Order on Amazon Japan before your trip and pick it up when you arrive

Open your account on Amazon.co.jp itself. Amazon's help pages describe accounts created with either an email address or a mobile phone number, and a mobile-number account can then be used from a browser too. The site's language settings offer English and Simplified Chinese as well as Japanese — but Amazon warns that some products sold there have no language-switching function or multilingual manual, so read the product details before you order electronics.

Amazon.co.jp accepts Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Diners Club, JCB and UnionPay (credit only), and places a ¥1 charge on the card when you order to check that it's valid. Three details matter from abroad. Your billing address must match the address on your card statement; for an address outside Japan, Amazon accepts only standard (half-width) Latin letters and numbers, up to 50 characters per line. The first time you order to a new address — your hotel — Amazon asks you to re-enter the card number. And debit cards are charged when Amazon starts preparing the shipment; cancel after that and, depending on your bank, the refund can take around 45 to 60 days.

Rakuten's help centre says cards issued outside Japan work if they carry a Visa, JCB, Mastercard, Diners Club or American Express logo, debit cards included, though some shops accept fewer. Rakuten doesn't check the card when you register or check out: it is authorised afterwards, automatically or when the shop chooses, so a refusal can surface later as a message from the shop. Rakuten's list of common causes includes an expiry date typed the wrong way round, a card close to expiry, a cardholder name that differs from the name on the order, and a credit limit about to be reached — and only your card issuer can tell you which. Order early enough to fix that before you leave. Rakuten's help centre also has FAQ sections in English and in Simplified and Traditional Chinese.

Email the hotel or ryokan before you order. Yamato Transport says some inns don't accept guests' parcels at all, some limit where and when you can collect them, and some charge for holding a parcel that arrives before your stay — so ask whether they'll take a parcel for you, from which date, whether there's a fee, and how the box should be labelled. Our guide to delivery to your ryokan covers the carriers' rules in more detail.

Copy the inn's postal code and Japanese address exactly as the inn gives it, from its website or your booking confirmation. Amazon's address form allows 16 full-width (Japanese) characters or 32 half-width characters per name, company and address line, so split a long address over the lines rather than cramming it, and use the separate city and prefecture fields for those parts. Put the inn's name in the company field and your own name as the recipient, spelled as on your booking. Don't skip the building: Yamato lists a missing building name among the reasons a parcel ends up undelivered.

Keep instructions out of the address lines — Amazon asks customers not to type delivery instructions there, and offers a separate delivery-instructions box at checkout for orders delivered by Amazon itself. Also check the drop-off setting. On eligible orders shipped by Amazon.co.jp the default is okihai, leaving the parcel at the door with no signature; Amazon says to switch it off if you want the parcel handed over in person, which is what a front desk needs.

Know how long it takes. Amazon says standard delivery usually arrives one to four days after dispatch, except on remote islands and in some other areas, and shows the expected date before you confirm. Items listed under Amazon Global (Amazon海外ダイレクト) ship from Amazon's overseas stores: those sold by Amazon's US store take 5–7 business days on premium shipping or 8–10 on economy, with no same-day or next-day option, so filter them out when time is short. On Rakuten each shop sets its own dispatch. Items labelled 最強翌日配送 (next-day delivery) are aimed at next-day arrival, but Rakuten notes that the earliest date isn't always tomorrow, that order cut-off times vary by shop and day, and that an order placed for the earliest delivery date can't be cancelled, even within 30 minutes.

The most useful tool for a trip is a fixed date. Amazon's date-and-time delivery (お届け日時指定便) lets you pick the day from a calendar at checkout for eligible in-stock items; how far ahead you can choose depends on when you order, the item and the area. It isn't available if you pay at a konbini or have the parcel sent to a pickup point, and once Amazon starts preparing the shipment the date can no longer be changed on the site — only by contacting the carrier after dispatch. For Rakuten's next-day items, the order screen shows whether you can choose a date, a time slot or both, and tracked mail-type deliveries can't be given a date at all. Pick the date the inn agreed to: Yamato's own guidance for parcels to accommodation is to have them arrive by the day before your stay.

If you'd rather not ask the inn to hold anything, aim for a pickup point or for later in the stay. Amazon's lockers and konbini counters keep parcels for three to seven days depending on the location, and Rakuten's konbini pickup for two or three, so have the parcel arrive after you land, not before; Amazon also warns that store pickup can take longer than its express delivery. On a stay of several nights you can simply order after checking in — handy for things you need only midway, such as laundry supplies for the second week. And if a delivery is missed, Yamato keeps the parcel at its office for seven days and Japan Post's Yu-Pack is held for seven days, before it goes back to the sender.

A ryokan stay usually means several trips a day along the corridors to the baths. A small waterproof bag for your phone and room key, a thin quick-drying towel and toiletries in travel bottles are light, cheap first orders that fit easily in a small parcel.

Check your plugs before you go. JNTO says Japan uses 100 V AC throughout, at 50 Hz in the east and 60 Hz in the west (including Nagoya, Kyoto and Osaka); dual-voltage devices such as some hair dryers, travel irons and shavers work anywhere, while others need a step-down transformer. The Japanese embassy in Singapore notes that flat two-pin plugs are generally used. If yours are a different shape, a conversion plug waiting at the first hotel saves a search on arrival night.

For summer trips, JNTO says the rainy season begins in May to June and that August and September can bring typhoons, so a folding umbrella or a poncho that fits over a backpack is worth having from day one.

Staying online is a separate booking. JNTO suggests renting a pocket Wi-Fi at an airport kiosk or reserving one online and having it delivered to your hotel — a rental company's service rather than an Amazon order — and lists SIM cards at major airports and electronics stores. It also warns not to expect Wi-Fi at traditional ryokan and smaller minshuku, especially in the mountains, so check with the inn when you book.

Nappies, wipes and a supply of familiar snacks take up a lot of suitcase space, and they're exactly the kind of thing to have waiting at the first hotel. Sizes, brands and labels may differ from what you use at home, so read the product page carefully, and order early enough that you can reorder if something isn't right.

For long rail journeys out to a hot-spring town, individually wrapped snacks, a refillable bottle and pocket packs of wet wipes are ordinary pre-orders. They matter most on the way to inns with no shop nearby — see the remote ryokan below — where whatever you didn't bring or buy on the way may simply not be available.

Distance changes the plan. Amazon's one-to-four-day estimate excludes remote islands and some other areas, and its date-specified delivery isn't offered everywhere. A mountain inn is also the last place to count on a konbini pickup nearby. Order early, agree a date with the inn and leave a day's margin.

Our report on Yumoto Choza, in Fukuchi Onsen in the Okuhida hills, puts it about 40 minutes by car or 70 by bus from Takayama Station, with the nearest convenience store about 30 minutes away by car and winter tyres needed from mid-November to early April. Ao no Za, by Lake Shikotsu about 40 minutes by car from New Chitose Airport, is also about 30 minutes' drive from the nearest konbini, and its free shuttle from the airport and JR Chitose Station must be booked by 19:00 three days ahead. If an inn like this is your first night after landing, having things delivered there — with the inn's agreement — is simpler than planning a shopping stop.

Yamashiroya, in Yunishigawa Onsen 20 minutes by bus from Yunishigawa-Onsen Station, has no convenience store in the village; the nearest is down in Kinugawa. Okamotoya, in Beppu's Myoban Onsen, has no shops nearby, the nearest about 20 minutes on foot. For both, our reports say to buy drinks and snacks on the way.

Chilled or frozen food. If the delivery is missed, Yamato keeps COOL TA-Q-BIN parcels for only three days, Japan Post lets the sender set a shorter holding period for chilled Yu-Pack, and Rakuten's konbini pickup doesn't take frozen or chilled goods. Don't assume an inn has fridge space for you.

Big or heavy boxes, especially to remote inns. Rakuten's konbini pickup stops at 100 cm (three sides combined) and 10 kg, Yamato's konbini and PUDO locker points don't accept parcels over 10 kg or 100 cm, and whatever arrives has to travel on with you.

Anything from overseas when the date matters — Amazon Global items from the US store take 5–10 business days — and electronics you'll need to set up in a hurry, since Amazon notes that some products have no language switch or multilingual manual.

Anything due before your first night without the inn's yes in writing. A missed delivery isn't the end, because the carrier holds the parcel for a week, but a parcel nobody accepts ends up back with the sender.