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Japanese To Pay Utility Bills Using Bitcoin (thestack.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the digital-currency dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Stack: Japanese citizens will soon be able to pay their utility bills using bitcoin. The facility is being provided by Coincheck Denki, a new service offered by the Japanese bitcoin company, which will be available to users in November. Coincheck outlined the new plan on its website. Also called 'Coincheck Electricity,' it will allow users to pay their electricity bills directly from their Coincheck bitcoin wallet. It also offers a discount plan for heavy users of electricity, with 4-6% of the total bill discounted for heavy users of electricity who pay in bitcoin. Coincheck's parent company, Reju Press, initially partnered with Mitsuwa Inc., to create the bitcoin payment system. Coincheck now works with Mitsuwa subsidiary E-Net Inc., and has formed a partnership with Marubeni Power Retail Corporation, which operates power plants in 17 locations in central Japan. Marubeni has offices in 66 countries worldwide, although no plans have been announced to take the bitcoin payment option outside of Japan. While the initial bitcoin payment rollout is for electricity bills, Coincheck plans to expand its offerings to bitcoin payment for 'life infrastructure,' to include payment of gas, water and mobile phone bills. It may even partner with landlords to allow customers of Coincheck to pay rent using bitcoin. The bitcoin payment plan will be rolled out in Chubu, Kanto (including Tokyo) and Kansai regions to start, with additional areas to be added sequentially. The company hopes to offer bitcoin payment options to one million electric customers within the first year.

8 of 36 comments (clear)

  1. Finally anonimity! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Finally I can pay my utility bills completely anonymously!

    -AC

    1. Re:Finally anonimity! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      This is a great way for a Government to find out who bitcoin users are, because they are voluntarily giving their names, addresses, etc. Everyone knows "normal" people don't use subversive crypto-currencies, so their info will be submitted to various gov security watch lists.

    2. Re:Finally anonimity! by ASDFnz · · Score: 2

      What, you paid using BitCoin? Can you prove that sir? I didn't think so.. (click)

      You genuinely don't know how bitcoin works do you?

  2. kinda cool by w3bd4wg · · Score: 2

    paying for the same thing they are made of....

  3. Obligatory by penguinoid · · Score: 4, Funny

    1) Mine bitcoins using electricity
    2) Pay electricity bill using bitcoins
    3) Loss!

    --
    Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
  4. Re:What problem is being solved here? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

    creating demand, crypto currency is generated by wasting huge amounts of electricity, why wouldn't want the energy companies want it to be more popular

    Nobody mines bitcoins in Japan. There is no benefit to Japanese utilities when bitcoins are mined in Oregon or Iceland. Iceland has the lowest electricity rates, but Oregon is close and has no sales tax.

  5. RECs, TRCs, and now BitCoin? Woot! by xeno · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Wait... "Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs), also known as Green tags, Renewable Energy Credits, Renewable Electricity Certificates, or Tradable Renewable Certificates (TRCs), are tradable, non-tangible energy commodities" (src:WikPed) in the US... and now I can directly pay for power consumption in another locale with a currency I can directly generate from power here... that I can can receive or sell thru these commodity markets? And it's international/lets one avoid taxes and currency markets or end-run them? Woot! Here in the PNW US, bitcoin mining is relatively profitable... maybe another couple of racks in Wenatchee are in order. Or Iceland.

    TL;DR: Bitcoin is just another TRC... only international.

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    I think not...(*poof*)
  6. Volatility by manu0601 · · Score: 2

    How do they address bitcoin change rate volatility?