How to find a relative's bank accounts and life policies in the Netherlands

When someone dies, the family often does not know which banks or insurers they used. In the Netherlands, the banks and the insurers each run one shared route for exactly this.

Bank accounts: Loket Slapende Tegoeden

The Loket Slapende Tegoeden was set up by Dutch banks together and is run by the Dutch Banking Association (NVB). Heirs, or the executor handling the estate, can make one request that goes to every participating bank. It covers accounts such as current, savings and investment accounts that have not been used for years.

Use it only if you do not know which bank held the account. If you do know the bank, contact that bank directly.

You need to identify yourself and send documents, such as a copy of the declaration of inheritance (verklaring van erfrecht) or the death certificate. The full list depends on your relationship to the person who died, and is set out on the site.

If a participating bank finds an account, you receive an email naming the bank, but not the amount. You then contact the bank yourself. The whole search takes at most three months.

Life and funeral insurance: the Zoekservice

The Dutch Association of Insurers (Verbond van Verzekeraars) runs a search service for life insurance policies, including funeral and term life policies. It covers two cases: your own policy that you have lost track of, and the policy of someone who has died.

For a relative who has died, you can apply if you are their child, spouse or partner, an heir, or the person handling the estate. You send a copy of the death certificate and, depending on your relationship, proof of it. The participating insurers search their own records and the Verbond tells you which insurer found a policy. You then contact that insurer. The service says the search takes about two to three months.

Before you apply, the service asks you to try yourself first: if you have any paperwork naming an insurer, call that insurer.

If the insurer no longer exists

The Zoekservice points people to De Nederlandsche Bank's information desk to find the successor of an insurer that no longer exists.

Worked abroad, or the person who died did?

Bank and insurance searches are national. Pensions built up in other countries need a separate search. PensionHunter, the cross-border pension option we feature, runs a free lost pension checker.

For the Dutch side, its page on Dutch pensions from abroad explains what can be done from outside the country.

We always point people to the free government tracing route first, and we take nothing from financial advisers.