全Full
More than three days before
Cancel and you are refunded in full.
Good to know
The small print, said plainly.
Everything here is also on the legal notice, in the wording Japanese law asks for. This page is the same thing in ordinary English.
What the price covers.
Included
The planning, the booking of your tables, and our time on the day. With us, that means we are with you all day and do the talking: the ordering, the asking, and anything that needs saying in Japanese.
Not included
Admission tickets, meals, drinks and travel. You buy your own tickets at each place and tap through the gates yourself with an IC card. We tell you roughly what to expect when we send your plan, so the total holds no surprises.
Our own costs
Our train fares and our own admission are ours, not yours. You are never asked to buy a guide a ticket.
Help for the rest of your trip
Once you have booked, ask us anything by message until you fly home, and it costs nothing. We answer between 8am and 10pm Japan time, and on a day we are out guiding it can take a few hours. If what you want is another whole day planned and its tables booked, that is a booking rather than a question, and we will say so.
One group a day
We take one booking a day, so the day you book is yours alone. Nobody else is added to it, and we are not running from one group to the next.
Changing or cancelling
Moving your day costs nothing.
However late you ask, if another date is free we simply move you to it. There is no fee for that, ever. The refund scale below only applies if you cancel outright.
半Half
Two days, or the day before
Half is refunded.
無None
On the day itself
No refund. The day was held for you alone, and nobody else was taken.
If we have to cancel, which has to do with illness on our side more than anything else, you get everything back and we help you fill the day another way.
How a refund reaches you. By the same route you paid: back onto the card through Stripe, or back into the PayPal account. We start it the day you ask. Your bank usually takes five to ten days after that, which is their pace and not ours. A cash booking has nothing to refund, since nothing was charged.
Write to us to cancel or move a day. Email or WhatsApp is enough. There is no form and no account to log into.
Weather
Rain does not cancel a day.
Ordinary rain
The day goes ahead. Osaka is built for it: covered arcades run for kilometres, and the markets, the food halls, the museums and the old shopping streets are all indoors. We rearrange the order the night before and tell you what changed. Bring an umbrella, or buy one for a few hundred yen at any convenience store.
Heat
July and August are genuinely hard. We shorten the walking, move the outdoor parts to the morning and the evening, and build in more places to sit down and cool off. Tell us if anyone in your group finds heat difficult and we plan around it from the start.
A typhoon, or an official warning
If a warning is issued or the trains stop, the day is unsafe and we do not run it. We move you to another date at no cost. If you fly home before we can, you are refunded in full.
Who decides
We do, and we tell you the evening before wherever the forecast allows. We would rather move a day than walk you through something miserable.
On the day
How it actually goes.
Where we meet
Your hotel lobby, at the hour you chose. That is why the form asks where you are staying. If you are not staying in Osaka, tell us and we will name a station instead.
If you are running late
Tell us and it is fine. Message or call and we move things around. A late start makes for a shorter day, not a cancelled one, and nobody minds.
If we cannot reach you
We wait an hour at the meeting point. If you have not appeared in that hour and we cannot get hold of you by phone, WhatsApp or email, the day ends there and it is not refunded. That is the one thing we cannot be flexible about, because the day was held for you alone. It is also why we ask for a number we can actually reach on the day.
How long a day runs
Around eight hours is usual, and the example day runs to about twelve because it includes the evening. Tell us what suits you. A short day is a perfectly good day.
Children
Welcome, and free under 13. Tell us their ages in the last box and we shorten the legs between stops and pick places that will not test them.
Getting around
An IC card, Suica or ICOCA, is the easy way. You tap in and out at every gate and it works on all of it: trains, subways and buses. If you have not got one, say so when you book and we will tell you where to pick one up beforehand, so the morning is not spent at a ticket machine. Expect a few hundred yen of fares between stops.
Walking, and stairs
Japanese stations involve stairs, and not all of them have lifts. If anyone in your group cannot manage much walking or standing, say so and we build a day that does not ask it.
Allergies and what you cannot eat
Tell us in writing on the form. We pass it to the restaurant when we book, in Japanese, rather than leaving it to be explained at the table.
Language
We work in English. Everything written to you, and everything said on the day, is in English.
Paying
Card, PayPal, or cash on the day.
Card and PayPal are paid when you book, on Stripe's or PayPal's own page, and the day is yours from that moment. Your card number never touches this website and we never see it. Your plan follows within 24 hours.
Cash is handed over in yen when we meet at your hotel. Nothing is charged when you book, and we write back within 24 hours to confirm the day is yours.