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For a native speaker, with regard to legal documents, are 判子 and 署名 becoming
substitutable? Japan likes to westernize, so are people beginning to just sign
stuff by hand?

Myself a non-native, I had a choice. _HR_ made me a 判子 to use for work
documents. For other documents like apartment, bank account, etc. I just
signed them.

**update** :  
A pro-translator wrote:

> 最終書類に署名することを拒否した。

I think that is a fail. That _seems_ a good way to express a refusal to agree
to the final terms of a legal document but isn't the meaning murky? Is this a  
(1) flat-out refusal of the terms,  
(2) or an agreement to the terms, but refusal to use a signature. He / she
wants to use a hanko.

In fact, digital signatures have already changed how we think of signatures.
Surely, the legal implications "署名" and "判子" is becoming unclear.
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2016-07-11T00:10:10.267
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definitions
For natives, is 署名 beginning to supersede 判子 with regard to signing official documents?
Not yet. Hanko is still required for LOTS of documents in both public and
private sectors. I guess, for most of the cases, hanko is not legally required
and it's just a common practice for those who want documents to feel relieved
just like other 念のため or 一応 stuff.

It's true that certain people don't like hanko culture. But it's not because
we like to westerize as you say, but because hanko culture often irritates us
especially when a person at a city office counter tells you to go back home to
bring your hanko and make a line and wait another 30 min, or when you receive
a retured contract document with a letter which says "your hanko is not
properly stamped".

A young mayor of Chiba city is one of those and he promised to reduce hanko-
required documents three years ago when he elected as a mayor. One year later,
[Chiba city reduced 3200 hanko-required documents to
1000](http://www.sankei.com/region/news/140526/rgn1405260007-n1.html).

You (and Leo) might go through many nonlegally hanko requirements with
signature because you are gaijin. I have never been allowed to substitute
hanko with signature in documents for the public sector because they think
it's 当たり前 for me to have a hanko.
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2016-07-11T06:51:26.757
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