Posted by Believe it or not, with all the digital transformation projects going on everywhere, as a resident in Belgium, I still receive more than one paper letters in my mailbox at least once a week!
Recently quite some of my colleagues are relocated to Brussels from India, they are still busy with the administrations from Belgium, regarding work permit, residence permit etc. During a casual chat with a colleague I told him the concept of official address, which is very important in Belgium. There was also a small stupid incident happened to me some years back, so I decided to write it down so other people don’t repeat it.
Register
When you arrive in Belgium for a long term living (more than 1 year), you need to go to the city hall/commune to register yourself so that eventually you can get a one year residence permit.
Before that, you need to prove that you have a valid address in Belgium by showing your renting contract or property contract, the staff would bring a 2D construct view of the building and ask you to confirm which exact room do you live in.
After this, they record your address in the system, but at this stage the address status is still to be confirmed.
Confirm
The confirmation process is carried out by police department, a policeman typically shows up unannounced at your door within one week of your registration, the purpose is to make sure you really live at the address you declared. If you happen to be at home, you just need to show him your passport to him for recording, then the process is finished, however if you are not home when he stops by, the police man will leave a letter to you and kindly invite you to go to the police station with the letter and your passport to complete the process.
Afterwards, the policeman will notify the commune about you and your confirmed address, then your application of the residence permit will continue.
Change
If you change your official address after the commune registration, you need to proactively go to the commune office and declare the change of your address again. And of course another police visit etc.
This is very important! Although your residence is typically valid for a whole year, you might think you can inform the commune of your address change when you renew your permit, this is very dangerous!
In 2013 I moved from one apartment to another but forgot to go to the commune to inform them about the change, obviously the next tenant took the “ownership” of my old address, and I became “no address” status. 5 months later, I was travelling to US for a business trip and was stopped at the passport control, the man looked at my ID card and said “The police man is looking for you, as it seems you don’t have an official address with you for a while.” Luckily he let me go to US still to finish my travel and afterwards I went to the commune immediately to change the official address, I was told, if I still did not act within 2 weeks, my “no address” status would exceed 6 months, which means, the system would automatically close my file, then I would be a physical person in Belgium illegally! (Sans-papier) – That would be big trouble for my record, and would influence the long term residence calculation also.
Legally live together
There is another fun concept in Belgium, which is called “legally live together”, which is a legal contract that couple typically sign, indicating they are in a relationship and moved in together. This paper is almost as powerful as getting married in terms of legal and financial responsibility. – This perhaps explains why lots of people do not get married but live together and raise children together.
Being in the legally living together status, the couple also needs to act responsible of each other, they have to help to pay the debt of the other one if necessary, and for foreigners, you need to provide lots of materials to prove you are genially in a relationship.
Read more:
https://www.liveinbelgium.be/legal-cohabitation-marriage-alternative/
Recommended movie – The Terminal (2004)
If you cannot imagine living in Belgium without an official address attached, you must be able to imagine a person travelling but all of a sudden without any home country attached.
This 7.3/10 rated movie tells about a man stuck in New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport because during his flight, he suddenly became stateless after outbreak of civil war in his home country. Cannot enter USA, nor going back to his home country, he started his adventure in the airport, up to 9 months, until the civil war is over.
