Practical guides
In short
These guides walk through the administrative and contractual steps that come up in Belgium: switching energy supplier or operator, registering a vehicle with the DIV, opening a bank account, joining a mutuality, changing address. Each one lists the documents required, the legal notice periods and the mistakes that cost money.
All guides
- Switching electricity or gas supplier in BelgiumOne month's notice, no penalty, no interruption: how the switch actually works.
- Finding your EAN code in BelgiumEighteen digits that identify your meter, not you and not your address.
- The energy transfer document explainedOne signed form fixes the meter readings and ends the argument before it starts.
- Easy Switch: changing telecom operator in BelgiumThe official Belgian procedure that lets your new operator do the cancelling.
- Keeping your phone number when you change operatorPortability is free and a right, but only if you ask for it before cancelling.
- Internet outage in Belgium: diagnosis and your rightsIsolate the fault, get a ticket reference, then escalate if the operator stalls.
- Moving your internet and TV to a new Belgian addressCheck availability at the exact address first, then decide between moving and switching.
- Registering a car in BelgiumYour insurer files the request, and the plate belongs to you, not to the car.
- The cost of registering a car in BelgiumFour separate charges from three different authorities, plus the premium that unlocks them.
- Importing a car into BelgiumCustoms, VAT status, conformity, inspection, then registration, strictly in that order.
- Bonus-malus: how claims history moves your premiumThe certificate that follows you between insurers, and what a foreign record buys you.
- Changing your mutuality in BelgiumStatutory cover never changes. Only the supplementary package and the contribution do.
- Joining a mutuality when you arrive in BelgiumCompulsory, free to choose, and impossible until the commune has registered you.
- Opening a bank account in BelgiumThe proof-of-address deadlock, and the two ways out of it.
- Switching banks in BelgiumA free service moves your direct debits. Everything else is still your job.
- Blocking a lost or stolen bank card in BelgiumReport first, file the police statement second, and note the exact time you called.
- Registration duties on a Belgian property purchaseA regional tax, reduced regimes everywhere, and a notary who costs it for free.
- Moving house in Belgium: the complete checklistWhat to do three months out, one month out, on the day and in the week after.
- Declaring a change of address in BelgiumDeclare at the new commune, wait for the police check, then update the chip on your eID.