What is a Japanese auction sheet?

Updated August 23, 2026 · 6 min read

A Japanese auction sheet is the one-page condition report an auction-house inspector writes before a used car is sold in Japan. Buyers use it — and verify the original — because it is independent of the later dealer story.

Definition: A Japanese auction sheet (車両査定票) is the inspector’s condition report for a car listed at a Japanese used-car auction. It is indexed to the chassis number and typically records overall grade, interior/exterior letters, mileage, equipment marks, inspector comments and a coded damage map. SheetJP retrieves that original record; it does not write or edit the sheet.

What the sheet is for

When a car enters a Japanese auction (USS, TAA, JU, HAA and others), a trained inspector examines it and fills a standardised form. That form is the auction sheet. Because the grader works for the auction — not the later exporter or yard — the sheet is the trade’s baseline for condition at that moment in Japan.

It is a snapshot. It does not describe shipping damage, later repairs, or whether your country will register the car. Destination inspections (entry certification, IVA, JEVIC/JAAI, WoF) answer different questions.

The fields buyers usually read first on any auction sheet.

What a typical sheet records

Field	What it usually shows	SheetJP explainer
Overall grade	S, 6–1, R, RA — one-number summary	Grades explained
Interior / exterior letters	A–E marks written 外 and 内	Letter grades
Damage map	A, U, W, XX and severity 1–4	Symbols
Mileage	Odometer at inspection	Odometer fraud
Equipment line	SR, NAVI, ETC, スマートキー…	Equipment codes
Dates	初度 (first reg) and 車検 (shaken) in Reiwa/Heisei	Date converter
Inspector notes	Handwritten faults the grade can omit	Comments
Chassis number	The key that retrieves this exact record	Chassis number

What an auction sheet is not

Not a Carfax-style title history for every country the car later visits.
Not an export certificate or deregistration paper — those prove identity/export, not condition.
Not a guarantee the car is undamaged after auction.
Not a permit to import. Age and duty rules are set by destination authorities.
Not useful if the image was edited. Only the auction’s own record settles authenticity.

How buyers use SheetJP with a sheet

SheetJP retrieves the original Japanese auction sheet by chassis number and delivers the unaltered grade, mileage and damage map when a strong match exists ($10). Free tools explain codes on a sheet you already have; they are not a substitute for that original record. If the automatic lookup cannot sell a sheet, you are not charged $10. A separate specialist archive search may be offered.

Step-by-step: verify by chassis number. Field-by-field walkthrough: how to read a Japanese auction sheet. Samples: sample auction sheets.

Retrieve the original sheet

Enter the chassis number on SheetJP to pull the unaltered auction record.