The matricule in Luxembourg: the thirteen-digit number everything hangs on

In Luxembourg you need one number, and it is called the matricule: the national identification number of thirteen digits from the Luxembourg national register. It costs nothing, there is no separate counter for it, and it replaces what are three numbers in the Netherlands: your BSN, your tax number and your health insurance number. The find on guichet.lu: whoever has a Dutch DigiD can already apply for the number online before moving. The trap: with that Dutch login you do get into MyGuichet, but you cannot sign anything with it — your tax return, for example.

What exactly is the matricule?

Luxembourg keeps one register of everyone who deals with a Luxembourg authority, resident or not: the Registre national des personnes physiques, the RNPP. Whoever is in it has a national identification number of thirteen digits. The register holds your name, your address, your date and place of birth, your family situation and your nationality, and the numbers of your partner and your children if they have one.

That register does something you are not used to from the Netherlands: services with access to it may in principle no longer ask you for an extract to prove data that is already correctly recorded there. You can view your own data via MyGuichet, at your commune's counter or by letter; the extract comes in French, German and Luxembourgish.

How do I get it?

For most newcomers the number follows from the report to the commune: whoever reports their arrival to the bureau de la population ends up in the register. That report and the registration after it are covered in the residence routes to Luxembourg; this is about what comes out of it.

There is a second route, and it is interesting for Dutch people. Luxembourg recognises the login means of a range of EU countries under the European eIDAS rules, and the Netherlands is on that list. If you do not have a matricule yet, you can apply for one online with your Dutch login; you are then entered in the RNPP and can register on MyGuichet afterwards.

What	Where	Deadline or cost
Report your arrival	bureau de la population of your commune	within 8 days of arrival
Matricule	follows from the report, or online via eIDAS	free
Certificat de résidence	commune, after the report	on request
Social security card	CCSS, after affiliation	free, within 3 weeks
Registration on MyGuichet	online, from a computer	from age 16, with a matricule
Temporary replacement health certificate	your health fund, via MyGuichet	valid for 3 months at most

Where does anyone ask for that number?

Everywhere. It is on your social security card, which the CCSS creates automatically as soon as you are affiliated as a main insured person and which arrives by post at your official address within three weeks. If you are employed, that runs through your employer's registration. If you are retired and come with an S1, you apply for the card through your health fund, the CNS — see healthcare in Luxembourg. The card has two sides: the Luxembourg one, which gets you seen by doctor and pharmacy, and the European health insurance card for temporary stays in another country. If it has not arrived yet and you need care, you request a replacement certificate via MyGuichet that is valid for three months at most.

Your tax hangs on the same number. After a change of address the tax authority ACD sends residents a new tax card, which you hand to your employer. And if you already have a car on Luxembourg plates, you report a new address to the SNCA within a month; how the car gets its plates is in car and driving licence in Luxembourg.

How do I log in: LuxTrust, eID or DigiD?

MyGuichet is the counter where you arrange the rest, and you need three things for it: a computer, an email address and a login means of your own. Those means are a LuxTrust product, a Luxembourg electronic identity card — which you do not get as a Dutch national — or an eIDAS means from another European country. Registering only works from a computer, not in the app; you pair a phone afterwards. A means is personal: partners do not share one.

With your DigiD you get in, but you sign nothing with it. Guichet.lu says it literally: with an eIDAS means from another country you cannot electronically sign procedures on MyGuichet, such as the tax return. Whoever comes to live in Luxembourg therefore still needs a LuxTrust product; whoever does their banking with LuxTrust Mobile can use that same product for MyGuichet.

Which papers help?

After your report you can ask the commune for a certificat de résidence, for yourself and your family. Many counters want to see it, and an employer uses it for moving leave.

For your certificates one rule saves money. The commune asks for a sworn translation of documents that are not in French, German or English — and a Dutch birth certificate is not. Within the EU you can instead ask the municipality that issues the certificate for a multilingual standard form, without an apostille. A counter may exceptionally still ask for a translation, but that is the exception.

How this number fits into your whole sequence — report, registration, healthcare, bank, tax — is in the step-by-step plan for Luxembourg.

In Vertrekklaar this is phase 4 of 5 of the journey, step 4.1: the same steps, but for your situation — in your order, tickable, and with the deadlines watched. See the whole journey to Luxembourg or go straight to step 4.1 in the open plan.