The Cost of the JET Application (in South Africa)

My wife and I have applied and been accepted for the position of Assistant Language Teacher (ALT) at the Japanese Exchange and Teaching Programme (JET Programme), and the following is a list of costs associated with the application process. Because we are South African, you'll see that the amounts here are measured in Rands, ZAR, or "bucks" as we call it in the vernacular.

Stage	Item	Cost per Person [Rands]	Cost per Couple [Rands]
1&2	Photos: 2 x Application form & 2 x Passport sized (for short-listed form) sized	R50.00	R100.00
1	Courier: Send the original application form to Pretoria	R108.00	R108.00
3	Doctors Consultation x 2	R310.00	R620.00
3	Chest X-Ray x 2	R409.00	R818.00
3	Urine Analysis (yes, they went there)	R11.00	R22.00
3	Police Clearance: Certificates x 2 (@R59 each)	R59.00	R118.00
3	Courier: Send clearance request from Cape Town to Pretoria and send completed certificate back.	R131.80	R131.80
3	Medical: Request 1 year (possibly post-dated) script for medication.	R300.00	R300.00
3	Courier: Send clearance certificates back to Pretoria	R108.00	R108.00
	Total	R1386.80	R2325.80

Ways to Optimise Your Application

In retrospect, there are a few things that I would have done differently to optimise the cost of our application: 

Firstly, in order to save on courier fees, it would probably have been easier to have sent our clearance certificate directly from the Police Clearance department (in Pretoria) to the Japanese Embassy (in Pretoria), rather than sending it back home to Cape Town, and then all the way back to Pretoria. On the plus side, my inefficiency meant that I would scan in the clearance certificate, which I now have digitally at my fingertips if ever I need it... but let's be honest, what are the chances I'm going to need it. <famous last words>

Secondly, try find a cheaper GP. In my area this seems hard to find, I know other GPs in the City Bowl of Cape Town charge in excess of R400 per consultation. Maybe if you are going with a partner you can find a doctor that will check both of you as part of a single consultation.

In addition to this, we got our scripts at a different time to getting our check-up. It's now 3-4 months later I think. If you're a good planner or know someone in the medical profession, you may be able to do it at the same time.

And thirdly, I would order my police clearance 6 weeks before the short listed applications are expected to be announced. This may save you some money if you can avoid using an overnight service (although I think registered mail is necessary), however it will save you a few grey hairs as it sucks when you're thinking (probably irrationally) that because your police clearance is not officially handed in yet, other applicants may be given preference over you.

Health Costs

Also, what may not be immediately obvious is that a potential reason for all the medical test may be because, by being accepted into the JET Programme, we are automatically transferring some financial responsibility for the maintenance of our health onto Japanese society as we will automatically be recipients of the Japanese National Health Insurance system, as well as optionally a recipient of the JET Programme Accident Insurance which seems to cover a number of illness, injury and death related scenarios.

In Closing...

Although this may seem like a large amount of money, the investment pays off big time with a 30,000% profit.

You won't find that on Wall Street.