Late pension payments and Japan PR: reading your ねんきんネット record

For permanent residence, ISA asks whether you paid your pension premiums at the proper time over the last 2 years (1 year for highly skilled professionals with 80+ points, J-Skip, and children of Japanese nationals or permanent residents). Each month of 国民年金 (national pension) is due by the end of the following month, and a month paid after that counts as late even if it is paid now. If you were an employee the whole time, your employer paid 厚生年金 (employees' pension); the months to look at are the gaps between jobs.

The deadline: end of the following month

国民年金法 第91条 says: 「毎月の保険料は、翌月末日までに納付しなければならない。」 Each month's premium must be paid by the last day of the following month.

The statute itself has no rule for weekends or holidays. The Japan Pension Service (JPS) states on its premium page that when the month-end falls on a Saturday, Sunday, national holiday or the New Year closure (31 December, 2 and 3 January), the deadline becomes the next business day of financial institutions. This is JPS practice rather than a statutory rule; our audit applies it.

Premium for	Month-end deadline	Effective deadline
August 2026	Wednesday 30 September 2026	30 September 2026
September 2026	Saturday 31 October 2026	Monday 2 November 2026
November 2026	Thursday 31 December 2026	Monday 4 January 2027

The deadline does not wait for a payment slip. If the 納付書 has not arrived, JPS lets you pay with the payment details shown in ねんきんネット (via Pay-easy).

Your review window

Route	Pension window
Work statuses, 家族滞在, 定住者, spouses, highly skilled 70+	2 years
Highly skilled 80+, J-Skip, children of Japanese nationals or (special) permanent residents	1 year

Question 4 of the self-check sheet reads 「直近２年間、年金保険料（国民年金及び厚生年金）を適正な時期に納付している。」, with the note 「未納や当初の納付期限を超えて納付したことがある場合は、「いいえ（Ｎｏ）」を選んでください。」 On the sheet for spouses and children, a person supported by someone else answers with the supporter's record. The other six questions are covered in the self-check sheet guide.

Employees: the risk is the gap between jobs

While you are covered by 厚生年金, your employer deducts and pays the premium, so there is no personal deadline to miss. When you leave a job and do not start another straight away, JPS explains that you become a 国民年金 第1号被保険者 (category 1 insured person) and pay the premiums yourself. The notification goes to your city or ward office within 14 days from the day after you leave.

JPS's own examples show how a month is counted:

• You leave on 15 April and do not start a new job: you are in 国民年金 from 16 April and pay from the April premium, which is due at the end of May.
• You leave on 31 March and join a new employer's 厚生年金 on 16 April: no 国民年金 premium is due for April, but the notification for 1 April is still needed.
• If you were a dependent spouse (第3号被保険者) of an employee and your spouse leaves the job, you lose that status too and must switch to category 1.

Exemptions and deferrals are not unpaid months

If JPS approved a 免除 (full or partial exemption), 納付猶予 (payment postponement) or 学生納付特例 (student deferral) for a month, the full premium was not due for that month. ねんきんネット shows such months as 全免, 半免, 猶予, 学特 and so on, not as 未納, and our audit treats them as exempt, not late. Two details matter:

• With a partial exemption the remaining part still has a deadline. A month shown as 半未 or 3/4未 has an unpaid remainder.
• From April 2027 ISA's guideline also looks at your projected pension. JPS's own table shows that postponed months not paid back add nothing to the pension amount.

Paying old months later

• An unpaid month can be paid within 2 years of its deadline; after that it is time-barred (JPS). Paying it settles the month, but the payment date is still after the deadline, so it remains a late payment for the self-check sheet.
• 追納 is different: it pays back months that were approved as exempt or postponed, within 10 years, to raise your future pension. Those months were never unpaid.
• The special 後納 schemes that allowed paying 5 or 10 years back ended on 30 September 2018.

What ISA accepts as pension records

ISA's application pages accept any of these:

1. From the 年金事務所 (pension office): the 被保険者記録照会回答票 with 被保険者記録照会（納付Ⅰ） and （納付Ⅱ）.
2. The ねんきん定期便 (pension statement), but only the full-period version sent in an envelope; the yearly postcard is not accepted. ISA says the full version can be requested by phone and takes about two months.
3. A printout of ねんきんネット's 「各月の年金記録」, plus the 「国民年金の年金記録（各月の納付状況）」 page if you had 国民年金 months in the last 2 years.

If you had 国民年金 months, add copies of all 国民年金保険料領収証書 (premium receipts) for them. ISA asks for these to prove that nothing was paid after its deadline; if you cannot submit them, its page asks for a written explanation (理由書) instead. If all 24 months were 国民年金 and you can submit all 24 receipts, ISA says you do not need the ねんきん定期便 or the ねんきんネット printout. Black out the 基礎年金番号 (basic pension number) on every copy and cover any My Number.

Reading the monthly record in ねんきんネット

Log in, choose 年金記録を確認する, then 月別の年金記録を確認する; for the 国民年金 detail, open 国民年金加入記録を確認する. The record is a grid of fiscal years (April to March) with a status for each month. Codes in JPS's user guide include:

Code	Meaning
納付	Paid (also months paid back after an exemption)
納受	Paid at a convenience store or similar, still being processed
未納	Unpaid and no longer payable
納可	Unpaid, still payable
全免 / 半免 / 3/4免 / 1/4免	Full or partial exemption (半未 and similar: remainder unpaid)
猶予 / 学特	Postponement / student deferral
3号	Dependent spouse of an employee
／	A month in 厚生年金

The grid shows a status code for each month, not the date you paid. A 納付 month may have been paid on time, paid late, or paid back after an exemption. The date comes from the receipt's stamp, your bank or card statement, or the app's payment history. JPS also notes that a paid month can show as 未納 until the payment is processed, and that convenience-store payments take about 12–16 business days to appear. If receipts are missing, ask your 年金事務所 which of its records shows the payment dates for your 国民年金 months.

Our cautious "clean from" reading

ISA has not published a formula for when a late payment stops mattering; it says it checks payment history as far as it can be confirmed. Our audit uses a cautious reading of the guideline: a late month stays in view until both its deadline and its payment date are older than your window. We take the later of the two dates, add the window, and add one day.

Example: the premium for April 2025 was due at the end of May. 31 May 2025 was a Saturday, so the effective deadline was Monday 2 June 2025. Paid on 20 June 2025, it was 18 days late. With a 2-year window, our "clean from" date is 21 June 2027, which is after 31 March 2027, so a filing on that date falls under the April 2027 guideline (what changes). With a 1-year window the date was 21 June 2026. If ISA has already refused an application over pension months, see PR after a refusal.

The free check reads one document, such as a ねんきんネット screenshot, and counts the payments it finds.