Legal

1. Terms of Service

These Terms of Service (the "Terms") govern your use of the websites operated by Dunkman Yoshi ("we"), including the Japanese Dream practice app, the diagnostic tests, the timeline, and the lessons, coaching and consulting sessions booked through this site (together, the "Service").

By creating an account, booking a session, or making a purchase, you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, please do not use the Service.

1-1. Scope of the Service

We currently provide the following:

• Japanese Dream practice app: AI-based conversation practice, purchased per session or as a pass
• Diagnostic tests: Japanese level test and other tests, with results and explanations
• One-on-one online sessions booked through this site: Strategy Session, Japanese Lessons, English Lessons, and consulting
• Japanese proficiency assessment for companies and schools: for each candidate or student, a written report covering their JLPT-equivalent level, how well their Japanese works in a Japanese workplace, and notes on their speaking. Candidates take the tests with an organization code, and pricing is per person
• Market Entry Consulting: a monthly engagement based on a separate agreement
• Monthly subscriptions such as the jump training program
• The timeline and profile pages

Prices, session lengths and other details are shown on each Services page. We may add, change or discontinue parts of the Service. If we discontinue something you have already paid for and not yet used, we will contact you about the unused balance.

1-2. Accounts and eligibility

• The Service is available only to individuals aged 18 or older.
• Please register with accurate information and keep your login credentials secure. You are responsible for activity carried out through your account.
• Accounts are for one person. Please do not share an account with, or transfer it to, someone else.
• We may suspend or close an account that breaches these Terms.
• You may delete your account at any time from your account page. Deleting an account does not by itself create a right to a refund. See section 4.

1-3. Prohibited conduct

When using the Service, please do not:

• Break any applicable law, or encourage others to do so
• Harass, threaten, defame or discriminate against anyone, whether on the timeline, on profile pages, or during a session
• Impersonate another person, or post someone else's personal information without their consent
• Infringe the copyright, trademark or other rights of a third party
• Copy, publish, resell or otherwise redistribute test questions, lesson materials, or session recordings
• Share, resell or lend paid access, invite codes or free passes to anyone else
• Access the Service by automated means (scraping, bots), attempt to reverse engineer it, or place an unreasonable load on it
• Attempt to bypass payment, access restrictions or bot protection

We may remove content and suspend or close accounts that breach this section.

1-4. Payments and fees

• Payment is made at the time of purchase or booking, by credit card (Stripe), PayPal, or bank transfer (Wise).
• The amount shown at checkout is the total amount charged; we do not add fees on top of it. Any currency conversion or transfer fees charged by your own bank or card issuer are outside our control.
• Access is granted once payment is confirmed. For bank transfers, this is after we have confirmed that the transfer has arrived, so there may be a delay of a business day or so.
• Purchased practice sessions that have not been started expire 30 days after purchase, as described in section 4.
• Free passes, complimentary test credits and lesson packs have no cash value, cannot be transferred to another person, and are not exchangeable for money.
• If a payment fails, is reversed, or is charged back, we may suspend access until the matter is resolved.

1-5. Assessment for companies and schools, and organization codes

This section applies when a company or school (the "organization") asks us to assess the Japanese of their candidates or students (the "test takers").

• What we receive from you: the information the organization gives us is limited to the organization name, the name and email address of your contact person, the number of people to be assessed, and the names and email addresses needed to identify the test takers. Everything the test taker enters themselves through their own account on this site (their test answers and results, and the recordings and transcripts from the speaking task) is received by us directly from that person.
• Purpose: we use that information only to carry out the assessment you asked for and to write and deliver a report on each test taker. We do not use it for anything else — not for our own marketing, not for other customers, and not as training data for AI.
• Consent from the test takers: obtaining the consent needed from each test taker — both to take the assessment and for their results and speaking notes to be given to the organization — is the organization's responsibility. We accept the work on the basis that you have obtained it.
• Delivery of the reports: we deliver one report per test taker to the organization. What those reports contain, and what they do not, is set out in section 3-4 of the Privacy Policy (Reports provided to companies and schools) below.
• Requests to delete: if the organization asks us to delete a test taker's recordings, transcripts or test records, we delete them promptly, without waiting for the retention period to run out. The same applies to a request from the test taker themselves.

Organization codes

• An organization code carries one place (a "seat") for each person you ordered. One seat is for one test taker (one account), and is assigned to the account that enters the code. Once every seat is taken, no further accounts can enter that code.
• Every organization code has an expiry date. A code issued through a purchase is valid for 90 days from the date it is issued; a code we issue individually is valid for the number of days we tell you when we hand it over. After it expires the code can no longer be entered or used to take a test.
• A code opens only the tests selected when it was issued. It does not open our other diagnostics.
• While the code is valid there is no limit on how many times a test taker may sit those tests. The exception is the speaking task, which is once per seat: once it has been submitted it cannot be recorded again.
• An organization code, and the access it gives, is for the organization to hand to its own candidates or students. It may not be transferred, resold or lent to anyone else. It has no cash value and is not exchangeable for money. This is the same rule as "Share, resell or lend paid access, invite codes or free passes to anyone else" in section 1-3 above.
• If a code is used in breach of these Terms, we may suspend it. From the moment it is suspended, test takers who have already entered it can no longer sit the tests either.

Pricing, cancellation and extensions of the expiry date are covered in section 4 below.

1-6. Bookings, rescheduling and cancellation

• All times are handled in Japan Standard Time (JST) and displayed in your own time zone for reference.
• A slot you select is held for a short time while you complete payment. If payment is not completed within that time, the slot is released to other customers.
• A booking is confirmed once payment is completed and you have received the confirmation email.
• To change the date or time of a booked session, please contact us at least 72 hours before the scheduled start. A change requested less than 72 hours before the session, and a no-show, are treated in the same way as a late cancellation.
• Cancellations and refunds are governed by section 4.
• If we have to cancel or move a session (illness, a connection failure at our end, or similar), you may choose between rescheduling and a full refund of that session.

1-7. Monthly engagements and subscriptions

• Monthly subscriptions renew automatically each month until cancelled. You may cancel at any time from your account page; cancellation takes effect at the end of the period you have already paid for, and the portion already paid is not refunded on a pro-rata basis.
• For Market Entry Consulting and other ongoing monthly engagements, either side may end the engagement by giving notice by email at least 30 days before the next billing date. Where a separate individual agreement provides otherwise, that agreement prevails. Fees for the month already in progress are not refunded.
• We may end an engagement immediately if these Terms are breached, or if payment is not made.

1-8. Intellectual property

The Service itself, together with the text, images, lesson materials, test questions, explanations, audio and software that make it up, belongs to us or to our licensors. You may use it for your own learning. Please do not copy, redistribute, publish or resell it, or use it to build a competing service, without our written permission.

You keep ownership of the content you post yourself (timeline posts, profile information, images and similar). By posting it, you grant us a non-exclusive, royalty-free license to store and display it as part of operating the Service, and you confirm that you have the rights needed to post it.

Conversation text produced during practice sessions and your diagnostic test results are handled as described in the Privacy Policy. Photographs taken at events are handled as described in section 3-5 of that policy.

1-9. Disclaimers and limitation of liability

• The Service is provided as is. AI-generated conversation, corrections, explanations and test results are learning aids and may contain mistakes; please do not rely on them as a definitive assessment.
• We do not guarantee any particular outcome, such as a job offer, a visa, a JLPT result, or a business result.
• Lessons, coaching and consulting are not legal, immigration, tax, financial or medical advice. For matters of that kind, please consult a qualified professional.
• Training programs that involve physical exercise carry a risk of injury. Please take part within your own limits, and consult a doctor first if you have any concern about your health.
• We are not responsible for interruptions caused by third-party services we rely on (Google, Firebase, Stripe, PayPal and similar), or by your own device or network.
• Nothing in these Terms limits our liability for death or personal injury, or for our own intentional misconduct or gross negligence. Subject to that, and to the extent permitted by law, our total liability in connection with the Service is limited to the amount you paid us for the service concerned during the 12 months before the event giving rise to the claim.

1-10. Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms to reflect changes in law or in our services. The current version is always the one posted on this page, and the date at the top shows when it was last changed. If a change is significant, we will announce it by email or within the Service before it takes effect. Continuing to use the Service after that point means you accept the updated Terms.

1-11. Governing law, jurisdiction and contact

These Terms are governed by the laws of Japan. Any dispute relating to the Service will be submitted to the Fukuoka District Court as the exclusive court of first instance. Where the Japanese and English versions of these Terms differ, the Japanese version prevails.

For questions about these Terms, contact: contact@dunkmanyoshi.com

2. Specified Commercial Transactions Act Disclosure

3. Privacy Policy

Dunkman Yoshi ("we") respects your privacy. This policy explains how we handle personal information collected through this website and the Japanese Dream app (together, the "Service").

3-1. Information we collect

(1) Japanese Dream app users — email address (Google or email/password login), profile information, and purchase records (card details are handled directly by Stripe / PayPal and are not stored by us).

For practice sessions, we do not store the content of your conversations on our servers. Each turn is sent to the AI to generate a reply and discarded once the reply has been returned. The one exception is a single-sentence note (300 characters or fewer) summarising your last session, so the next one can pick up where you left off. That note is deleted with your account.

In the practice app, your voice is sent for speech-to-text and text-to-speech as you use it, and the audio you speak is not stored. The spoken replies are not stored either, with one exception: the opening line of a conversation is the same fixed sentence for everyone (a few dozen of them in total), so we keep the synthesised audio for those lines rather than generating them again every time. That audio contains nothing specific to you.

Recordings from the speaking task in our assessment for companies and schools are stored. How they are handled is set out in (6) below.

(2) Timeline and profile pages — nickname, profile photo, and the content of your posts, comments and wall messages. These are public: anyone can read them, including visitors who are not signed in. They may also be picked up by search engines. Please only post what you are happy to have published.

(3) Inquiries and payment help — your name, email address, what you wrote, and, for payment help, the product, payment method and page you were on. We keep these to answer you and to keep a record of what happened.

(4) Coaching / consulting clients — name, email address, payment information (handled by Stripe / PayPal), and any information you choose to share about your goals or project.

(5) Newsletter / update list (Google Form) — for people interested in careers or life in Japan who choose to share their email, name, background, occupation, Japanese level, and related information via an optional Google Form, used only to send updates and announcements about our services.

(6) Test takers in our assessment for companies and schools — when you take the assessment with an organization code, then alongside your test answers and results we store the audio you record in the speaking task, together with its transcript. Specifically:

• Where it is stored: the recordings in Firebase Storage (Google Cloud, United States) and the transcripts and test results in Firestore (same). Both sit in locations that can only be read through our own server; no publicly reachable URL is issued for them.
• Why it is stored: to write a report on each test taker, including notes on their speaking, and to deliver that report to the company or school that commissioned it. We do not use it for any other purpose.
• How long it is kept: recordings are deleted automatically 90 days after your last recording. Transcripts and test results are kept while your account exists and are deleted, along with any remaining recordings, when you delete your account.
• Who can see it: only us, as the person writing the report.
• Requests to delete: if you ask us, or the commissioning company or school asks us, we delete it promptly rather than waiting for the periods above.

Information collected under (1) to (6) is kept separate and is not automatically merged, even if the same email address appears in more than one place.

3-2. How we use this information

• To provide and operate the Service
• To respond to inquiries
• To send updates and announcements about our services
• To improve the Service
• To process payments
• To let us review your diagnostic test results, including which questions you answered correctly and the answers you selected, so that we can understand your progress and provide teaching and learning support
• For assessments commissioned by companies and schools, to write a report on each test taker and deliver it to the organization that commissioned it — which includes listening to the speaking task recordings and reading their transcripts in order to write the speaking notes

3-3. Third-party services / data we send externally

We rely on the following services to run the Service. All of them are third parties located outside Japan, so their country is listed alongside.

All of these providers are based in the United States. The United States does not have a single comprehensive data protection regime recognised as equivalent to Japan's, but each provider publishes contractual terms covering personal data (a data processing agreement and standard contractual clauses), and we rely on those terms when we entrust data to them. For details of how each provider handles data, please see their own privacy policies.

3-4. Reports provided to companies and schools

In our assessment for companies and schools, we deliver one report per test taker to the company or school that commissioned it. That is not us processing data on the organization's behalf, and it is not joint use of the same data — it is handing over the deliverable that was ordered, to a third party. We therefore set it out separately from the providers listed in 3-3 above.

We never hand over the recordings themselves. And we provide only the results of the tests that code was issued for — not the results of any diagnostic the test taker bought and sat on their own, and not their timeline posts.

Obtaining the consent needed from each test taker for this is the organization's responsibility (see section 1-5 of the Terms of Service). If the organization or the test taker asks us to delete this data, we delete it promptly.

3-5. Event photography

• We take photos at meetups and other events, and may publish them on this site and on IDM's social media accounts (Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn).
• If you would rather not be photographed, please tell us at the event. No reason is needed.
• If you would like a photo taken down after it has been published, we will remove it promptly. Tell the organizer directly, or reach us through the contact form.

3-6. Data retention

• Conversation content: not stored (discarded once the reply has been returned)
• The one-sentence note about your last session: kept while your account exists, deleted with your account
• Practice app audio: not stored; discarded immediately after processing
• Speaking task recordings (assessment for companies and schools): deleted automatically 90 days after your last recording, or when you delete your account, whichever comes first
• Speaking task transcripts and diagnostic test results: kept while your account exists and deleted when you delete your account, or earlier if you or the commissioning organization asks us to
• Account information, board posts and profile: kept while your account exists, and deleted when you delete your account
• Inquiries and payment help: kept as a record of the exchange
• Purchase and payment records: kept after your account is deleted, because we are required by law to retain accounting records. When your account is deleted we remove everything that identifies who made the purchase (name, email address, account ID) and keep only the date, amount, currency and product

3-7. Cookies and similar technologies

• Google Analytics (GA4): used for basic traffic analytics. Advertising features (e.g. Google Signals) are not enabled. Analytics cookies are only set if you agree when we ask on your first visit. If you decline, the analytics code is never loaded, and nothing about your use of the site is limited. You can change this choice at any time, right here:

  Your current choice: Checking...

  AllowDeclineReset

  This choice is stored in your browser only and is never sent to our servers. On a different browser or device we will ask again. Choosing “Reset” brings the original consent banner back.

• Firebase Authentication: uses local browser storage (similar to cookies) to keep you signed in.
• Stripe / PayPal: these payment processors may set their own cookies during checkout, outside of our control.

3-8. Minors

The Service is available only to individuals aged 18 or older. We do not knowingly collect personal information from anyone under 18. If we become aware that we have collected such information, we will delete it promptly.

3-9. Your rights

You may request access to, correction of, or deletion of your personal information by contacting us at the email address below. We will respond within a reasonable timeframe.

3-10. Contact

For privacy-related questions, contact: contact@dunkmanyoshi.com

3-11. Changes to this policy

We may update this policy from time to time to reflect changes in law or our services. Updates take effect once posted on this page. If we introduce new analytics tools (e.g. expanding our use of Google Analytics), we will update this policy accordingly.

4. Cancellation & Refund Policy

Japanese Dream practice app

No cancellations or refunds are accepted after purchase. Payment is considered the start of service usage.

Purchased sessions that have not been started must be used within 30 days of purchase; unused sessions expire automatically after this period.

Strategy Session ($150 / $80) / Japanese Lessons ($35 / $20)

Cancellations made at least 72 hours before the scheduled session are eligible for a refund. Cancellations made after that point are not eligible for a refund. Refunds are issued minus payment processing fees.

Diagnostic tests (the Japanese level test and the other tests)

No cancellations or refunds are accepted after purchase. A single test attempt ($3) becomes available immediately after payment, and payment is considered the start of service usage.

A purchased attempt must be used within 6 days of purchase. Unused attempts expire automatically after this period and are not refunded. The test is designed to be taken in one sitting, right after you buy it.

If you are on the monthly diagnostic test plan, the same terms as the Jump Training subscription below apply.

English Lessons ($35 / $20)

The same terms as the Japanese Lessons above apply. Cancellations made at least 72 hours before the scheduled session are eligible for a refund. Cancellations made after that point are not eligible for a refund. Refunds are issued minus payment processing fees.

6-session lesson packages (Japanese Lessons / English Lessons, $175)

Individual sessions: if you cancel at least 72 hours before a scheduled session, that session is returned to your account as an unused credit. Cancellations made after that point use up the session.

The package itself: if you decide to stop partway through, we refund the sessions you have not used. Sessions already held are settled at the single-session price ($35 each), and the remaining balance is refunded minus payment processing fees. The package discount is given for completing the package, so it does not carry over into a partial refund.

For example, on a $175 package where one session has been held, that session is settled at $35 and the balance is refunded. From the fifth session onwards there is no balance left to refund.

Expiry: credits are valid for 3 months from the date of purchase. Credits still unused when that period ends expire automatically and are not refunded; expired credits are outside the refund above. If you buy another package while credits are still valid, the expiry date is extended by 3 months from the existing expiry date.

The three months of unlimited diagnostic tests included with the package end when a refund is issued.

Strategy Session packages ($220 / $280)

These combine a session with a deliverable: a rebuilt resume, or a mock interview with feedback. Cancellations made at least 72 hours before the scheduled session are refunded in full, minus payment processing fees.

After the session has taken place, the deliverable is already in production. From that point the package is not refundable, in the same way as the individual add-ons above.

U.S. Relocation Consulting / LinkedIn Coaching ($150 per 60 min / $80 per 30 min)

The same terms as the sessions above apply. Cancellations made at least 72 hours before the scheduled session are eligible for a refund, minus payment processing fees. Cancellations made after that point are not eligible for a refund.

The U.S. roadmap PDF is included with the 60-minute session at no extra charge. It is not sold separately and carries no separate price, so there is nothing to refund for it on its own. If the session itself is refunded under the terms above, the roadmap is not produced.

Jump Training (monthly subscription, $60 per month)

You can cancel at any time from your account page, using the "Cancel subscription" button shown on your subscription.

Cancelling stops the automatic renewal. Your subscription stays active until the end of the billing period you have already paid for, and you keep access until that date. The date is shown on your account page.

We do not refund the unused remainder of a billing period on a pro-rata basis, and payments already made for previous months are not refunded. See also section 1-7 of the Terms of Service above.

Japanese proficiency assessment for companies and schools ($65 per person / $45 for 10 people or more / $35 for 30 people or more)

Cancelling before the reports are delivered: once you tell us you are stopping, we do not charge for the people who have not taken the tests. If you are paying against an invoice, those people are deducted from the invoice. If you have already paid by card or PayPal, that portion is refunded minus payment processing fees.

Refunds after the reports are delivered: each report is written by a person, one at a time, so it is not refundable once delivered. From the point where a candidate has finished their tests and we have started writing their report, that person's fee is no longer refundable.

Organization code expiry: a code issued through a purchase is valid for 90 days from the date it is issued; a code we issue individually is valid for the number of days we tell you when we hand it over. Places left unused when the code expires are not refunded, even if they were paid for in advance. If your people cannot finish within the period, please tell us — before or after the expiry date — and we will extend it.

Market Entry Consulting ($500+/month)

You may cancel within 72 hours of signing the agreement for a full refund, minus payment processing fees. After 72 hours, or once the engagement has begun, cancellations are not eligible for a refund. The notice period for ending an ongoing monthly engagement is set out in section 1-7 of the Terms of Service above.

In all cases, payment processing fees are non-refundable.

5. Data Credits

Location suggestions on member profiles use place data from GeoNames (geonames.org), licensed under CC BY 4.0.

School suggestions use data from ROR, the Research Organization Registry (ror.org), licensed under CC0 1.0.