I was driving through Zurich city last Saturday. I had borrowed my girlfriend's father's car because I had guests.

The police pulled me over on General Guissan-quai. They were friendly enough and spoke English to me. They checked the car's papers, my licence and permit (thankfully I had it on me).

Then they set about checking the car itself. After testing the indicators, break lights and lights, they came to the conclusion that one of them was not bright enough.

Fair enough, one of them is fading.

They gave me a form which I had to sign which said that I had to have it fixed and report with the fixed car to a police station by Wednesday. That means 2-3 working days.

If I do not, I face a possible 5000 CHF fine.

I told the good policeman that the car was going back to Basel and he said it was better to report back to a Zurich Police station as the process of validating that the light had been fixed would be faster.

The car went back to Basel and today my girlfriend, Das Management, reported to the police station with the car.

The Basel police had never heard of such a process and laughed. This, apparently, is not standard procedure for all cantons.

The police said themselves that normally a basel station would not even bother updating a Zurich station with the required information, in this case, that the bulb on the car had been replaced.

my girlfriend said that the police were nice and friendly and that they had said that they would contact the relevant office and confirm that the work had been done.

My thoughts...

How can a Cantonal Police office issue the driver of a vehicle from another Canton with warning that cannot be processed by another Police station in another Canton?

And how the hell am I supposed to get the work done in 2 working days, and drive back to Zurich (imagijne coming from Geneva or Ticino) just so that they can check the bulb?

I appreciate that they want cars to be nice and roadworthy, but shouldn't a country as effecient as Switzerland be able to have a coordinated Police administration?

I would suggest you rent the DVD "Die Schweizermacher" - it will answer alot If you cannot find it easily, I can get a hold of a copy for you. Cool thing is you can watch it in German or Swiss-german, with English, Swiss, or German Subtitles.....

This is also known as "Kantönligeist" - on the other hand, unlike in the states, the state police will not stop chasing you on the highway just because you crossed the state border....

Was it just the bulb or the entire headlight that needed replacing? A bulb is switched out in no time as most gas stations carry them.

Unfortunately gooner was in someone else's car, but it's a good idea to carry a spare set of bulbs - you'll need a set if taking your car to France in any case.

I'd recommend a good torch as well, as to replace a light at the front may involve dismantling part of the air intake system. I found that out the hard way

I would not mind getting that DVD myself if I may say so!

I would say this was a little harassment sponsored by the Zürich police force.
They could have told you to exchange the bulb, without all this administrative rubbish.

For major delicts, there is a working coordination between the various cantons. For getting fines paid and other standard issues it works more or less ok.

But maybe Basel police has no official form to state, that a bulb of a car has been exchanged, so this tends to a non-standard task. This creates headaches and becomes a terrible administrative challenge.