.

While waiting for the Inkan to be made, we looked around the store and there were many cute and unique Inkan cases to choose from. While wandering around we were told that the Inkan was done! It was so fast and we got our Inkan made within 10 minutes.

If you would like to get your Inkan in a few minutes and under 1000 yen, you can try visiting 9in Beppu (キューイン別府)!

キューイン別府

11-2 Wakakusacho, Beppu, Oita 874-0925, Japan

(Access: 3 minutes' walk from Mochigahama bus stop)