On July 18, the hometown tax payment website Satofuru introduced in Tokyo the trends of hometown tax payments and the latest thank-you gift trends for the first half of 2023.
The “Satofuru App de One-Stop Application” is a system (free of charge) that allows users to complete applications online with a my number card and the Satofuru App, whereas previously they had to complete applications by mail. According to a survey conducted by the company, approximately 80% of users were able to complete the application within 6 minutes, and more than 99% of users wish to repeat the service.
With more than 1,200 local governments, 30,000 contracted businesses, and more than 680,000 items, “Satofuru” is currently the most popular tax payment site in Japan. Mr. Yuki Sakahira of the Corporate Strategy Office’s Public Relations Group, who took the podium, first introduced the “Satofuru App de One-Stop Application” service, which the company began offering in November 2022.
Trends in Furusato Tax Payment and the Latest Thank You Gift Trends
In May 2023, a full 15 years will have passed since the start of the Furusato tax payment system. Both the amount of donations and the number of donations have been increasing every year, and in FY2021, the amount of donations received reached a record high of over 830.2 billion yen, approximately 1.2 times the amount of the previous year.
According to Mr. Sakahira, the recent “high cost of living” has also had an impact on such hometown tax payments. In a survey of donors, more than 40% answered “Yes” to the question, “Has the high cost of living had an impact on your choice of tax gifts? More than 40% of the donors answered “Yes” to the question, “Has the high cost of living affected your choice of tax gifts?
In the genres of thank-you gifts chosen by hometown taxpayers in 2022, “seafood/seafood” and “meat” remain popular, but approximately one in six respondents chose “sundries/daily necessities” as their favorite.
In a survey about “translated” thank-you gifts, more than 30% of the respondents indicated that they have applied for “translated” thank-you gifts, and more than 70% of them have applied for them in 2022.
In the ranking of the most popular thank-you gifts for the first half of 2023, the top-ranked item is the Okhotsk scallop from Monbetsu City, Hokkaido, which has been the top-ranked item in Satofuru for four consecutive years. The company estimates that the trend of selecting thank-you gifts for daily use will continue in 2023 due to the high cost of living that has been continuing since 2022. The company estimates that this trend will continue in 2023.
Next is the ranking of Satofuru’s search keywords for the first half of the year: No. 1 is “rice,” No. 2 is “toilet paper” and No. 6 is “there is a reason,” again suggesting that many people are searching for rice and daily necessities that they use on a daily basis due to high prices. In fact, the number of donations of “rice” has increased approximately 1.5 times in two years, and “toilet paper” has increased approximately 5 times in two years.
Many of these products have higher contents or lower donation amounts than usual.
© Source travel watch