Four rules, and three of them fail quietly
The Dutch IND publishes its upload requirements clearly, which is more than most. The difficulty is that three of the four give you no useful warning when you break them.
| Rule | What it says |
|---|---|
| Formats | PDF (without password protection) and JPG; some applications also JPEG |
| Each file | Less than 8MB |
| All files together | No more than 40MB |
| Portfolios | You cannot upload a PDF portfolio with combined PDF files |
The total that nobody budgets for
Most portals cap each file. The IND caps each file and the whole submission.
Six documents at 7MB each are all individually legal - every one comfortably under the 8MB limit - and together they are 42MB, which is over. Nothing about preparing those files tells you that, because each one passed the only check you thought existed.
If you are assembling a large application, add the sizes up before you start uploading. It is the single most useful thing you can do, and almost nobody does it.
The rule they state twice
"Only upload PDFs without password protection."
The IND says this twice on the same page. When an organisation repeats itself like that, it is usually telling you what it spends most of its time rejecting.
A password-protected PDF opens perfectly well on your own computer - your reader remembered the password, probably months ago - so there is no padlock, no prompt, nothing at all to notice. Bank statements are the usual source, because many banks protect them by default, and bank statements are exactly what an immigration application asks for.
If a file came from a bank, an insurer or a pension provider, assume it is protected until you have checked. Remove the password and upload the unprotected copy.
The obscure one: PDF portfolios
"You cannot upload a PDF portfolio with combined PDF files."
A PDF portfolio is not a merged document. It is a PDF acting as a container, holding several complete files inside it as separate items. Acrobat will make one for you if you combine files a particular way, and in a folder listing it looks exactly like any other PDF.
Open it and look. If you see a sidebar listing your documents as separate files rather than a single continuous set of pages, it is a portfolio and the IND will refuse it.
The fix is to merge the documents properly into one continuous PDF, where page 5 follows page 4 rather than sitting inside a separate attachment.
Before you upload
- Add the file sizes up. Under 40MB in total, not just under 8MB each.
- Anything from a bank? Check it for password protection first.
- Did you combine files in Acrobat? Open the result and confirm it is a merged document, not a portfolio.
- Any PNG screenshots? Not accepted — convert them.
You can check a file against these rules before uploading. It reads the actual file contents rather than the extension, and it detects password protection, which is the one you cannot see for yourself.