E-Money

A contract term with a phone company is two years and renewed automatically.

Users must pay a penalty when they cancel their contract in any other month but in the renewal month. 

It's a strange rule, but/and so they changed the rule sometime after I contracted with Softbank in 2019.

Yet, I must pay about 10,000 yen to Softbank as a penalty for breaching the contract. 

To compensate for this expense, my new phone company au KDDI pays me the same amount, not in cash but in au Pay. 

I've avoided using e-money for several reasons, but I guess it's time to give up the idea. 

Today I tried charging some money to au Pay in two ways; by cash 2000 yen using an ATM at SEVEN BANK at Seven Eleven, and another 3000 yen by credit card app on my smartphone.  Now I have 5000 yen in my au pay.  And, I learned charging money by/via credit card is a clever way to earn 'points.'

It was kind of fun to learn something new, though I feel I gave in.