Tax allowances for dependents who live abroad

[zeroshiki]

I just looked it up and the requirement to prove you've been sending money overseas was setup 2017 onwards. Anything before that you didn't need to prove it. That might explain the discrepancy or it might be that immigration checked it through their own channels anyway.

Your results will vary but my personal opinion is that the less they have to investigate about you, the better for your peace of mind so you should just finish PR now then do what Tkydon recommended and file a correction on your taxes. When I applied for citizenship, I second guessed myself on every single thing I submitted and ran myself crazy with worry specifically with the dependent tax deduction thing which in the end amounted to nothing but those were sleepless nights for sure.

[Kiro]

For what it’s worth, I got PR approved a few years back while having (two) dependents during many years, including the year I submitted my application, and was never asked anything. Maybe they checked, maybe they didn’t, but all my papers were in order and submitted yearly by the company I worked for.

Thank you for this information.
I am assuming that the two dependents were residing outside Japan when you were supporting them and no additional documents were required.

Correct, both outside Japan. No documents regarding dependents was ever asked when I applied, nor after (no phone call to ask me for additional documents, nothing).
I provided the 3 years of tax payments as required, and I seriously doubt they called the tax office to ask “does this person who always paid his taxes has dependents?” … but who knows.
This was in 2018.

[Viralriver]

Curious - filing a dependent instantly applies the maximum tax deduction for that dependent. I can't say that I've supported them with just 100k JPY in the year so give me a 100k deduction. And also it's stated that there's no set requirement for the amount of money. Twice in this thread though it's been mentioned that you need to be sending your dependents more than the 380k amount (or whatever the value is). Where does this ruling come from or is it a guess?

Thanks! I'm filing dependents and a little worried since also applying for PR and don't want to mess anything up. On this note, do they actually ask for more proof on the dependents when applying for PR?

[zeroshiki]

For what it’s worth, I got PR approved a few years back while having (two) dependents during many years, including the year I submitted my application, and was never asked anything. Maybe they checked, maybe they didn’t, but all my papers were in order and submitted yearly by the company I worked for.

Thank you for this information.
I am assuming that the two dependents were residing outside Japan when you were supporting them and no additional documents were required.

Correct, both outside Japan. No documents regarding dependents was ever asked when I applied, nor after (no phone call to ask me for additional documents, nothing).
I provided the 3 years of tax payments as required, and I seriously doubt they called the tax office to ask “does this person who always paid his taxes has dependents?” … but who knows.
This was in 2018.

On the Nouzei Shoumeisho which you are required to submit, it says there if you have received deductions for dependents how many and how much. Also, immigration definitely has the ability to look through your tax records or at the least ask the tax agency for it. I'd actually be surprised if they didn't.

Curious - filing a dependent instantly applies the maximum tax deduction for that dependent. I can't say that I've supported them with just 100k JPY in the year so give me a 100k deduction. And also it's stated that there's no set requirement for the amount of money. Twice in this thread though it's been mentioned that you need to be sending your dependents more than the 380k amount (or whatever the value is). Where does this ruling come from or is it a guess?

Thanks! I'm filing dependents and a little worried since also applying for PR and don't want to mess anything up. On this note, do they actually ask for more proof on the dependents when applying for PR?

Nothing on the NTA site says anything about amounts. Just that the money you're sending should be enough for them live off of. If not, then they're not really dependent on you and you're just giving them gifts.

[goran]

I just looked it up and the requirement to prove you've been sending money overseas was setup 2017 onwards. Anything before that you didn't need to prove it. That might explain the discrepancy or it might be that immigration checked it through their own channels anyway.

Your results will vary but my personal opinion is that the less they have to investigate about you, the better for your peace of mind so you should just finish PR now then do what Tkydon recommended and file a correction on your taxes. When I applied for citizenship, I second guessed myself on every single thing I submitted and ran myself crazy with worry specifically with the dependent tax deduction thing which in the end amounted to nothing but those were sleepless nights for sure.

Thank you. This is what I am going to do.
Good sleep beats saving few thousand yens! (esp if one can claim those few thousand yen retrospectively)

[Tkydon]

Why would they give you a Tax Deduction of Y380,000, so a rebate of maybe 20% +10% or 33% + 10%, if you only sent Y100,000 ???

The idea is that you send much more than Y380,000, and they then allow you to deduct Y380,000 of that amount of money as Tax Free...

[zeroshiki]

Because they never used to check it and even when they started, they've never explicitly held the standard that the amount you spent needed to be greater than the deduction. Look at the mortgage deduction as another example.