Manufacturers of cash register systems used by supermarkets, convenience stores and other retailers have told the bipartisan national council on social security, which is discussing consumption tax cuts and other issues, that modifications to allow a zero-tax rate on food would take about a year.
This technical roadblock has cast serious doubt on the feasibility of implementing the temporary tax rate within fiscal 2026 as Takaichi has sought. However, if the rate was reduced to a level such as 1%, the modification period could be shortened to about three to six months, the manufacturers said.
by SkyInJapan
34 comments
How can cash registers be so inflexible? A year?!? That is quite embarrassing.
*sucking air between the teeth* …
… しょうがない (insert shrug here).
imagine how old the code is
This just makes me wonder about operations that don’t use dated cash registers.
“Such inflexibility is an ’embarrassment’ for the country, Prime Minister Takaichi confirmed via fax.”
That’s embarrassing.
Japanese supermarkets use JAN codes when scanning items.
They link to a database that includes things like the tax category.
All they would have to do is change the 8% (reduced tax rate) to 0%. The 10% (standard consumption tax) could remain as is.
Surely it would just be a simple system update that changes a single variable. Oh Japan…
Good lord this is again, so embarrassing…
Is that why it wasnt a big deal when did the whole 6% dine in and 8% for take out. Or what it is?
They simply can’t do 0%. Lmfao.
Gyomu supermarket in my city finally added a bash register that shows you a running total as they scan each item, rather than only the price at the end
It was super flexible when they needed to increase tax. Twice.
Yea, it’s very embarrassing how offline Japan still is (and how slow any change is implemented) … but maybe it’s actually for the better, because a lot of online systems look like from the 80s and that’s not great in today’s internet, because those systems’ security probably looks accordingly as well.
But this isn’t a cash register system problem, it’s a being stuck in the past forever problem … or you could say the country has an LDP problem, because that’s literally their primary goal, keeping Japan in the past. And Takaichi is very big on that, so not sure why she’s surprised … but glad she finally feels some embarrassment for it.
I remember Isetan Shinjuku, had a really old school POS and printer, it literally was like zap zap zap zap and it printed line by line, word by word. Really old school
The tax rebate for tourists is overly-complicated and uses up tons of time and resources to process 😵💫
How is it possible that in Europe where every product has different tax and sometimes tax rates can change overnight there is zero problem with that? Cant they just copy same solutions?
Just set the tax rate to 0.0001. Ship It.
Hmmm ok… when it is for increasing the consumption tax, registers are really flexible for some reason.
I haven’t used cash in years to be honest. I always keep cash in my wallet because there’s always some stupid place that hasn’t implemented cashless systems, but for the most part I don’t need it.
I’m confused why this is a problem. Isn’t tax added? Just don’t add it and done. But even a reduction to 1% would be helpful to people. So start with that at least.
So, it can do integer percentages… 0% is an integer percentage. Sounds like an easy fix to me.
I just wonder if when they increased the tax rate some years ago, it also long time to implement.
Oddly specific.
It’s amazing how in a couple of generations the image of Japan went from “hi-tech industrial juggernaut with bullet trains and humanoid robots” to “Everything runs on software that makes Windows 98 look cutting edge.”
This isn’t just a Japan problem. The Danish government wanted to do the same thing, and ran into the exact same issue.
Can it do decimals? 0.1 or 0.01 is still doable
A blanket tax is a tax for the rich. Funny how politicians act like they’re giving by fixing their mistakes. Look busy.
So it must be an integer, not 0.00001?
That tracks. Mizuho Bank only allows letters and numbers in their passwords (no special characters like !@#$%^&*).
Honestly something like this is embarrassing from the public perspective in the year 2026.
Imagine having difficulty with cash register software when you can send people to the moon
Software dev here… one year for 0 percent tax is probably about right.
It’s not about changing a number in a spreadsheet and calling it a day. You have multiple layers of hardware, software, servers and networking across dozens of companies.
For example, my local supermarket has e-ink digital displays for many of its prices… with both base price and tax-included price, as well as a special color when it’s on sale. I don’t know how they update them… but I’m guessing it’s not some obasan typing into a calculator. It probably requires a special piece of hardware or tablet, that takes prices from a database that is managed by the central headquarters of the supermarket chain. Which itself is updated via a backend user interface with complicated rules and formulations for each item number.
Could you change the tax number to 0%? Maybe. But the impact across the whole system would be vast. The end point tablet may check for 0 or negative tax values, and throw an error, saying it’s an invalid value. Or even worse… it may not check for 0 tax at all. Some legacy code may even try to divide by 0%… on old languages, like COBOL or C… that can just crash the whole computer… so your test surface is enormous.
If one company did everything end to end, all handled internally, across the entire country… then maybe you could make the 0 percent change in a month or two. But across dozens of vendors, hardware, code bases, etc… one year sounds realistic.
此奴は選挙前に公約として掲げた消費税の減税をしたくないから、レジメーカーのせいにして逃げおおせようとしているだけだよ。
増税するときはあっという間にデータ更新が出来るのに、またもや｢恥ずかしい｣嘘を吐いて誤魔化そうとして、自分は無知だと自己紹介したんだ。
Japan in general is notoriously bureaucratic and inflexible, so this isn’t surprising. The DMV is especially last century. Government organizations in Japan are all like that really.
You know what else sucks? Not being able to mix payment methods. As in, pay with partial cash and the rest on a card.
Many car parking machines still can’t accept the new bank notes despite it getting harder and harder to find those old notes.
This might be about supporting different rates in different items?
I realise this is somewhat tangential, but a zero percent consumption tax? How are they making up the shortfall?!
They should tell us the names of manufacturer.
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