Photo/Illutration The Metropolitan Police Department’s driver’s license center in Tokyo’s Shinagawa Ward (Asahi Shimbun file photo)

The National Police Agency on July 10 announced tighter procedures for converting foreign driver’s permits into Japanese licenses, including imposing tougher written and skills tests and preventing short-term tourists from applying.

The new measures will be included in revisions of the Road Traffic Law and take effect on Oct. 1, after the NPA solicits public opinions through Aug. 9.

“We aim to ensure that drivers understand Japan’s traffic rules, which will contribute to road safety,” the NPA explained.

The government started considering the new rules following a pair of high-profile traffic accidents caused by foreign drivers with converted licenses and growing criticism that the written test is “too easy.”

The conversion process involves both a knowledge test and a skills test.

The knowledge test consists of 10 true-or-false questions using illustrations, and a passing score is seven correct answers.

In 2024, the passage rate was 93 percent.

The NPA plans to eliminate the illustrations, increase the number of questions to 50, and raise the passing score to 90 percent.

The skills test, taken at a driver’s license center, will include new tasks, such as driving through railroad crossings and crosswalks.

A stricter scoring system will be applied in the test for rule violations, such as failure to use the turn signal.

NO TOURISTS

Applicants seeking to convert their driver’s permits to Japanese licenses must provide an address in Japan.

Currently, addresses for hotels or acquaintances’ homes are accepted as valid places of stay in Japan. This loose rule has allowed tourists to convert their licenses to Japanese ones.

The NPA surveyed license conversion systems in 15 countries and regions, including Britain and China, and found that many require applicants to have stayed in the country for at least three months. Basically, they do not allow conversions for short-term visitors.

The NPA will follow suit by requiring applicants to provide a certificate of residence for address verification. Diplomats and others in special vocations will be exempt from this rule.

ACCIDENTS CAUSED BY FOREIGN DRIVERS

In May, a Chinese driver veered off a road in Saitama Prefecture and hit four elementary school children, causing minor and serious injuries.

In Mie Prefecture, a Peruvian man driving the wrong way on an expressway led to a multiple-vehicle accident.

Both drivers had obtained Japanese licenses through the foreign license conversion system.

In 2024, foreign drivers caused 7,286 traffic accidents in Japan, up 561 from a decade earlier. However, the specific number of accidents caused by drivers with converted driver’s licenses is unknown.

The number of foreign nationals converting their licenses has surged in recent years.

In 2024, 68,623 people obtained a Japanese license through this system, 2.4 times the figure of a decade earlier.

Vietnamese were the largest group of license converters last year, with 16,681 drivers, followed by 15,251 Chinese and 4,901 South Koreans.

Due to the rising number of applicants, 44 of Japan’s 47 prefectural police departments have introduced a reservation system for the first procedure at driver’s license centers.

Only the Chiba, Saitama and Fukuoka prefectural police departments do not require such reservations.

Japanese driver’s licenses are coveted because they can be used to obtain an International Driving Permit, which allows holders to legally drive in about 100 countries that are signatories to the 1949 Geneva Conventions.

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