Freelancing on the side

1

An SME in another country has offered to hire me to do a specific programming task for them. Since 95% of you have frontend, backend or fullstack in your job titles, I thought someone here might have some advice…

How should one go about this in Switzerland - i.e., do I need a business number or anything?
Do I need to charge VAT?
How would I go about declaring this income (am taxed at source on permit B here)?

Keep in mind, this is a very small job, <20hrs, and I have no plans to evolve this into a significant source of income.

2

I would recommend using a payroll company located in Switzerland to serve as an intermediate between you and your foreign client. They will charge you a fee to take care of all this for you.

3

Really? For such a small amount of non-recurring work?

4

do the work, get paid (perhaps on your swiss bank account), come tax declaration time (most cantons by end of April for the past year) if the amount is >2000CHF declare as independent revenue. you might want to call your tax authority to ask what form you should use.

5

That’s not going to cover social contributions though, right?

6

You are already employed (so you are not considered “independant”). So this will just be additional income that you would declare. Ask your tax authority.

No, you don’t charge VAT.

1 Like
7

Right, so I think I will just get paid directly to my personal foreign currency account, then next year declare it as accessory income and pay 10% flat tax on it here (Barème/Tarif D). Apparently this is fine for any side work that doesn’t exceed 30% of my full-time job. I don’t see any issues with this and don’t want to go through a 3rd party for this small side-contract.

Any caveats that haven’t been brought up yet?

8

the only thing not discussed was clearing with your employer if it’s ok to do this side work…as far as i remember you might be contractually required to disclose this sort of activity as they are concerned by your well-being (you should not come to work being tired, etc.) however probably most people freelancing on the side don’t do this. might be a problem if they do find out though :smirk: :zipper_mouth_face:

going through a local company will just eat into your margin…makes little sense if that is your customer, my 2c