Dont' read this unless:
1. Laughing at other people's misery brings you joy.
2. You are several months into trying to open a bank account with Rakuten and wondering if you have been singled out for punishment.
3. You really like lists.
So. I'm about to pass the 6 month mark for my application for a Bank account with Raku (yes 楽) ten bank.
Six months? Half a year? Two seasons? Yes, yes and yes.
I'm commically unlucky so that will play a part and they have placed some additional hurdles for me which took extra time.
1. Initial application just seemed to stagnate. After some prompting they requested evidence of employment (I'm a company director and this may have been the cause.)
Took approx one week to get a form prepared and delivered to them then back to playing the waiting game.
2. About 2.5 months into the process they starting to send me messages saying to scan and upload the resident card. As i was sure i'd done this during the intial application, I thought "this is odd" the second time and then "this is really odd" the third time I was uploading it.
Eventually they tired of this game and actually told me part of the card was "unreadable".
(From forensic analysis I suspect it wasn't clear if the Permanent resident car was to expire on the 30th or the 80th of the month next year.)
When getting the new one printed immigration asked me to show them what wasn't readable as they thought it was all readable.
Issuing and uploading the new card took me less than 2 weeks.
3. After a few weeks of radio silence I grew listless and started to use the online 問い合わせ webform.
a) If you are feeling nostalgia for the earlier days of the internet I highly recommend the asthetics of this form as it's visibly copyrighted from 2001 and certainly looks like it is from that era.
b) If you want to coerce Rakuten Bank into responding on the status of your application I do NOT recommend using that form. It does nothing.
4. If you want to shame them into action you need to find (good luck) and call the Customer Service phone number for account opening issues.
You'll know you have the right number as it starts with "If you already have a bank account press 1#"!!
(Why you gotta do me like this Rakuten.)
Press 2#, 3# to start the wait for an underpaid graduate to shine a flashlight into the dark dank recesses of their account application "process".
About a week after one such phone call they contacted me to ask if I was sure about the katakana for one of my many names. I didn't use any ID with Katakana and it's a name that has a few versions in katakana. This was approaching 5 months into the application.
I responded immediately and hurrdily got back to waiting.
(Annecdote related to my view of katakana names at the end as a reward for anyone that makes it that far. Or skip ahead. You'll miss nothing.).
Things get a bit hazy after this. But I've been hammering the webform whilst calling them occasionally for the past month.
Apparently, from my latest chat with them;
1. My experience with them is not unusual!
Incredibly, they seemed to think that might assuage me somehow.
2. The webform works! They are sure!!
I asked how many flags from webform requests that I'd made were on my application. They could not tell me.
I mentioned I'd waiting as long as 4 weeks after a webform request before calling and they said, "things are handled in order and there can be delays due to how popular bank accounts with Rakuten are." (Obviously not a direct translation).
Whilst I can't say for sure the webform does nothing but send an automated email saying to 'shut up and wait your damn turn'. I do suspect it shares the same code base as the elevator Close Door button.
3. "no promises" But they think my application looks OK and just needs more time.
It did feel like we were talking about grafted plant that was just lying there wilted and lifeless on the windowsill.
Looking forward to the latter half of the year I suspect one of three things will happen;
1. They'll find some nuanced reason to reject my account outright. Probably becuase of the one time I wrote "講座” instead of "口座” due to the small font on the antique webform.
2. Nothing. And I will be back to calling them again in a few weeks then I'll be back here wasting valuable space on this forum.
3. I will make a placard and protest outside their offices with a bunch of leaflets recapping the above.
-- Annecdote concerning my opinion of katakana names --
Many years ago I was rushing to catch a limousine (fancier that is sound) bus to the airport. I got to the bus stop in time and they took my luggage telling me to buy a ticket over at the ticket booth about 50 metres away.
The skies were dark that day my friend. I was traveling somewhere I didn't want to go for a purpose I wouldn't enjoy and wasn't using the taxi I'd normally use as I'd forgotten to reserve it over 24 hours in advance. (Becuase that's a thing!)
I'm not trying to justify my actions, merely offer some mitigiation for what follows.
The ticket booth in question was jointly operated by two visibly time served obatarians. The conversation was conducted entirely in Japanese. A language in which I am frequently described as; お上手 by the locals, and "compentent" by other foreigners.
MM: "I'd like a ticket for that bus" [pointing]. (It has but one destination).
TBO(Ticket Booth Obatarians): "Name please".
MM:
TBO: "Name please".
MM: "No. Just a ticket. I'm not enquiring about a job on the bus.".
TBO: Slightly more forcefully. "Name. We need your name."
MM: Glancing up to darkend skies. "Why on earth could you need that."
TBO: "Because".
MM: <Gives name with normal english pronouciation>
TBO:
MM: With more than a touch of the devil inside him. <Repeats name withe English pronunciation>.
TBO:
I notice they've loaded a lot of other luggage after mine so I have the upper hand. Departure time is rapidly approaching.
MM: < Repeats name with English pronunciation>
Anxious looks from the BSA (Bus Stop Attendant).
TBO: "Can you spell it"
MM: <States first letter of name as it sounds in the English alphabet>
TBO:
MM: <Goes though alphabet up to the point of the letter to make it clearer>
TBO: "No. In Japanese"
MM: "I don't have a Japanese name."
TBO: "But we need it in Japanese."
I'll spare you the rest but I let this go one for a while longer until I thought that;
1. There was a genuine chance they'd unload my luggage.
2. Someone in the queue that had formed me might stab me. Even though we all know they'd all arrived well ahead of time for their buses and possessed Japanese names.
MM: "スミス." (Not my real name.)
