How much cash will we need? Ballpark figure? Options? Lets talk money!

[LovesTimone]

In doing my research and reading all the wonderful tips here on the DIS... and by the way.... Thank You

I understand that Japan is a cash based society much more than here in the US...Getting cash/yen can easily be done at the ATM's at 7-11 stores...

We are going for 2 weeks, and it will be just DH and I ... We are planning on Tokyo, Osaka, Arashiyama, and TDR - plus all the touristy thing, museum, temples, etc....

1) We are planning on getting a Suica card, we can use it for the train, and in some convince stores and restaurants. How much should we put on the card to start with? I don't want to have to stop constantly to add money to the card, nor do I want to put to much... and how easy or big of a hassle is it to add to the card...?

2) Around how much Cash/ Yen plan on?

3) Was there anywhere you went you were shocked that did not except CC... and was cash only...

As always Thanks for all the help...

 

[wongck]

Yeah I am as shocked as you wth that credit card in Japan.
I did a plan of places to visit using IC card and total up the amount. Google maps does provide the trip cost estimate. At least that way transport cost can be estimated.
Food wise, a different story...LOL.... can't hold back on good food.

 

[wongck]

You can refund IC cards for a small fee.

 

[Sandeep1]

Came back from my 2nd trip to Japan in April and I was able to use my card at most places. Suica card is a great idea, you can use it for metra and snacks. You can put $100 on it. It will go by fast.

You may want to get your whole itinerary planned out, all cities and side trips, and then decide if the JR Rail Pass is a good idea. I like it for the convenience but it can also be a money saver depending on how much you will use it.

As for how much cash to plan on spending, it's really an impossible question to answer. Do you like high end restaurants? There is no limit to how much money one can spend on dining in Japan. I went to a high end Kobe beef restaurant in Kyoto and spent $300 just for myself. Do you like to drink? Snack? Shop? All of that will add up quick in Japan.

 

[princesspiglet]

Download the Suica app and add money as you go. You can also add your Suica card to Apple Pay.

 

[LovesTimone]

Came back from my 2nd trip to Japan in April and I was able to use my card at most places. Suica card is a great idea, you can use it for metra and snacks. You can put $100 on it. It will go by fast.

You may want to get your whole itinerary planned out, all cities and side trips, and then decide if the JR Rail Pass is a good idea. I like it for the convenience but it can also be a money saver depending on how much you will use it.

As for how much cash to plan on spending, it's really an impossible question to answer. Do you like high end restaurants? There is no limit to how much money one can spend on dining in Japan. I went to a high end Kobe beef restaurant in Kyoto and spent $300 just for myself. Do you like to drink? Snack? Shop? All of that will add up quick in Japan.

I am working on the rough rough draft right now, and I had hoped to post it this week, and that's not happening due to " hurricane Dorian" so it will be a a week or two before I can get it posted...

We do plan on enjoying a few high end meals, as well we do also like to have some adult beverages, snacks ( street food) and are planning on shopping... quite alot....

We have 2 set of friends that are going in November and their approach to this is completely different...
One couple is just going with the I will deal with when I get their approach, I do think that they are going to order the JR pass, once they finally listened that you can't get it there, then they were like oh I guess we have to get it... and the other may have over spent... They ordered the JR Pass, green car.. for 14 days, and a Sucia cards for the whole family and totaled together just on the Sucia is 2,000 US dollars... as well he ordered 5,000.00 US dollar worth of Yen which is 531,475 in yen...

 

[LovesTimone]

Download the Suica app and add money as you go. You can also add your Suica card to Apple Pay.

Thanks jotted is down in the "book"

 

[Haley R]

I am working on the rough rough draft right now, and I had hoped to post it this week, and that's not happening due to " hurricane Dorian" so it will be a a week or two before I can get it posted...

We do plan on enjoying a few high end meals, as well we do also like to have some adult beverages, snacks ( street food) and are planning on shopping... quite alot....

We have 2 set of friends that are going in November and their approach to this is completely different...
One couple is just going with the I will deal with when I get their approach, I do think that they are going to order the JR pass, once they finally listened that you can't get it there, then they were like oh I guess we have to get it... and the other may have over spent... They ordered the JR Pass, green car.. for 14 days, and a Sucia cards for the whole family and totaled together just on the Sucia is 2,000 US dollars... as well he ordered 5,000.00 US dollar worth of Yen which is 531,475 in yen...

Holy cow that’s a lot of yen to carry around. At most we had $100 worth at once

 

[AngelDisney]

We brought USD1500 worth of yens and $500 in USD cash (18 days in Japan). It’s hard to decide whether to use the yen or the credit card to keep enough yen for no credit card purchases like the market. First I planned to exchange the dollar into yen at Kansai airport if needed when I flew to Sapporo, but we were not able to really enjoy the Kuromon Ichiba at Osaka with their melt-in-the-mouth Toro sushi and Kobe beef (luckily one Kobe beef stall accepted credit card) while worrying that we would be out of yens before getting to Kansai airport. So I googled currency exchange places with the best rate at Osaka and found one whose rate was surprisingly very close to the rate I checked online in Dotonbori. I changed all $500 and still have about ¥20000 left. We are ok with leftover yens as it’s a sign that we will return for another visit to Japan! I seldom use ATM on trips and usually bring local currencies and extra USD for exchange if needed. We have a USD account in Canada and USD in $100’s usually has the best exchange rates for local currencies in Asian countries.

 

[LovesTimone]

I am working on the rough rough draft right now, and I had hoped to post it this week, and that's not happening due to " hurricane Dorian" so it will be a a week or two before I can get it posted...

We do plan on enjoying a few high end meals, as well we do also like to have some adult beverages, snacks ( street food) and are planning on shopping... quite alot....

We have 2 set of friends that are going in November and their approach to this is completely different...
One couple is just going with the I will deal with when I get their approach, I do think that they are going to order the JR pass, once they finally listened that you can't get it there, then they were like oh I guess we have to get it... and the other may have over spent... They ordered the JR Pass, green car.. for 14 days, and a Sucia cards for the whole family and totaled together just on the Sucia is 2,000 US dollars... as well he ordered 5,000.00 US dollar worth of Yen which is 531,475 in yen...

OP here,

I talked to my friends that sorta over spent... They want to return the JR pass for the 14 days, and make it only a 7 days Pass.... they are sticking with the green car still.... I think that I read somewhere that you can do that? right?

They made reservation for a private car service to pick them up at the airport, take them into Shibuya to their hotel... and then pick them up at Tokyo Disneyland hotel and take them back to the airport... which he says is so that he can keep his sanity... trying to keep up with everyone, and then adding the luggage into the equation which tilts the scale...

With the Sucia card once I realized that he was paying for all of the cards, its only like 200.00 on each card for their group of 10... ( my friend, her DH... their DD and her DH, and their kids, 16 , 13 , 10, and then their DD, and her kids 15, 12....

No going back on the Yen, its already ordered, paid for and they pick it up next week... He actually think that he doesn't have enough Yen for the 1st week.

 

[Sandeep1]

OP here,

I talked to my friends that sorta over spent... They want to return the JR pass for the 14 days, and make it only a 7 days Pass.... they are sticking with the green car still.... I think that I read somewhere that you can do that? right?

They made reservation for a private car service to pick them up at the airport, take them into Shibuya to their hotel... and then pick them up at Tokyo Disneyland hotel and take them back to the airport... which he says is so that he can keep his sanity... trying to keep up with everyone, and then adding the luggage into the equation which tilts the scale...

With the Sucia card once I realized that he was paying for all of the cards, its only like 200.00 on each card for their group of 10... ( my friend, her DH... their DD and her DH, and their kids, 16 , 13 , 10, and then their DD, and her kids 15, 12....

No going back on the Yen, its already ordered, paid for and they pick it up next week... He actually think that he doesn't have enough Yen for the 1st week.

Yes, JR passes can be returned for a refund. There really is no need to order that much yen ahead of time. There are 7-11s all over the place that have ATMs. Very easy to get yen when you need it.

 

[nono]

In a cash or non-cash society, I bring cash. How much ? Well, enough to cover a 2 day outage of cash machines and credit card machines. Mother Nature doesn't seem to ever go on vacation when I do, so....

 

[fabfemmeboy]

Suica - we usually just start with like $20 and top up as we go. We do roughly that amount/plan in every place we visit. It's also easier to do it that way especially if you have the JR pass and so aren't sure how much you'll need to use the non-JR lines.

Cash - for Japan, we usually assume about $35-45 per person per day for non-Disney days to cover our food, snacks, incidentals, entry fees, and souvenirs. Obviously not every day will be that amount, some days are much lower and then you make it up on the day you buy a yukata or spend like $100 on stationary supplies because you're nerds like us. For theme park days, our rule of thumb is about 1.5-2x whatever we would budget for a non-Disney day in that place. So when we go to Paris, it's 100 Euro/day in town (for the pair of us) or 150 Euro at DLP. In Florida or California, $50-75 for non-park days, $100 for park days. When we went to China last year, we averaged about 330RMB/$50 USD and 670RMB/$100USD for Disney which turned out to be more than enough while still getting everything we wanted. So since for Japan we're assuming about $70-90 per day for both of us, for park days we're assuming $150. (That doesn't include the JR pass or our hotels.) Based on other people's trip breakdowns, from what I can tell and the way we travel - average food, no alcohol, and way too many tchotchkes - I think that'll be plenty for non-park days and might be a bit of a stretch in the park. We'll see.

 

[bibbidibobbidibecky]

Most places in Tokyo used credit cards, honestly. The places that didn't were the smaller restaurants. We bought metro passes in Tokyo and that was very nice to have. Kyoto had less credit card use, but we were still fine. When we were out in Arashiyama most places were cash only, but we found a Family Mart with an ATM when we were a little low. I did have issues using my CC in the metro and train ticket machines when we had to do that, but for the JR there is always a ticket office in the main stations where you can use a CC. I'd say pull out $500 when you get to the airport and then more as you need it. The only places in the parks that were cash-only were the little kiosks selling snacks.

 

[Sk8Leigh]

I just got back. I took 35K yen to start with. That was immediately a problem when I went to go buy some park tickets and it wouldn't accept my cc with no foreign transaction fees. So then I had to make a choice whether to pay in cash or use a different credit card that did have fees. I paid in cash and then ended up getting 20K yen twice more from the Hilton ATM before I left TDR. I was afraid that I would have trouble the whole time at TDR, but the rest of the time was fine. However, I did have problems with the card a few more times outside of Disney. It was odd, because my card wasn't really declining until the last time (ie, I didn't get a notice from the cc company until then that there was a problem; When I was trying to use it at TDR, I called them and they said the card was fine. It just didn't work there.) I ended up getting another 30K before I left, so I used a total of 105K yen while I was there. I should definitely have brought more than the 35K yen to begin with. I could probably have charged some of that, but I hated to charge small amounts when I know they don't really do that, and mostly I had small amounts.

 

[LovesTimone]

I just got back. I took 35K yen to start with. That was immediately a problem when I went to go buy some park tickets and it wouldn't accept my cc with no foreign transaction fees. So then I had to make a choice whether to pay in cash or use a different credit card that did have fees. I paid in cash and then ended up getting 20K yen twice more from the Hilton ATM before I left TDR. I was afraid that I would have trouble the whole time at TDR, but the rest of the time was fine. However, I did have problems with the card a few more times outside of Disney. It was odd, because my card wasn't really declining until the last time (ie, I didn't get a notice from the cc company until then that there was a problem; When I was trying to use it at TDR, I called them and they said the card was fine. It just didn't work there.) I ended up getting another 30K before I left, so I used a total of 105K yen while I was there. I should definitely have brought more than the 35K yen to begin with. I could probably have charged some of that, but I hated to charge small amounts when I know they don't really do that, and mostly I had small amounts.

We have CC's with no international transaction fees, and we have used them traveling abroad before. We are going to double check right before we leave to make sure that everything is good... We did get hit with a couple time for just using the machine, I think like 5.00 euros... we just paid it and moved on...Once home we noticed that the CC credited our account for the use of the machine... so I think it really depends on which card... it's hard making sure that everything is in order, and that you have a back up plan, and a extra back up plan for the just in cases...

Thanks for the info...