Starting April 1, the fees for commercial registration electronic certificates have been revised. Electronic certificates with a validity period of one month can now be issued for 500 yen, and electronic certificates with a validity period of three to 3 months have also been reduced in price by up to 27 yen.
If it's possible to do it for 500 yen, I think I'll give it a try. It's a bit annoying that it can only be done from a Windows PC, though.
A business registration electronic certificate is an electronic certificate required for a company representative to carry out various procedures online. It is used for the following purposes:
Commercial registration electronic certificateMain uses
The Commercial Registration Electronic Certificate can be used for the following purposes:
- Legal matters
- Commercial registration, deposits, electronic notarization, and obtaining seal certificates, etc.
- Tax matters
- Filing and paying taxes using the national tax electronic filing and payment system (e-Tax) or local tax electronic filing system (eLTAX).
- Social insurance and labor insurance
- Health insurance and employee pension insurance procedures, and labor insurance related applications.
- Patents
- Online patent applications and international applications (PCT-RO).
- Car ownership procedures
- Automobile-related procedures such as vehicle registration and periodic inspections.
- Other administrative procedures
- Electronic applications for radio wave usage, electronic bidding by the Defense Acquisition Agency, and a common electronic procurement system for government ministries and agencies.
But there aren't many opportunities to use any of them.
How to digitally sign a PDF
The Commercial Registry Digital Certificate can also be used to sign PDF documents such as contracts. To sign a PDF, follow these steps:
1. Preparation of necessary software
- Use Adobe Acrobat Pro or Adobe Acrobat Reader.
- It will be convenient to install the "Commercial Registration Electronic Certification Software" and "General Application Software" provided by the Ministry of Justice.
2. Prepare your PDF file
- If the file to be signed is a Word or Excel document, convert it to PDF format beforehand.
3. Procedure for attaching electronic signature
- Open PDF file
- Open the PDF you want to sign in Adobe Acrobat Pro or Reader.
- Setting up a Digital ID
- From the menu, select "Tools" → "Certificates".
- Click "Digital Signature" and specify the signature location.
- Select "Set up a new digital ID" and then "Use the digital ID from the file."
- Select the commercial registration electronic certificate (extension .p12) and enter a password to set it.
- Executing the signature
- Select the digital ID you set up and enter your password again.
- Once signed, save the signed PDF file.
- Confirmation of signature completion
- When a PDF has been signed, Adobe will display the message "This document contains a valid signature."
Warnings
- Since commercial registration electronic certificates are issued by the Legal Affairs Bureau, when you verify them with Adobe Acrobat, you may see the message "There is a problem with at least one signature." This is because the root certificate of the Legal Affairs Bureau is not registered in Adobe's trusted list. Even in this case, there is no problem if you verify it with software provided by the Ministry of Justice, but this is an obstacle when trying to use it in general.
- We can also accommodate cases where multiple signatures are required or additional signatures are required.
For more information,https://www.moj.go.jp/ONLINE/CERTIFICATION/index.html Please see.