Refugees waiting longer and longer for their citizen service number

Refugees and asylum seekers are waiting longer and longer to get their citizen service numbers (BSN). At least 8,000 people are on months-long waiting lists due to administrative backlogs, the refugees’ association VluchtelingenWerk Nederland said to the Volkskrant. In practice, this means they can’t work in the Netherlands and find it more challenging to move out of the asylum seekers’ shelter to a regular home.

According to the regulations, asylum seekers must register in the Basic Registration of Persons within six months, at which time they get their BSN. That means they can start building a life in the Netherlands to a limited extent. After their asylum application is granted, and they get refugee status and a residency permit, the BSN is basically the access code for further participation in society, the newspaper wrote.

Figures recently released by the Ministry of Justice and Security show that at least 8,000 asylum seekers and refugees have been waiting longer than six months for their BSN. The vast majority have been waiting for nine months or longer. Several thousand have been waiting more than a year, VluchtelingenWerk said.

Without a BSN, you can’t open a bank account, which means there’s nowhere to get your salary, social assistance benefits, or allowances. It can also lead to housing problems, a VluchtelingenWerk spokesperson said to the newspaper. Many municipalities want to see a bank account number when allocating a house, to make sure the person can pay their rent.

The fact that refugees can’t move out of asylum shelters and find work is particularly painful, given the widespread staff shortages in the Netherlands and the crisis in asylum shelter.

According to the association, this generation of asylum seekers and refugees is getting a false start in the Netherlands. “A BSN is much more than a piece of administration,” the spokesperson said.