How to register for Yahoo Japan Auctions (for English speakers)

Hi All, I'm fairly new here but would like to share some tips on how to register for Yahoo Japan Auctions (YJA) if you're Japanese illiterate (like me). There's tonnes of proxy buying sites discussed elsewhere but the benefits of having your own YJA login include:

1. Suggested items; YJA is great at tracking your searches and browsing habits and suggesting products that it thinks you will like that you may have otherwise never found.
2. Suggested items are a great way to pick up on new search terms you might not have known about before; such as 開発 任天堂 which is good for Nintendo developer items.
3. Convenient search following and item watching, with instant notification.

First, I'd suggest using Chrome browser. Right clicking on a web page in Chrome that's written in Japanese will show an option 'Translate to English' - this comes in really handy.

So lets go to Yahoo Japan Auctions

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In Chrome browser you can right click on a webpage and translate to English

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Click 'Newly acquired' under the login link to go to the registration page

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Again, right click and translate to English. Clicking on a field will expand it so you can see what to enter. Enter your email address and it will automatically suggest a Yahoo Japan ID for you. For postcode I just choose Tokyo which is 100-0001. Birthday must be entered like 1980/01/01 format (YYYY/MM/DD).

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Next is the hard part. Open the wiki page for Hiragana (a Japanese alphabet). The captcha style security code here uses this language and you will need to copy and paste from the 5x10 grid characters as shown in the wiki window. Don't worry if you make a mistake, just try again. Also there is a timer, so hurry! It's generally not that hard to picture match the somewhat obscured characters in the security field but if you find it too hard, just refresh that field with the 'Display another image' button.

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Finally you'll receive an activation email and code number to enter on the next page.

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And now you're automatically logged in. Click on the search box and enter a search term. Some examples include:
開発機 development kit
開発用 for development
開発機材 development equipment
任天堂 Nintendo
開発 任天堂 development Nintendo
ネットやろうぜ net yaroze
(please suggest more in replies below)

[GALLERY=media, 2523]Slide07 by Shane Battye posted Mar 1, 2018 at 11:41 PM[/GALLERY]​

You can follow a search and be notified when new items appear matching that criteria by clicking the 'Register new arrival...' button. On the next window it takes you to, uncheck 'Apps' and it will then allow 'Notify immediately' via email.

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When you find an item you like, hit the yellow star to watch it.

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Watched items will notify you 15 minutes before the auction end to bid. Unlike eBay, Yahoo Japan Auctions hinders snipe bidding by extending the auction finish time if a bid is made within 5 minutes of the scheduled end time.

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However, I would not recommend making actual purchases this way as the process of completing a transaction and potentially communicating with a seller is best left to a proxy service. If you find an item you like just copy and paste it's listing title into the search of your proxy service and bid that way.

You don't need to spend much time on YJA to find some incredible listings and the more time you spend searching for things you like while logged in, the better it gets at suggesting items you might be interested in - many of which may have entirely Japanese titles that you would never have searched for or found simply because they were buried within the other 'Nintendo 64' listings.

 

Shhhhhh shh shhhhhh you're giving away all the secrets, I'll be out of a side-gig if you keep this up.

 

I did briefly consider the ramifications of opening up this market. My hope is firstly, that it encourages greater numbers of listings on YJA because there'll be more buyers, and secondly, that it reduces the eBay mark ups you occasionally see on items that have been handballed directly from YJA. But yeah... maybe I've just shot myself in the foot haha

 

It's happening naturally already, it's a lot harder to get good deals these days even compared to 2 years ago. I lived in Japan from 2013 - 2017 and you wouldn't believe how many 3,000 yen PS1 Debugging Stations I scored. So what's the harm in accelerating the process, this is a great guide, good job.

 

Couple of questions:

- Any idea how to pass the Mobile Phone verification with a non Japanese phone number? (Apparently this is required, in order to bid on certain lots.)
- How can I find out about shipping import costs per listing, or if the item will even ship overseas? Is there something specific I should avoid?

 

I've always used a proxy for bidding on an item so I don't know about that. I can recommend jauce.com as I've used them for a long time and they're reliable with shipping and packing and helpful with questions, even contacting sellers on your behalf with queries.

Generally domestic shipping is shown on the item page but with heavy items you may need them to contact a seller to ask the weight to get an idea of internal delivery. They provide a total cost estimate calculator and can ship surface or airmail (EMS or FedEx). https://www.jauce.com/japan_auction_detail.php

The benefit of using such a service too is that they will hold your items up to 60 days in their arrival warehouse in Japan so that you can choose to bundle multiple items and save overall shipping cost from Japan to your location.

 

The Captcha part makes me wanna kill myself

 

Yeah it's pretty intense. It took me couple of goes for this walk through cos first I inexplicably made an error and second time it said page had expired... I hadn't even been aware of a timer. I tend to refresh the captcha field until I see one that looks relatively doable.

 

This is a good guidegto setup your own account but no good for anyone who wants to bid without using a proxy. Basically you can't. To use Yahoo Auctions fully you will need a Japanese phone number, address and credit card.

 

Yeah I'd recommend non-Japanese speakers stick to a proxy or friend with an account for actual bidding. It could get messy if you're unable communicate with a seller.

 

Well yeah, but that's not what this guide is for. It's to give you an easier way to find and keep track of auctions, because proxy sites don't have a watch list feature like Yahoo and eBay have.