DASHIBANK

Japan's restaurants are hard to book if you do not speak Japanese. Thousands of them take reservations only by telephone. No website, no booking form, no English. The listing you found on a map app has a phone number and nothing else. If you cannot make that call, you cannot get the table. DASHIBANK makes the call. Tell us where you want to eat, when, and for how many. A bilingual agent telephones the restaurant in Japanese, in polite business register (keigo), inside Japan's normal calling hours. It asks for your table, handles the questions a restaurant actually asks (party size, children, dietary limits, whether you accept a set course), and reports back what was agreed. You pay 500 yen when a booking is confirmed. If the restaurant says no, or does not pick up, you pay nothing. WHAT YOU GET A directory of restaurants and ryokan (traditional inns) across Japan, including the ones that exist nowhere else in English. Maps that show what is near you, what is open, and what is worth the trip. A booking agent that calls on your behalf and tells you the truth about the outcome. Confirmed, declined, or no answer. A plan: shortlist several places, rank them, and we call in your order of preference until one says yes. HOW THE CALL WORKS The agent speaks Japanese to the restaurant and English to you. It books under your name, states your party size, and relays any conditions the restaurant sets. If the restaurant offers a different time, you decide. If it wants a set course or a card to hold the table, you are asked first. We do not pretend to be you, and we do not hide what we are. PRICING 500 yen per confirmed booking. Nothing for a call that does not get you a table. No subscription, no membership. Changes and cancellations are handled by the same agent, on the same terms. WHERE IT WORKS Anywhere in Japan that answers a telephone. Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, and the places that are harder to reach in English than either.