Bespoke approach for students’ municipal registration in the Maastricht Region

19 September 2023

Last week, 100 secondary school students from United World College Maastricht (UWCM) registered at Gemeente Maastricht. The recently arrived international students were escorted by bus to the municipal offices (gemeentehuis) where all the formalities of registration in the Netherlands were carried out in 1 single appointment: proof of identification, applying for a citizen service number (burgerservicenummer, BSN) and providing biometric data.

Without the current collaboration between the Immigratie- en Naturalisatiedienst (IND) and GemeenteLoket within the Maastricht Region, these students would have had to travel to Utrecht to complete these important administrative processes on the national “uitreikdag”. Together, the IND and GemeenteLoket organise this registration day each year for students from Zuyd Hogeschool, Maastricht School of Management (MSM), UWCM, Jan van Eyck Academy and Maastricht University (UM).

For UM in particular, this involves a total of 1,200 students. To this end, the University planned 6 full-day sessions for biometric intake at the IND desk within the municipal offices. Gemeente Maastricht offers a partly digital process for application and registration, as well as sessions for the students for identification and collection of their BSN. 

Afterwards, UM organised another 2 sessions for issuing residence cards (verblijfskaarten) at their Student Services Centre (SSC). In each case, 2 IND representatives were also present.

We are proud to be able to offer this customised service for the Maastricht Region region and we are eager to see this collaboration continue.