Office Work in Japan for Filipinos: Gijinkoku Visa Guide

Key Takeaways

Office and professional work in Japan, such as accounting, marketing, IT, overseas trade, translation and interpretation, falls mainly under one status of residence: "Engineer/Specialist in Humanities/International Services", usually called Gijinkoku.
A Filipino college graduate qualifies when the job needs knowledge related to the course studied. For university graduates, including graduates of universities outside Japan, Japan's Immigration Services Agency (ISA) judges this link flexibly.
Without a degree, the usual route is 10 years or more of related work experience. For "international services" work such as overseas trade, PR or interpretation, it is 3 years or more.
Factory, packing and "no experience needed" jobs do not qualify, even if the job offer calls them office work.
The pay must be equal to or higher than what a Japanese employee would receive for the same work.
On the Japanese side, a Certificate of Eligibility (COE) is applied for in Japan. On the Philippine side, direct hiring is banned unless exempted; MWO-Tokyo runs a verification process for this, which takes 10 to 15 working days and has no fee.
From April 15, 2026, work that mainly uses language skills with people (for example interpretation or hotel front-desk work) requires language ability at CEFR B2 level.

What "office work" means under Japanese immigration rules

Japan has no visa called "office work visa". What decides the work a foreigner may do in Japan is the status of residence (在留資格): the legal category that sets the activity allowed. People often call it a "visa".

For office and professional jobs, the status is Engineer/Specialist in Humanities/International Services (技術・人文知識・国際業務). Its short name in Japan is Gijinkoku. It covers work under a contract with a public or private organization in Japan that needs one of three kinds of knowledge:

Part of the status	Knowledge the work must need	Examples given by ISA
Engineer	Natural sciences: science, engineering, agriculture, medicine, dentistry, pharmacy	Mechanical engineers and other engineers
Specialist in Humanities	Humanities: law, economics, sociology, literature, philosophy, education, psychology, history, political science, commerce, business administration	Marketing staff
International Services	Thinking or sensitivity based on a foreign culture	Interpreters, designers

In all three parts, ISA's guideline says the work must need professional ability at a certain level backed by academic training. This is the core test. A job title alone does not decide it; the actual tasks do.

Key facts about the status:

Period of stay: 5 years, 3 years, 1 year or 3 months.
Who can be the employer: companies, the national government, local governments, incorporated administrative agencies and other corporations, foreign companies with an office in Japan, and individuals with an office in Japan.
Type of contract: employment, or a mandate, outsourcing or commission contract. In every case, the contract must be continuous and with a specific organization.

Gijinkoku is one of the largest statuses in Japan. According to ISA, at the end of 2025 there were 4,125,395 foreign residents in Japan, and 475,790 of them held Gijinkoku, an increase of 57,084. By number, it ranked second after permanent residents, ahead of students, technical intern trainees and Specified Skilled Workers. Filipinos in Japan numbered 356,579, up 15,061.

Office jobs that qualify: ISA's own approved cases

ISA publishes real examples of applications it approved and refused. The approved cases below involve graduates of universities in their home country, which is the situation of a Filipino graduate applying from the Philippines. The monthly pay figures are the amounts in ISA's examples, not typical salaries.

Course studied	Job in Japan	Monthly pay in ISA's example
Accounting	Accounting for trade with companies in the home country, in the overseas business division of a computer and information-processing company	About 250,000 yen
Business administration	Interpretation and translation for trade with the home country, at a food and general-goods import and sales company	About 300,000 yen
Economics and international relations	Marketing support between the home country and Japan at an automaker: market, user and import-trend research, sales and supply-demand management, liaison with local dealers	About 200,000 yen
Engineering, then work at a software company	Software engineer in computer-related services at a software company	About 350,000 yen
Business administration, then work as a management consultant	Consultant for business with IT companies in the home country, at an IT company	About 450,000 yen

ISA's approved cases for graduates of Japanese universities show how wide the link between course and job can be: an economics graduate working as a systems engineer at a software development company, a business administration graduate doing translation and interpretation at a computer-related services company, and a law graduate working as a lawyer's assistant at a law firm.

Two patterns appear across these cases. First, the job uses the knowledge from the course, even when the course name and the job title differ. Second, many approved jobs connect Japan with the worker's home country, such as trade, marketing or consulting for that market.

Jobs that do not qualify

The same rules that approve office work also close the door on simple labor. A job offer that says "office" or "staff" can still fail if the real tasks are of the following kinds.

Simple physical work. ISA refused an education graduate hired to pack lunch boxes at a factory. The work was not found to need humanities knowledge.
"No experience needed" jobs. ISA's guideline says jobs whose hiring criteria say things like "no experience needed, you will get used to it quickly" are not covered. Jobs that Japanese employees without the required education or experience usually do are also not covered.
Mixed jobs where qualifying work is only a small part. ISA looks at the activity during the whole period of stay. If the qualifying work is only a small part and the rest is work that needs no special skill or that can be learned by repeated training, the status does not apply.
Employers that do not really exist. ISA refused an economics graduate who applied to do accounting at an accounting office, because a restaurant, not an accounting office, was at the stated address and no clear explanation was given.

There is one accepted exception to the "mixed job" rule: on-the-job training at the start of employment that leads to qualifying work, when Japanese new hires do the same training. In one approved case, a literature graduate of a Japanese university was hired as a career-track employee at a food retailer's head office. The first 2 years were training in a supermarket (shelving, cashier, customer service), followed by sales, administration or overseas business, on the same career plan as Japanese graduates.

ISA's comparison of Gijinkoku and Specified Skilled Worker (SSW) shows the same line by industry. In manufacturing, production and assembly line work belongs to SSW, while design, programming and technical development belong to Gijinkoku. In restaurants, cooking and customer service belong to SSW, while management of several stores and planning belong to Gijinkoku.

How the degree must relate to the job

The requirement comes from Japan's landing criteria ordinance (上陸基準省令, Ministry of Justice Ordinance No. 16 of 1990). For work needing natural-science or humanities knowledge, the applicant must meet one of the following:

Route	Requirement
University degree	Graduated from a university, or received equivalent or higher education, having majored in a subject related to the knowledge the job needs
Japanese vocational school	Completed a related professional course at a specialized training college (専修学校, senmon gakko, a Japanese vocational school) in Japan
Work experience	10 years or more of practical experience; the years spent studying related subjects can be counted

Points that matter for Filipino graduates:

Flexible matching for university graduates. ISA's guideline states that it judges the relation between a university major and the job flexibly, and that it applies the same approach to universities abroad. A Philippine bachelor's degree is therefore judged on the same basis.
Stricter matching for vocational schools. For a specialized training college in Japan, a considerable degree of relation between the course and the job is required in principle.
Experience does not have to be identical. The 10 years do not have to be in the exact same work; related work counts.
IT exception. For IT work, passing an IT exam or holding an IT qualification designated by Japan's Minister of Justice replaces the education or experience requirement.

International services work

For work based on a foreign culture, the ordinance sets a separate rule. The work must be translation, interpretation, PR, advertising, overseas trade, fashion or interior design, product development or similar work, and the applicant must have 3 years or more of practical experience in related work. A university graduate doing translation or interpretation does not need the 3 years.

The pay rule

The ordinance requires pay equal to or higher than what a Japanese national would receive for the same work. ISA's guideline defines pay as payment for services. Allowances that only reimburse costs, such as commuting, family and housing allowances, are not counted (unless they are taxable).

ISA's refused cases show how this is applied. An engineering graduate was offered 135,000 yen a month as an engineer at a computer-related services company, while a Japanese new graduate hired at the same time for the same kind of work received 180,000 yen a month. The application was refused because the pay was not equal to a Japanese national's.

The comparison is with Japanese workers doing the same job at the same employer, not with pay levels in the Philippines.

Language-based customer work: the CEFR B2 rule from April 15, 2026

For applications on or after April 15, 2026, ISA added a language rule. For work that mainly uses language skills with people, such as translation, interpretation and hotel front-desk customer service, ability equivalent to CEFR B2 is a precondition. CEFR is the Common European Framework of Reference for languages, and ISA uses its B2 level as the bar for this kind of work. Without it, ISA does not treat the work as work at the required level. When the employer is Category 3 or 4 (see the next section), ISA asks for a document proving this ability, and also for a declaration about the employer's representative.

For Japanese, ISA's attachment 4 treats B2 as met by any of the following:

JLPT N2 or higher
BJT (Business Japanese Proficiency Test) 400 points or higher
20 years or more in Japan as a mid- to long-term resident
Graduation from a Japanese university, or completion of a Japanese college of technology or specialized training college course, when the major relates to the job (with an exception for certain approved courses)
Finishing compulsory education in Japan and graduating from a Japanese high school

For a language other than Japanese, the same document treats B2 as met if the language is the applicant's mother tongue or an official language, or if a test result shows CEFR B2 or higher (only tests that show the CEFR level on the certificate or official website), or if there is a reasonable explanation. Under the 1987 Philippine Constitution (Article XIV, Section 7), the official languages of the Philippines are Filipino and English. By the document's wording, English-language work by Filipino applicants falls under the official-language condition, but ISA decides each application individually; the document sets a standard, not an automatic approval.

Steps on the Japanese side: the Certificate of Eligibility (COE)

The Certificate of Eligibility (COE) (在留資格認定証明書) is a certificate that the Japanese side applies for in Japan before the visa is issued. The application is made by the Japanese side, not by the worker in the Philippines.

The documents depend on the employer category, ISA's grouping of employers by size and tax filing:

Category	Who is included
Category 1	Listed companies, national and local governments, incorporated administrative agencies and similar
Category 2	Employers whose withholding tax on employees' salaries in the previous year was 10 million yen or more
Category 3	Employers that filed the previous year's statutory withholding summary (法定調書合計表), other than Category 2
Category 4	Employers that fit none of the above

Documents common to all categories include the application form, a photo, a return envelope with postage, and proof of the employer's category. For Category 1 and 2 employers, other documents are generally not needed. For Category 4, the list includes:

A document showing the working conditions
The applicant's résumé
Proof of graduation or of work periods
A description of the employer's business
The employer's latest financial statements

For Category 3 and 4 employers, the declaration about the employer's representative and, for language-based customer work, the B2 proof described above are also required. Who files the COE, what it costs and how long it takes is explained in Certificate of Eligibility for Japan: Requirements and Timeline.

Steps on the Philippine side: direct hiring and MWO verification

The ban on direct hiring

A direct hire is a Filipino hired by a foreign employer without a licensed recruitment agency. Article 18 of the Labor Code of the Philippines bans this by default. It states that no employer may hire a Filipino worker for overseas employment "except through the Boards and entities authorized by the Secretary of Labor." The same article exempts members of the diplomatic corps, international organizations and other employers allowed by the Secretary of Labor.

A Japanese employer that wants to hire a Filipino directly therefore needs an exemption from this ban. The Philippine office that handles this in Japan is the Migrant Workers Office (MWO), the office of the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW) inside the Philippine Embassy. MWO-Tokyo's jurisdiction covers 19 prefectures, including Tokyo, Kanagawa, Saitama, Chiba and Okinawa.

MWO-Tokyo verification for a direct hire

MWO-Tokyo's page "Exemption on the Ban on Direct Hiring" (posted August 4, 2025) sets out the process:

Processing time: 10 to 15 working days.
Fee: none. The page states that MWO-Tokyo does not collect fees for the verification process.
Translation: Japanese documents must be translated into English.
Signatures: signatures and hanko (Japanese name seals) must be original; e-signatures are not accepted.

The checklist has 14 items:

Application form
Original standard employment contract
List of duties and position qualifications
Salary breakdown
OFW mandatory insurance policy or certificate
Copy of a valid visa or COE
The worker's passport, valid at least 6 months from the intended departure
Signed detailed CV
PRC license or TESDA National Certificate, if any
Certified true copy of the college diploma and Transcript of Records
Employment certificates from previous employers
Notarized statement on how the worker secured the employment (notarized in the Philippines)
Company registration (Tokibo Tohon) for corporations, or business permit and tax certificate for sole proprietors
Copy of the employer's passport or government ID

Because the checklist asks for a copy of the visa or COE, the COE step on the Japanese side comes first. The diploma and Transcript of Records in item 10 are the same records that show the link between the course and the job.

Workers leaving the Philippines as OFWs also need an OEC (Overseas Employment Certificate), the DMW exit clearance for OFWs. How it works is explained in What Is an OEC and Why You Cannot Skip It.

Workers who change employers while in Japan

MWO-Tokyo has a separate Balik-Manggagawa (returning OFW) contract verification for workers who changed employers while in Japan and have already started with the new employer. Professionals and skilled workers submit:

A DMW standard employment contract, or an addendum with DMW-prescribed provisions signed by both sides
Passport copy and residence card copy
Proof of current employment
A sworn statement on how they were hired
A copy of the health insurance card or My Number card
A copy of the employer representative's passport
Company registration with English translation

They then register on the DMW Online Services Portal. SSW workers are told to call the office instead.

Employer conduct that blocks new hiring

ISA's guideline protects workers on this status. An employer found to have done any of the following cannot newly take in workers on Gijinkoku during its suspension period:

Violence, threats or confinement against foreign workers
Taking away their passport or residence card
Not paying part or all of their wages
Unfairly restricting their going out or private life

These rules are a useful check on any employer. A legitimate employer has no reason to hold a worker's passport or residence card.

How Gijinkoku differs from SSW and TITP

Specified Skilled Worker (SSW) and the Technical Intern Training Program (TITP) are separate routes with different purposes, and Hanapon covers each in its own article. In short, ISA's comparison sheet (as of January 2026) states that SSW (i) needs a skills test pass and Japanese at JLPT N4 or higher (N3 or higher in some fields), and SSW (ii) needs the SSW (ii) skills test, while Gijinkoku needs, roughly, a university degree or 10 years or more of experience (3 years or more for international services work); by industry, SSW covers hands-on work such as assembly lines, cooking and basic car maintenance, while Gijinkoku covers design, programming, planning, management and supervisory roles. How the three routes compare is explained in TITP vs SSW vs Ikusei Shuro: Which Route to Japan Fits You?.

Step-by-step checklist

Check the tasks, not the job title. The work must need knowledge from the natural sciences or humanities, or be international services work such as interpretation or overseas trade. Packing, line work or "no experience needed" work does not qualify.
Check the link to the degree. Compare the course and Transcript of Records with the duties. ISA judges this flexibly for university graduates, including graduates of foreign universities.
Check the pay. It must be equal to or higher than a Japanese employee's pay for the same work. Commuting, family and housing allowances (unless taxable) do not count.
Check the language rule. For interpretation, translation, front-desk or similar customer work, B2-level ability in the working language is a precondition.
The employer applies for the COE in Japan, with documents based on its category.
Complete the Philippine side. For a direct hire, the employer and worker go through MWO verification (10 to 15 working days, no fee at MWO-Tokyo), then the worker obtains the OEC before departure.

FAQ

Q: Can a Filipino graduate get office work in Japan if the course does not exactly match the job?

Yes, in many cases. ISA's guideline says it judges the relation between a university major and the job flexibly and applies the same approach to universities abroad. ISA's approved cases include an economics graduate working as a systems engineer and a business administration graduate working as an interpreter and translator. The job still has to need professional knowledge; a degree does not make simple labor eligible.

Q: Is English enough, or is Japanese required?

For work that mainly uses language skills with people, ISA requires CEFR B2 ability in the language used. For Japanese, that means JLPT N2 or higher or another listed proof. For other languages, ISA's document treats B2 as met when the language is the applicant's mother tongue or an official language, and English is an official language of the Philippines. ISA still decides each application individually.

Q: Can a Japanese company hire a Filipino directly, without a recruitment agency?

Direct hiring is banned under Article 18 of the Philippine Labor Code unless the employer is exempted. For employers in MWO-Tokyo's area, MWO-Tokyo handles the exemption through its verification process, which uses a 14-item checklist, takes 10 to 15 working days and has no fee. The COE must be in hand first, because a copy of the visa or COE is on the checklist.

Summary

Office and professional work in Japan for Filipinos runs mainly through the Engineer/Specialist in Humanities/International Services status, known as Gijinkoku. The work must need professional knowledge from the natural sciences or humanities, or be international services work such as interpretation or overseas trade. A college degree in a related field is the usual qualification, and ISA judges that link flexibly for graduates of foreign universities. Factory, packing and "no experience needed" jobs do not qualify. Pay must match what a Japanese employee earns for the same work, and from April 15, 2026, language-based customer work requires CEFR B2 ability. The employer applies for the COE in Japan; on the Philippine side, a direct hire needs an exemption from the direct-hiring ban, handled by MWO-Tokyo's verification, followed by the OEC.

Sources

Immigration Services Agency of Japan, "Engineer/Specialist in Humanities/International Services" status page: https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/applications/status/gijinkoku.html
Immigration Services Agency of Japan, guideline on the Engineer/Specialist in Humanities/International Services status (revised April 2026): https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/content/001413639.pdf
Immigration Services Agency of Japan, permitted and refused cases (Attachment 3): https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/content/001413912.pdf
Immigration Services Agency of Japan, language ability for language-based customer work (Attachment 4): https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/content/001413643.pdf
Immigration Services Agency of Japan, differences between Engineer/Specialist in Humanities/International Services and Specified Skilled Worker: https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/content/001452975.pdf
Immigration Services Agency of Japan, foreign residents at the end of 2025 (press release): https://www.moj.go.jp/isa/publications/press/13_00062.html
e-Gov Law Search, Ministry of Justice Ordinance on landing criteria (Ordinance No. 16 of 1990): https://laws.e-gov.go.jp/law/402M50000010016
Labor Code of the Philippines (Presidential Decree No. 442): https://lawphil.net/statutes/presdecs/pd1974/pd_442_1974.html
1987 Constitution of the Republic of the Philippines: https://lawphil.net/consti/cons1987.html
MWO-Tokyo, Exemption on the Ban on Direct Hiring: https://mwo-tokyo.dmw.gov.ph/index.php/2025/08/04/exemption-on-the-ban-on-direct-hiring/
MWO-Tokyo, Balik-Manggagawa contract verification: https://mwo-tokyo.dmw.gov.ph/index.php/bmcv/