Bürgeramt Innenstadt - Stadt Köln

Go early or you will wait for hours and then they’ll shutdown. If you have a family, call and make an appointment. The workers are nice enough, but under a lot of stress. It’s not fun for anyone. It’s actually gotten better over the years, if you can believe that. Among many of those coming in, there’s little sense of order and a general disregard for others’ places in line.

I had a good experience with an employee she was very cooperative and helpful

This place is absolutely horrendous. I would not imagine a government office being run like that even in a the least developed country in the world. I’ve travelled places and had to deal with tons of bureaucracy to obtain residence permit but nowhere was as bad as at the Bezirksausländeramt Innenstadt. People line up in front the tiny elevator and entrance to the stairwell long before the opening time. Right on the dot at 8am they open the elevator and the entrance and people rush to the 4th floor. It’s worse than the stampede. Elbows everywhere, pushing and showing, anything to win the race for the waiting ticket. Congratulations, level one completed. Now begins the abhorrent wait. People are crammed in to the small waiting room, no proper ventilation nor sitting. Everyone just sits on the floor, sweating and staring at the display in hopes to see their number. There is no way to make an appointment. You are forced to wait, hours and hours for your turn. You can’t leave because they close the door after 12pm. There’s no water fountain, no food vending machine. Children are restless, babies are crying, people are worried and yet still you wait. Because there is no other way. Finally, you see your number on the screen and you feel like you won the lottery. With a big smile you politely greet the office worker (in German of course) just to receive dismissive frown. Furthermore, people working there think it is okay to yell at you, throw your papers and documents back at your face and refuse to answer any kind of questions. Their phones are unreachable, emails as well and the web site hardly has any useful information. I did my homework, I tried to get informed but there are some questions that are too specific and have to be asked in person. Yet the employe almost pushed me out of the office, saying there are other people waiting. I know! I was there with them for the past 5 hours!! Surely there is another way this could be managed and organised. I’ve seen it done in bigger cities, bigger countries, heck even poorer less developed countries have it figured out better than at this Bezirksausländeramt Innenstadt in Cologne. I’d suggest to avoid it but you just can’t if you are moving to this place. But public needs to know how they treat honest people over there and that’s why this review. Something ought to change.

Super long waiting times.

Better than most offices in Cologne