In many European countries, one needs a permanent address or domicile to be entitled to
social rights. To address this minimum prerequisite, mechanisms for administrative
inclusion are in place for people experiencing homelessness without an address, such as
the reference address in Belgium. Yet, hitherto, poverty organizations raised concerns
whether it succeeds in doing so. This paper disentangles the non-take-up mechanisms
behind this reference address by drawing on interviews with professionals. Our evidence
suggests this address is a minimum minimorum of social protection, albeit it can reflect and
reinforce administrative and social exclusion of the beneficiaries through (1) the
disproportionate punitive consequences when not complying to the imposed (sometimes
additional) criteria, (2) their subjection to interprofessional (sometimes arbitrary) variation
of the administration, and (3) their stigmatization. By focusing on this key policy targeting
people experiencing homelessness, the results contribute to the debate on the entitlement
to and non-take-up of rights, the barriers that homeless persons are confronted with, and
the possibility of an administrative address that includes the most excluded
