In the Netherlands, the three biggest pension insurers have a total of 350 million euros lying around in unclaimed pensions.

Thousands of people forget their Dutch pension each year

Pension insurers ABP (civil service), PWZW (health service) and PMT (engineering) are looking for 100.000 people who have yet to claim their pension.

In many instances, people do not realise that they have the right to a pension even if the pension holder is deceased. In this case, the next of kin are entitled to the pension.

Luckily, a great deal of pension holders are found via the Municipal Personal Records Database (BRP), their citizen service number (BSN), or via the Social Insurance Bank (SVB), as they manage the state pension.

Search still underway

Pension insurers in the Netherlands have had some success in finding the rightful parties to pensions, with the pension insurer for the Transport sector having found 32.000 unclaimed pension owners in the last two years and PFZW 3.000 rightful claimants last year.

Despite these numbers, there are still a great number of people who are untraceable. This is often the case with people who have worked in the Netherlands for a few years, built up a pension, then moved abroad. People who worked here during the 60s and 70s are also a little harder to find as citizen service numbers were not issued back then.