I think this is the right name. The little "wagon" you pull from the back of your car with a hitch. Well, anyone know anything about renting them? I am considering doing so, but some one I know here, filled with too much information says I will need a special permit to use one, on the highways here. I am not talking aobut some huge mother. Just to haul a few items. Any tips on where to find them at a good price?
And is this true about having to have a special permit or the like?

When my husband and I went to get our Swiss drivers' licenses, we had to sign a special form to waive our right to pull a trailer of any kind.

Our regular US drivers' licenses allow you to pull a trailer, but the Swiss one does not, hence, the signing of the waiver. They made this very clear to us, even bringing over an additional worker who was fluent in English, to explain this policy to us again in our native language. It seemed to be a rule that they take VERY seriously.

There were two or three links on this thread a couple of weeks ago.

Ooh, that's odd. My Swiss licence (swapped from UK) has a little picture of a car with a trailer - Category "BE".

<saunters off to google to find out what category BE means>



Edit : Wikipedia says;

Category BE = "Without prejudice to the provisions of type-approval rules for the vehicles concerned, combination of vehicles consisting of a tractor vehicle in category B and a trailer or semi-trailer where the maximum authorised mass of the trailer or semi-trailer does not exceed 3500 kg."

And even with Category "B" (standard car licence) you can have "a trailer having a maximum authorised mass which does not exceed 750 kg."


Note - Switzerland uses the EU system of vehicle categories.

New to me. My CH license converted from my UK one still has both BE and D1E categories on it.

When you buy a trailer you get a grey registration card just like a car. This is matched to your car - they make sure that the car is suitable to pull the trailer.

For renting I'm not sure how this would work but I guess the firms mentioned in the other thread would know .

Ditto - so the waiver can't be a Vaud thing.

Could be just non-EU countries effected. The standard categories in Switzerland for all EU exchanged licenses includes BE as does a new Swiss license.

We hired one from Huwyler Anhänger in Affoltern am Albis when we moved some years ago, the process was just as easy as hiring a car.

Huwyler in Af-am-Albis
Stussi in Wettswil
Schaub in Egg

They are the 3 I know of - the latter being the cheapest AFAIK.

You need to make sure that the cars ausweis does have the towing capacity filled out - otherwise (for Kanton Zurich) drop in to the Strassenverkehsamt between 1120 and 1140 - they will check and approve it - and change your ausweis.

Those who passed their tests in the UK after 1997 are limited to a total train weight of 3500kg

As for the liscense, it depends on how big the trailer is. For a really small one, no; for a larger one, you may need something extra in your driver's liscense. Sorry, I forgot what the cut off is.

We have a trailer, owned, separate grey card for this but irrelevant if renting. The more important thing is the hitch on the car in my opinion. Does your car have one? There was a lot of pain and paperwork to get the hitch installed on the car, your grey card needs to be amended for this, and it states how much you are allowed to tow (legal limit of weight), etc.