did you miss a zero there? otherwise, where can i get these 12% p.a. contracts? want many of them! 
I wabt to speciry that you can deduct 3b only in Canton fribourg and geneva
To conclude my initial post, I sold (=cancelled) my life insurance. besides the non-capital-building costs, I lost roughly CHF 2500, that is a return of -25% over 4 years 
The decision was based on
- the extremely low return prospect of a 30 years illiquid investment
- bundled insurances that were bundled with it at premiums that are not competitive on the market (= too high)
and a few more, minor aspects.
so, conclusing, dont invest in life insurance products!
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Well done @nugget !
Did the same last year (after 6 years…) ! In my case, the impulse came from the yearly reports… after I noticed that the expected return was lower and lower, I began to care about it and ran some math…
Better late than never ! 
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I also made a terrible decision signing up to a similar scam. The details are too shameful to share, but I am in the process of cancelling the contract right now. How I wish I had known then what I know now!
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Hi everyone, it’s my first post but I’ve been reading (and benefiting!) from all of your advice for a month or 2 now. Thank you all v much!
I made the same mistake as @nugget and signed up for a 3a + life insurance policy (like @Alex, the details are too shameful to share, but I was basically lied to by the advisor). Pleased I’m not alone in the ‘got scammed’ corner!
I stand to lose 10’000 of my 20’000 investment 
due to the surrender value.
How did you all go about getting out of the insurance?
@nugget how did you reduce the loss from the estimated 6K to only 2.5K if you don’t mind my asking?
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I made the same mistake. ( "Pillar 3a life insurance" stories )
Fortunately I did not waited too long before realizing that this insurance was far from optimal (10 months in the contract).
In this situation, it is important to not get trapped in the sunk cost fallacy. You have to compare what you’ll lose if you stop this insurance now, vs what you’ll lose if you keep the contract until maturity.
In my case it was lose 5k now vs lose 40k at maturity, so it was a no brainer! But it is still a very sour bullet to bite, especially when you receive the letter saying that the contract is now worthless.
Luckily I dodged that bullet, i got visited by a team of live insurance brokers for “after apprenticeship financial counsel” that was apparently sponsored by my employer (it was not but it sounded legit).
At that point I had already read the whole of MMM and had some investments going. It was kind of funny how the pitched how bad it would be if I had to live on halve of my salary in some wired edge case.
Couldn’t agree more with you on the sunk cost fallacy (thanks for the link); I did a quick calculation using Axa’s online customer portal and saw that if I continue paying the full 6768 CHF p/a for even just another 5 years, I would lose 22K instead of 10K.
10K hurts but it doesn’t sting like 22K would!!
hey @mia,
How did you all go about getting out of the insurance?
@nugget how did you reduce the loss from the estimated 6K to only 2.5K if you don’t mind my asking?
by some tricky finance math… i can’t find the documents anymore, so this is how the numbers are roughly made up:
originally (fall 2016) I asked for the buy-back value, and they stated some CHF 6xxx. of my 4 yearly premiums of CHF 3000 each (summing 12k) that i paid so far, I considered the difference to be my loss, hence the 6k. later I realised that the CHF 3000 yearly premium are made up of about 2.5 kCHF actual wealth contribution (=>10k after 4 years), and the remaining CHF 500 being insurances. So when they transferred CHF 7.5k some months later (which surprised me), i considered the CHF 2500 difference as my actual loss.
good point with the sunk cost! I made this calculation too, assuming average 5% with broad index ETFs i would have >200k instead of 110k at 65. as Julianek stated: no-brainer!
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ah haaa, thanks @nugget. I’m going to ask my contact how much of the full 6.7K premium I paid each year (…what was I thinking!) was actually insurance fees. Thank you all for your help 
yes, better do that. as pointed out in the beginning of the thread, my contract was
CHF 2337 capital building
CHF 133 Prämienbefreiung
CHF 550 Todesfallversicherung: o
these infos were not in the contract, but only available after I requested them in written form
and on top of that, putting the full 6.7k into one police instead of in 5 smaller ones is going to cost you easily avoidable multiple 10k’s in taxes, see the credit suisse calculator here
=> one big chunk vs 5 small chunks split over 5 years does the trick since the taxes rise progressively with the amount
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Thinking about the sunk cost fallacy is also what made me wake up to reality. In my case, the scammers were going to get all their money regardless of whether I cancelled the contract now or later. The only difference for me was how long the rest of my money was going to be immobilized, what I would lose if I invested it better and how long I was going to feel bad about this situation. Once I accepted this, the decision to take the loss, learn from it and move on was easy. Hurtful, but simple.
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Hello @Julianek
I am in the same situation as you got fooled and subscribed for a 3a pillar with swisslife insurance. I would like to cancel this 3a pillar after 7 months is it possible ? You said you stopped paying premiums how ? What consequences ?
Thank you all for helping me out
Hi @S44144,
What I did is simply stopping paying after 8 months (and I cancelled my LSV payment at my bank). The insurance company sent payment reminders during 3-4 months, and then finally they sent me a letter saying that since i was not paying anymore, my life insurance contract is null and worthless.
Needless to say, I lost all the premiums I had paid since the beginning (around 4k CHF). But if I had stayed in this contract, I would have lost a lot more in the long term.
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Thank you so much !!! I will call tomorrow and tell them that I will keep you posted ! And if they don’t want I will stop paying too ! Thank you so much I finally see some lights I was so depressed about it
I’d suggest to send an explicit cancellation letter by registered mail to the insurance, not just stop paying, or they might sue you for the last few months until the moment they decide to cancel - they’re still covering risk of your death until then so you owe them money theoretically.
Don’t expect to recover any money: “Rückkauf” value of your policy in first few years is likely to be zero. You got scammed plain and simple, but unfortunately it’s all legal in CH…
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So I contacted the guy who sold me the contract and he sent me the cancellation paper that I sign and sent directly. He tried through 4 mails to change my mind but my decision was made.
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Hi I’ve come out from my mental hiatus and decided to again take a look at my finances.
Like everyone beginning in Switzerland i was attacked by a bunch of pillar3a life insurance offers.
Now looking at them they look like a not that great deal, today after reading the forum I think I will choose VIAC as my 3a and I am debating about the life insurance part as a separate contract, do I have to take it? Does any one know what are the spouse benefits in Switzerland
Signing up for a life insurance in case of a young working person without significant support obligations is generally unwise, the only ones profiting from it almost certainly would be just your insurer and salesperson. You’re insured to some degree through the employer anyway. 3a-bound insurances with their typically complicated and intransparent terms are an especially dumb choice to waste some money
Does any one know what are the spouse benefits in Switzerland
Whatever your insurance contract says. If you and your spouse can’t read and comprehend it on your own, probably you should not sign it then
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