Today, we're giving the floor to Valentine and Philippe, a Swiss couple who decided to embark on an open-ended journey with Louise, their VW T3 van, in March 2021. They kindly offered to share their experience with Swiss administrative procedures on our blog to benefit future world travelers and long-term travelers from Switzerland. Since our own RTW trip is becoming dated, we thought it would be interesting to share a recent experience with the infamously complicated Swiss administrative paperwork ;).
About us
We are Philippe, 33, an electrical engineer, and Valentine, 29, a journalist. We could define ourselves as a "Romand" couple (French-speaking Swiss). Philippe comes from the Fribourg countryside. Valentine has lived between Gros-de-Vaud and Chablais in Valais. Nature is our favorite playground. We enjoy both hiking in the mountains and cycling trips by the sea. We spent many months developing the idea of a journey with no return date aboard our T3 van. Our first horizon: heading east, starting with Greece. Our cruising rhythm: stopping whenever we feel like it, alternating between wild camping, Workaway, and any other opportunities that arise through encounters and adventures.
We plan to start traveling in March 2021 for an indefinite period with our VW T3 van. Regarding administrative procedures, we opted for a definitive departure, mainly to avoid paying health insurance and taxes (even though we no longer have income). But also because, in reality, we no longer have housing in Switzerland, and it didn't make much sense to establish residence with someone from our circle when we don't really know where we'll settle the next time we decide to put down roots somewhere...
It's already been mentioned on this travel blog: the paperwork is really not an enjoyable part of the preparations before an RTW trip for Swiss citizens. Even if sometimes it feels like everything is very complicated, or even impossible, you need to stay calm, insist a bit when necessary, and don't hesitate too much to work around the rules when they're too Swiss and rigid. There are many aspects for which the globetrotter status is not really provided for, so we have no choice but to do things a bit differently, which won't make us (or you ;)) outlaws. So here's how we handled each paperwork domain.
Home and address, procedures with the municipality and the canton
We no longer have a domicile and withdrew our papers from the last municipality where we lived. For this, we requested a departure certificate, which indicated that we were leaving for India. It was absolutely necessary to provide a destination; we chose this because it's roughly in the direction we're heading, and we adopted the tactic of the further away, the better. We are now considered, in a way, to be in transit. Otherwise, we retrieved our certificates of origin, which we left with our parents. Moreover, we cannot be Swiss citizens abroad because then we would need to register with a Swiss representation in a country.
As we detail throughout the article, we kept a mailbox at our parents' home or kept our last address. We set up mail forwarding for one year (30 CHF at the Post Office). It seems that this can also be renewed, but that needs to be confirmed. Another interesting piece of information we got at the Post Office: a person with the same family name as you can collect registered mail addressed to you without any issue. They effectively have the power of attorney.
Taxes
The general principle is that you need to have paid your taxes for the previous year, and if possible for the current year, before departure. In our case, we were helped quite a bit by the Cantonal Tax Service. Thanks to them, we received a tax assessment decision much more quickly than usual. They also coordinated with the municipality, which in turn sent us the municipal tax assessment, then issued the sacrosanct departure certificate. That was for the 2020 taxes. At the time of completing the procedures, mid-January 2021, it was not possible for "IT reasons" to pay taxes for 2021. We had to leave a contact address in Switzerland, where we will still be sent a tax form next year for the first few months of 2021.
Private/professional pension
In Switzerland, there's the possibility of contributing to voluntary OASI (Old Age and Survivors' Insurance) for people without income who are concerned about their retirement. At first, we thought it would be good to do this. The contribution amount is not excessive and is based on assets when there is no income. But in trying to calculate the impact of a few years without contributions on our retirement pension, we actually realized:
- It was impossible, even according to the Cantonal Fund, to know today what it would be like in more than 30 years. Notably because the system is likely to change by then.
- If we still try to make projections, the differences with and without contributions seem minimal on the pensions we would receive around 2055.
So we finally chose not to subscribe to the voluntary AVS, knowing that we still have a few months after departure to change our minds. If that's the case, however, we would need to register with a Swiss representation abroad.
For the pension fund (OP), we had to open a vested benefits account at the bank. The money is blocked there until we have a new employer, in Switzerland or elsewhere. If we never work again, it will sit in the bank until we're 65.
Vehicle
We obviously couldn't leave without a license plate, and it would have been complicated to register the bus abroad. So we kept our plates and, for now, left our old address on the registration card. The advice we would give is the following: when leaving your residence, if you can make an address change to someone in your circle who lives in the same canton where your vehicle is registered, that's great.
However, you should know that it's not possible to do the same to another canton, because in that case, you would have to register with the Auto Service of this new canton, which would ask you for… a certificate of residence ;). If you don't have a place where mail from the Auto Service can be sent (mainly for taxes), you can try to contact them to request to receive everything online. This is where you see the differences between cantons in terms of digitalization…
Regarding the vehicle inspection, it took place shortly before our departure, which gives us about two years of margin. For the next summons, it will depend on where we are in our journey. It's possible to have an inspection done abroad, by going to a local garage that would certify the good condition of the vehicle. You then just need to send this certificate back to Switzerland.
In terms of vehicle insurance, nothing special. It's up to you, as for the previous points, to see how you can handle the mail (everything by email or keep a mailbox with someone in Switzerland).
Health insurance
Most health insurance companies agree to cancel policies (basic and supplementary) upon presentation of the famous departure certificate. We were with two different insurers, and it was quite interesting to compare the procedures in each of them. The timeframes for receiving the deregistration confirmation varied considerably. One of them didn't ask for anything more, while the other still mentioned this obligation in effect since the law change in 2017. Then we took out an international travel insurance valid for one year (we chose AVA). When asking about extending the contract beyond this deadline, we were told it would be OK as long as we don't settle permanently somewhere.
In case of a serious problem, repatriation is covered to our country of origin. Once back in Switzerland, we would then need to establish residence in a municipality "urgently" and resubscribe to KVG just as quickly so that any medical care we might need would be covered by Swiss insurance.
Bank
In theory, you need a tax domicile in Switzerland to have one or more accounts there. But this apparently remains theoretical. We were able to keep our existing accounts without any problems and open others by providing an address at our parents'.
Ben: I would add that we had already done the same thing in 2013 and were somewhat scolded by our bank when we returned... But nothing too serious ;).
Telephony
If roaming were cheap and worth it in Switzerland, everyone would know about it! So we logically canceled our subscriptions (also with the help of the departure certificate) to convert them to Prepaid. Our Swiss SIM cards were put into old phones, and we also took Greek cards on Prepaid. To avoid having two phones, we recommend those with dual SIM cards.
We hope that Valentine and Philippe's experience with Swiss administrative paperwork will be useful to you. As you can see, they are among the many Swiss travelers who have decided to get around the sometimes too rigid Swiss rules by choosing to withdraw their papers from their municipality (without depositing them abroad). Of course, this is their responsibility alone, and everyone is responsible for making their own decisions with full knowledge of the facts... But we share their view that there is probably a lack of clear status for trips around the world or open-ended trips in Switzerland that would greatly simplify administrative procedures for this kind of project.
In any case, we wish them wonderful adventures aboard Louise. And if you have any questions for them, don't hesitate to leave a comment below!
Join the discussion