I haven't seen a check since the 80ies, except one. Got one in return from some USSAnian scammer company. I was told by my bank I had to travel to USSA to cash it in. Would you be happy if you got a check which you had to travel to Japan to cash in? Probably cheaper to take the 5% option.
Sturle, you keep mentioning this 5% emergency withdrawal option, but not a single person on this site has been able to provide any evidence for it. Further, if such an option existed, it would currently be quite profitable as the spread between other sites and Mtgox is over 5%.
See previous pages of this thread for first hand reports of emergency withdrawals.
The spread must be much more than 5% for it to be worthwhile. Even with normal SEPA withdrawal you need at least 5% spread to be sure to make noticeable profit. Sell BTC (at bid) - fee. Buy BTC (at ask) - fee. Withdraw fiat - fee. Transfer to another exchange - fee. In between there may be a currency rate risk if the other exchange doesn't support EUR. EUR/USD has been changing up to 2% in day lately.
It is better if you have a domestic bank account in Japan and can withdraw JPY at a fee of only 200 JPY. It is next day to a few days if there is very high volume of withdrawals. On Friday the JPY volume on MtGox was more than 50% of the total volume on Bitstamp, so I suppose people with a Japanese bank account are making a huge profit on arbitrage. Makes much more sense than withdrawing at a 5% fee. But of course, they as well have to struggle with Japanese banking when sending the money to the next exchange. In other threads you will see people complain over restrictions.