Hi all,

On a salary of 135k, resident in Zug Kanton, I appear to be netting 9,500 CHF a month. Myself and the HR department both originally estimated it should be 8,400 including the QS (band B) before I actually started work.

I am being deducted all the usual unemployment and other deductions, but can see no line in the breakdown for the deduction for QS.

a) Should I correct/contact my employer?

b) If I didn't pay QS for an entire year, would I get a whopping tax bill at the end of the year? I'm above the 120k threshhold, so I'm anticipating completing a return anyway.

It will eventually catch up to you. My old company had a bug/error
in the payroll processing, and the tax authority eventually caught
up to me.

What happened when they did catch up with you? And how did it get resolved?

Your Lohnausweiss (Which you should get by the end of this month for 2011) will show you haven't paid any Qullensteuer and when you file your taxes you will get a tax bill from the Steueramt in Zug. They must have treated you as a C-Permit holder.

Thankfully, I've only received two salaries (December and January) since coming to CH, so the bill shouldn't be too massive!

In that case you should call your HR department and ask them to correct it, as this won't be corrected till next year and it's better to sort it out now.

I believe you won't have to file taxes for 2011 as the one payment won't trigger the limit.

The tax authority asked me to file a tax return, and the tax due
showed that I owed a certain amount.

I simply paid it. There was no penalty or anything.

Where in the range did this "amount" come? Was it nearer the 'stiff drink' end of the scale, or the 'full on cardiac arrest' end?

Update: I have just been informed by HR that my "2200 Deduct kanton tax at source" contribution has indeed been deducted. Phew.

Still seems low though - 3.61%?

Then again, why am I complaining....

You are complaining because you are missing two other tax liabilities. Federal and gemiende. Brace yourself for those two.

This is possible. I take it you are married with one child and the other half is not in gainful enmployment?
Quellensteuer Tariffs for Kanton Zug for 2011 can be found here
There are 3 Tax codes A, B, or C with a + or - if you pay Church Tax or not. The explanation for each code can be found at the top of each Tariff sheet.

Quellensteuer is the average for the Kanton and includes those taxes too in the calculation. Variations will be in the gemeinde tax AFAIK if and when you file your yearly taxes.

Yeah - I can't say I'm looking forward to those. How much do you think I should put aside for those? But if the good doc is correct, these are already 'built in' to QS?

You don't need to put anything aside... The Quellensteuer should cover it. See my post above.

It was not too bad. It is in Canton Zug after all.