My Japan SE Visa Approval Journey as a Freelancer/VA
Hello! Just wanted to share my experience on my first application for a Japan tourism visa.
I actually just acted on a whim kasi I wasn't planning on visiting Japan till November this year. Pero last Feb 15, ewan ko ba ano pumasok sa isip ko lol but anyways, here it is:
Feb 15: Booked a slot for April 15 in VFS Davao, Premium Lounge kasi walang regular upon checking. I didn't want to wait 2+ hours or even a few more days and mag refresh2 so I just booked the Premium Lounge for Php 2720.
April 1st week: Decided to check my upcoming appointment and there's an available slot 5 days earlier so I decided to update my appointment to April 10 instead.
April 10: Submitted my documents. It was a fairly easy process and I guess the premium lounge benefits are worth it kasi the staff was meticulously checking my documents. Bonus na lang yung snacks. I actually applied for an SE visa and prepared its documents pero upon checking the VFS confirmation email, it seems that the staff changed my application to ME (with considerable financial capacity) kahit wala akong ME form. No idea why they did that but sabi nila na hayaan ko nalang daw.
April 22: My passport was sent to LBC na huhu I couldn't waittttt
April 25: Got my passport, got SE visa! Decided to check the visa page agad instead of looking at the C/R letters at the back of the passport lol. April 20 yung issue date by the way.
Documents and Information:
- Certificate of Employment indicating the start of employment, salary (3x,xxx), position
- Bank certs for my 2 trad banks and 2 digital banks. Almost 200k total balance. For the 2 trad banks, the ADB was 13k and 55k. By the way, I got these certs mga 3rd week of March.
- 6-month bank statements for the 2 digital banks. Had to explain why I submitted this on top of the bank certs cuz of no ADB info in a cover letter.
- 2026 1st Quarter ITR and 2025 Annual ITR. I also explained in a cover letter why I had no tax due cuz of my late BIR registration
- BIR COR as a freelancer/VA
- Past international travels were Thailand March 2025, Thailand September 2025, Hongkong-Macau November 2025, and Vietnam March 2026.
3rd week of May yung travel date ko and I'll be going alone! See you, Kansai!