Here is what you can do if the IND is late in deciding

The law states that the IND has 6 months to decide on an asylum application. But because waiting times in the Netherlands have continued to increase in recent years, this is not working. Therefore, the Dutch government has decided to temporarily extend this period by 9 months until 1 January 2025. Therefore, the IND currently has 15 months to decide on requests submitted between 27 September 2022 and 1 January 2025. And in exceptional situations, the IND can extend this period another one (or two?) times by 3 months.

The IND can extend the legal decision period to a maximum of 21 months (6+9=15; possible 3-month extension is 18. So where do those other 3 months come from now? And why are you not allowed to raise the alarm until you have been waiting for 23 months. And even then it can take another 1.5 months after that (Over 2 years now). Is there no end to this. Why does the government get away with this. Are the courts not putting their foot down?).

This currently means that after signing your asylum application:

• It is an average of 4 weeks before you have the 1st interview with the IND.

• After that, it takes an average of 48 weeks before you have the 2nd interview with the IND

Only when you now wait longer than 23 months and have not yet had an appointment with MediFirst (and thus have not yet had a 2nd interview with the IND), you can email centralewerkverdeling@ind.nl. If your case is then scheduled, it will take another 3-4 weeks or so until the appointment with MediFirst and then, depending on the medical advice, another 1-2 months until the detailed hearing. In fact, the average wait times are currently already 20-21 months for the general asylum procedure.

The IND expressly asks that you email only about cases older than 23 months. The IND then checks that the applicant is properly in the systems. And if possible, information is also provided about the remaining waiting time. Asking attention to younger cases is useless because unfortunately there are still many cases waiting for a decision.

Is the

Immigratie- en Naturalisatiedienst Postbus 14 9560 AA TER APEL

After receiving the notice of default, the IND has 2 weeks to make a decision on your application.

If your application was not complete, the IND can reject your application. So make sure your application was complete at the time you declare them in default.

If the IND still does not make a decision after your notice of default, the IND is obliged to pay you a fine. And you can appeal to the courts.

To start the procedure, you file a notice of appeal with the court. A notice of appeal is a document you use to start proceedings against the government within administrative law.

The court often decides these types of cases by just looking at the documents. The court asks the IND to send all the documents of the case and explain why they have not made a decision yet. Then there does not need to be a tribunal.

If there does need to be tribunal, you will receive a letter about this from the court.

If the court decides that you are right, the IND must make a quick decision regarding your application. Usually, the court gives the IND 2 weeks to do this. If the IND does not decide within this time frame, the court can impose an additional fine on the IND for each day they are late according to the time limit set by the court.

If there is no hearing, the court issues a ruling within 8 weeks of receiving the notice of appeal. If there is a hearing, the court will issue a ruling within 6 weeks of the hearing. If the court needs more time, they will inform you. The ruling will be sent to your address.

You can seek legal advice from a lawyer before you decide to force the IND to make a decision. This will increase your chances of a positive outcome. You can also go to