More young people struggling with debts; Health insurance premiums a particular problem

Debt collectors are seeing more and more young people struggling with debts, NOS reports after surveying bailiffs in the Netherlands. Several mentioned that health insurance premiums are a particular problem for young people.

Flanderijn, one of the largest debt collectors in the country, currently has around 45,000 young people with payment arrears in its files. “That number is not getting smaller; in fact, we see it increasing by 1 or 2 percent every year,” director Michel van Leeuwen said.

Syncasso has noticed a “big enough increase” in young people with payment arrears “to say that something is going on here,” a spokesperson told NOS.

Several debt collectors told the broadcaster that health insurance premiums are often the first arrears to appear for young people. A 2021 survey by Nibud among vocational students showed that many young people don’t realize that they can apply for the health care allowance to help them pay those premiums. According to Flanderijn, it often hears that young people don’t apply for healthcare benefits because “they’re afraid they’ll have to pay the money back later.”

According to Nancy Rijssel of the Young Adults Life Coaching Foundation, young people “often do not have sufficient financial knowledge and do not know how to deal” with things like health insurance premiums. The idea is that parents teach their children about financial responsibility. “But if there are already financial problems at home, parents cannot teach their children that,” Rijssel told NOS.

Flanderijn also found this in a survey of young people. 86 percent said they would have liked to learn more about managing their finances at school. “There are already many initiatives to support young people, but we think schools can play an important role when it comes to financial education,” Van Leeuwen said.