There’s a lot of snickering from other parts of the world when they find out that some people in Japan still use fax machines, but an an even more old-school communications method is still an option too.

NTT is a name you’ll hear often in Japan. It’s the country’s biggest telecommunications company, operating both Docomo, Japan’s largest mobile phone network, and Flet’s Hikari, one of the top Internet service providers.

The N in NTT stands for “Nippon,” one of the ways to say “Japan” in Japanese (yes, there’s more than one), and the second T stands for “telephone,” which tracks with the company’s current business operations. But that first “T?” It stands for “telegraph,” since telegram services were a major cornerstone of NTT’s business when the company was founded in 1952.

However, unlike its U.S. counterpart American Telephone and Telegraph, which continues to go by AT&T out of tradition, NTT’s name isn’t just a way to maintain a symbolic connection to its company history, because, to this day, you can still have NTT deliver a telegram for you.

Yes, if you’ve got something to say to someone and don’t want to call them on the phone, send them an email, shoot them a text, or grab a pen and hand-write them a letter, NTT has staff standing by to take down your message, print it out on a piece of paper, and then deliver it directly to the recipient. This isn’t exactly a cheap way to communicate. NTT charges a fee of 735 yen (US$4.90) for the first 25 kanji characters, or 514.5 yen for up to 25 kana (the simpler form of Japanese script) or Latin alphabet letters. After that it’s 94.5 yen per five additional kanji or 63 yen per five additional kana/letters.

▼ No, there is no 0.5-yen coin in Japan, and no, we’re not sure why NTT doesn’t just round those fees up or down.

Making things not just anachronistic, but ironic as well, is that NTT doesn’t have Old West-style telegram stands set up next to the town squares. If you want to send a telegram you either call NTT on the phone or visit their website. In other words, before you can send a telegram you’ll need to already have access to a more modern and convenient way of communicating.

▼ Oh, and you can also place your telegram order from a car phone, in case you want to communicate like it’s both the 1980s and the 1880s.

Telegram orders placed between 8 a.m. and 7 p.m. can be delivered the same day, and if you’re any later your message won’t arrive until the following day, unless you pay an additional 2,100 yen for urgent delivery by 10 p.m. or between 6 and 8 a.m.

But if sending telegrams isn’t cheap, isn’t quick, and requires you to already have a phone or Internet connection, why does anyone in Japan send them? Primarily for weddings, funerals, and other occasions on which they wish to formally convey their congratulations or condolences. Japan is a country in which marking formal occasions with formal declarations of sentiment is considered the proper thing to do, and in 2022 NTT delivered 3.77 million telegrams for its customers, more than 90 percent of them for weddings, funerals, and other such events.

However, this doesn’t mean that NTT’s telegraph division is thriving. Those 3.77 million telegrams actually represent a massive drop from the service’s peak in 1963, when NTT delivered roughly 94 million telegrams, around 86 percent of which were for communications more urgent than “Congratulations!” or “I’m so sorry for your loss.” Sending telegrams is becoming a less and less common point of wedding/funeral courtesy among younger Japanese generations as well.

▼ This beaming bride is unlikely to say “Thank you all so much for coming! Except those of you who lacked the good manners to send a telegram. You won’t be served any cake, so please go home now.”

With both the societal demand and profit potential for telegrams fading fast, NTT President and CEO Akira Shimada believes the writing is on the wall/piece of paper delivered by a paid courier. Speaking at an NTT financial results briefing on Wednesday, Shimada said “I believe the time has come for us to progress with discussions on the timing for shutting down [NTT’s telegram services].”

However, shutting down the service isn’t as simple as NTT recording a message that says “You’re already on the phone, so just call the other person directly!” and posting an equivalent on their telegram order website. The operation of telegram services is governed by parts of Telecommunications Business Law that were codified back when a working telegraph network was a vital part of a country’s infrastructure. Before NTT can stop offering the service, it will need to apply for and obtain permission from the Japanese government’s Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications.

It’s unlikely that such an application would be denied, however. If NTT does indeed shut down the service, it would leave rival telecom company KDDI as the last remaining telegram service provider in Japan, and it’s easy to imagine that they’re looking to get out of the game too.

With virtually no private citizens now owning their own telegraph equipment, that the end of telegram service probably won’t have its own version of the memorial service held for discarded pagers at a Tokyo temple when that communications network was sunsetted a few years ago. Still, it seems like telegram services will become a thing of the past sooner rather than later in Japan, and if you’d like to send one last one, or maybe your first, NTT has instructions on how to place orders, in English, on their website here.

Source: NHK News Web via Hachima Kiko, Jiji, NTT
Top image: Pakutaso
Insert images: Pakutaso, NTT, Pakutaso (2)
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