Under an existing agreement, the national welcome office (ONA) covers Post account fees for asylum seekers arriving in Luxembourg, who might opening an account at a bank without a job contract and other documentation. Applicants can open a basic account with a V-Pay card.

This offer is now being extended to refugees from Ukraine under the EU’s temporary protection mechanism, which also allows people who have fled the country to work in Luxembourg.

The ONA is pooling requests and will help organise meetings to open the accounts between the applicants and Post.

In February, Post lifted all fees for calls and text messages to Ukraine for customers. While the measure was initially set to expire at the end of March, it has been extended until 30 June.

And refugees who arrived in Luxembourg from Ukraine can receive a free mobile phone subscription with unlimited calls to Ukraine as well as text message and mobile data packages. Applicants must be able to provide their temporary protection documentation to be able to benefit from this programme.

Finally, the telecommunications company is providing the ONA with several properties to help accommodate Ukrainian families. Around 4,000 people are estimated to have arrived in Luxembourg in the last three week. This compares to 2,500 asylum seekers for all of 2015 at the height of the Syrian refugee crisis.

Foreign minister Jean Asselborn (LSAP) has advised against citizen initiatives bringing back large numbers of refugees from the Ukrainian border countries without having organised private accommodation as Luxembourg scrambles to make room for the arrivals.

An extra hall made temporarily available at Luxexpo will need to be reclaimed by the event organiser mid-April. Luxembourg’s asylum shelters were already nearing capacity before the outbreak of war in Ukraine as many refugees struggle to leave the shelters and fine housing on the private market.

Although Post is incorporated as an independent company, it belongs to the Luxembourg state.