We use a company called HiFX to do international transfers. I can't guarantee they do transfers to Japan but we use them to do transfers to Spain and the USA. Once you register with them you can check on a daily basis what the transfer rate is and get the best possible one. Might be worth a try.
I use Paypal to make money transfers to relatives in Japan. I admit I don't pay attention to PP's commission fee.
The person should link their Japanese bank account to their Paypal account first. Once it's sorted, you can transfer the money to their Paypal account and they transfer it to their bank account. The money transfer via PP/PP is done instantly and depending on their bank, the transfer via PP/bank can take between thirty minutes and three working days.
A lot of people use LLoyds to make transfers, though. Probably because of GoLLoyds (now known as Shinsei Bank) in Japan. Transfers are free to Lloyds customers, but some recipients' banks in Japan charge them a small fee, approx. 1500 yen, for receiving a transfer.
Otherwise, buy an International Postal Money Order from your local post office - cost between £1.80 and £2.20 - and post it.
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If I am misunderstanding your question, just ignore me.
Banks charge something like 25 pounds + give a poor exchange rate. The bulk rate at the moment is 172.
The person should link their Japanese bank account to their Paypal account first. Once it's sorted, you can transfer the money to their Paypal account and they transfer it to their bank account. The money transfer via PP/PP is done instantly and depending on their bank, the transfer via PP/bank can take between thirty minutes and three working days.
A lot of people use LLoyds to make transfers, though. Probably because of GoLLoyds (now known as Shinsei Bank) in Japan. Transfers are free to Lloyds customers, but some recipients' banks in Japan charge them a small fee, approx. 1500 yen, for receiving a transfer.
Otherwise, buy an International Postal Money Order from your local post office - cost between £1.80 and £2.20 - and post it.
In the end I went with monycorp.com because they offered a very good rate 1.67yen = 1 and only 9 pound fee.