JR West Announces a Second Hokuriku-Kansai Ticketless Campaign

This campaign has ended: entry and the qualifying journeys closed on 31 August 2026. The Hokuriku-Kansai Ticketless fare itself is still on sale year-round. How far points can bring down the cost of a return trip is compared in return costs by funding source.

WESTER Points (basic) returned by lot10,000pointsTo 200 people. For first-time buyers who travel both ways between the Hokuriku area and the Kyoto–Osaka stations

Announced by

West Japan Railway (JR West), 23 July 2026

Products

Hokuriku-Kansai Ticketless and Hokuriku-Kansai Ticketless (Hayatoku 7), sold on e5489 only. Journeys on the Shirasagi are outside the campaign

Sections

The Hokuriku area to and from every station between Kyoto and Osaka

Travel period

2026-08-01 – 2026-08-31

Entry period

2026-08-01 – 2026-08-31

Points awarded

Around mid-September 2026; the points expire on 2028-03-31

Checked on

2026-09-20

JR West announced a second Hokuriku-Kansai Ticketless campaign on 23 July 2026. Buy the ticket on e5489 for the first time, travel both ways between Hokuriku and the Kyoto–Osaka section during August, enter the draw, and 200 people win 10,000 WESTER Points.

Two hundred people win. Everyone else still takes JPY 1,790 off Osaka to Kanazawa by buying Hayatoku 7

Hokuriku-Kansai Ticketless is an e5489-only ticket that bundles the fare and the charge for the Hokuriku Shinkansen with the limited express charge for the Thunderbird or the Shirasagi. On the limited express section it covers the charge alone, so the fare for that conventional line comes off a transport IC card separately. The price is not settled until you add the two together, which is how JR West’s own price table sets it out — the ticket price in one column and the IC deduction in another.

From the JR Odekake Net price tables (read 2026-09-20). The IC column is the conventional-line fare for the Osaka to Tsuruga section and the like, and the balance has to be on the card before you board.

Switching to Hayatoku 7, bought at least seven days ahead, takes Osaka to Kanazawa from JPY 8,500 to JPY 6,710 — JPY 1,790, or 21% off the total. Fukui saves JPY 900 and Toyama JPY 2,230, the latter 23%. Return, that is JPY 3,580 on Kanazawa, and it is the part of this that does not depend on a draw. The catch is the deadline: Hayatoku 7 closes seven days before travel, which does not suit a business trip whose dates firm up in the last week. Standard Ticketless stays on sale until four minutes before departure.

Ten thousand points is 74% of the JPY 13,420 a Hayatoku 7 return to Kanazawa costs, so a win brings the round trip down to roughly JPY 3,400. Against that, there are 200 places and JR West does not publish how many people enter, so the odds are unknown. Nor is there a notification: winners find out when the points appear in mid-September.

The conditions worth reading are the exclusions. One leg alone does not count. Cancelling, refunding or breaking the journey takes you out, and so does changing the booking by telephone, and so does printing the ticket and travelling on paper. Payment has to be taken at the moment of booking on e5489, from a credit card registered to the account; paying at a convenience store, a bank or a station counter does not qualify. The campaign page adds one more line that is easy to miss — journeys on the Shirasagi are excluded — so an itinerary that reaches Hokuriku by changing at Maibara can buy the ticket and still not be in the draw.

How far can points take a trip? Return costs compared by funding source →

Source: JR West news release, “Second Hokuriku-Kansai Ticketless debut campaign” (23 July 2026, PDF) / WESTER portal campaign detail page / JR Odekake Net price tables for Hokuriku-Kansai Ticketless and the Hayatoku 7 version / Photo: airlines470, CC BY-SA 2.0 (Wikimedia Commons) / Checked on 2026-09-20