Working remote from abroad on a Swiss contract

Most of the questions I get about remote work from Switzerland are operational. The hard ones are legal. Where am I tax resident if I spend three months in Lisbon? Do I lose AHV? Does my employer care, and if so, why? This page is the short version of the answers, with statute references and pointers to the glossary for term-by-term definitions.

The framing that matters before anything else: Swiss law does not prohibit a Swiss employee from working remotely abroad. The constraints come from three regimes that all apply at once. Where you are tax resident decides where income tax is owed. Which country's social-security system covers the work decides AHV, Pillar 2, and unemployment insurance. And whether your physical presence in another country triggers tax obligations for your employer is the "permanent establishment" question, which has nothing to do with you and everything to do with the company.

What this page is not. Not legal advice. Not tax advice. The thresholds and statute references below are the framework, not your specific situation. Talk to a Swiss tax advisor or employment lawyer for anything you intend to act on. Sources linked inline; the glossary carries the longer regulatory write-up.

The 25 and 49.9% framework

If you live in Switzerland and want to spend a few weeks or months working from another EU/EFTA country, two thresholds shape what's possible. They sit on top of each other, and they're often conflated.

The 25% baseline. EU Regulation 883/2004 is the EU-wide rule for cross-border workers. The default: a worker employed by a Swiss company falls under Swiss social security, unless they perform 25% or more of their working time in another EU/EFTA country. Above 25%, social security shifts to that country (and Swiss AHV and Pillar 2 stop). This rule reaches Switzerland through the EU-Switzerland Agreement on the Free Movement of Persons.

The 49.9% layer for telework. A multilateral framework agreement entered into force on 1 July 2023, signed by Switzerland and most EU/EFTA states (not all: Italy, Ireland, Greece, and a few others have stayed out so far). It specifically raises the 25% threshold for telework. An employee resident in a participating country can telework for a Swiss employer up to 49.9% of working time without shifting social security away from Switzerland. At 50% or above, the regime moves to the country of residence anyway.

Two precisions worth being clear about. The framework covers telework only (working from home or a co-working space). Client visits, conferences, and temporary postings fall under separate rules. The framework also works in both directions: a Swiss resident teleworking for an EU/EFTA-based employer can use the same 49.9% ceiling.

For destinations outside EU/EFTA, neither threshold applies. Switzerland has bilateral social-security agreements with around 50 other countries (including the United States, Canada, Japan, and the United Kingdom). These typically cover initial "posting" arrangements of up to about five years, with extensions possible by mutual agreement of the authorities. For longer-term setups outside both regimes, Swiss social security generally cannot be maintained.

The A1 certificate

An A1 certificate is the document that confirms which country's social-security system covers a worker during a cross-border arrangement. It is the proof an employer needs to keep paying AHV and Pillar 2 in Switzerland while the employee performs part of their work in another EU/EFTA country.

A1 certificates are issued by the Swiss compensation office (Ausgleichskasse) competent for the employer. The employer applies, not the employee. Whether one is strictly required depends on the specific arrangement and the destination country's enforcement posture. Some EU countries enforce it strictly (France in particular, which has actively fined employers and workers found without one in place). When in doubt, ask your employer whether yours needs one before you go.

A1 covers EU/EFTA. For destinations under a bilateral social-security agreement, the equivalent document is a certificate of coverage issued under that specific treaty.

Tax residency: the 30 and 90-day rule

If you stay in Switzerland for most of the year, this section is short: you remain a Swiss tax resident. If you spend long stretches abroad, it gets more interesting.

Swiss federal tax law sets the test at DBG Art. 3, with a parallel rule at StHG Art. 3 for cantonal and communal tax. There are two ways to be tax resident in Switzerland: by having your primary registered residence (Wohnsitz) here, or by physical presence in Switzerland of 30 days or more while working, or 90 days or more without working. Once tax resident, Switzerland taxes worldwide income, subject to its double-taxation agreements with over 100 countries.

The number people most often mention, the "183-day rule," comes from the OECD model tax treaty. It is the threshold above which an individual is generally treated as tax resident in the country where they spent that time. When both countries claim you, the OECD tie-breaker tests (permanent home, then centre of vital interests, then habitual abode, then nationality) decide which one wins for treaty purposes. In practice, stays abroad of under around 90 days a year typically do not shift Swiss residency. Longer stays may, depending on the destination country's own rules.

The honest version: this is the area where individual circumstances actually matter, and where Swiss tax advisors earn their fees. The closer your trips abroad get to three months, the more worth it the half-hour consultation becomes.

AHV and Pillar 2 continuity

AHV (the Swiss state pension, Pillar 1) and Pillar 2 (mandatory occupational pension) are tied to a Swiss employment contract and to which country's social-security regime covers the work. Both continue to accrue as long as Swiss social security is maintained.

This is the main reason "fully nomadic on a Swiss contract" is the configuration that most often gets restructured. Some employers will keep the Swiss contract intact and accept that AHV and Pillar 2 are interrupted for a sabbatical-shaped period. Others will move the worker onto an Employer of Record arrangement, which ends Swiss social-security coverage in exchange for full geographic flexibility. The two paths have different long-run implications for your pension and unemployment-insurance entitlements.

Permanent-establishment risk for your employer

This is the one most workers never think about, which is also the one most likely to get a request refused.

"Permanent establishment" (PE) is a tax-law concept. An employer can be deemed to have a taxable presence in another country if an employee performs work there habitually. The consequences for the employer can include corporate tax registration in that country, tax on a portion of profits attributable to that country, VAT registration in some cases, and local payroll obligations. None of these are cheap to remediate.

There is no clean numeric test for PE. Under the OECD model treaty, a PE arises when there is a "fixed place of business" through which the employer's business is partly carried on. The closest thing to a numeric guideline today is the OECD's 2025 Commentary update: a home office can qualify as a fixed place of business if the employee spends 50% or more of their working time there over twelve months, provided there is a commercial reason for the work being done in that country. The often-cited "183-day rule" is a different test (governing the employee's own income tax, not the employer's PE exposure), and it should not be relied on as a PE shield.

In practice, the type of role matters more than the day count. A junior engineer writing code from a beach in Italy is a lower PE risk than a sales lead closing deals from an Italian co-working space. Both expose the employer to some risk; the second exposes it to materially more, because the work is being carried on commercially in that country.

This is why employers set explicit limits on time abroad even when they are otherwise fully remote-friendly. The cap is rarely about distrust of the employee. It's about keeping the company's tax footprint inside Switzerland.

How Swiss employers typically handle it

Among the remote-friendly companies tracked on Remotli, common policy patterns include:

• A primary-residence requirement. The employee stays a Swiss tax resident, with an official Swiss address and Wohnsitz registered in a Swiss canton.
• A maximum number of days abroad per year. Commonly 30 to 90 days. Some companies require formal approval beyond a threshold; others trust the employee to stay within the cap.
• Country restrictions. Often EU/EFTA only, sometimes a defined whitelist aligned with countries where bilateral agreements or the 49.9% framework cover social security.
• Structured EU residence under the 49.9% framework. Allowing a permanent part-time work-from-EU pattern (residing in France, Germany, or Italy while working for a Zurich employer).
• Fully nomadic via Employer of Record. A smaller set of employers will restructure the contract via an EoR, ending Swiss social-security coverage in exchange for full geographic flexibility.

The specific policy is set per company, and listings on Remotli show it where the company has stated one publicly. The numbers I see most often in practice cluster around the lower end of the range. Three months a year, fully approved, is something many Swiss employers will sign off on. Six months starts to attract pushback even at otherwise remote-first companies, because that's the band where the 49.9% threshold and permanent-establishment risk both start to bite.

Before you go: a short checklist

1. Ask your employer. Even if remote work is in your contract, the abroad question is usually a separate conversation. Get the policy in writing before you book the flight.
2. Check the country. EU/EFTA, bilateral-treaty country, or neither. The answer changes everything below.
3. Ask whether you need an A1 certificate. For EU/EFTA telework, ask your employer whether your specific arrangement requires one and what their process is. The application is theirs to make.
4. Count the days. Both Swiss-side (the DBG and StHG 30/90-day thresholds) and destination-side (their own residency rules).
5. Confirm health insurance coverage. Swiss basic health insurance (KVG) covers medically necessary care during temporary stays in EU/EFTA via the European Health Insurance Card. For longer stays, longer trips, or non-EU destinations, top-up travel cover is the safer call.
6. Tax registration in the destination, if you cross the threshold. Many countries have a 90 or 183-day local-registration trigger that runs in parallel with the social-security question.
7. Keep a record. Boarding passes, exit stamps, accommodation receipts. If a question comes up two years later, the burden of proof is yours.
8. For anything ambiguous: ask a Swiss tax advisor. A 30-minute consultation is cheap compared to a misfiled year.

Reviewed once a year. Not legal or tax advice. For your specific case, talk to a professional. See also the glossary for term-by-term definitions of AHV, Pillar 2, B and C permits, Quellensteuer, and the underlying regulatory frameworks.