Let me ask one question. All imaginary numbers but I would like to know. Ok I am married. My wife works full time and I run my self employed business (not gmbh or AG).

So imagine my wife earns 100k
I earn 100k
___________________
Total income = 200k

Now imagine my business costs/expenditure were 120k due to seting up costs etc. Now when it comes to tax will I be able to deduct 120k from our total income of 200k or only from my part which was 100k?

I think you have to separate personal tax and company tax. And if you early 200k together, the amount exposed to tax should be nowhere near that amount - more like close to half.

You have a decent accountant, I hope?

Ok, that definately doesn't belong on the previous thread - I've split it and moved it to the business forum. Please help to make my life a little easier... New topic - new thread!

But in this question there is no company - his business expenses will be mixed in with his personal income, and possibly his wife's.

I do not think so! If he is working as a self employed person he cannot do that quite so simply. He is obliged to form some form of company ie register a trading name and a trading structure which we assume here will be either a single person company or a partnership. He is then able to deduct his expenses from the income of that company only which has the status of a legal independent person(juristische Person). He is able to declare a negative income for this company however and partially carry this forward to reduce future taxable obligations.

My girlfriend has no registered company to speak of and DOES deduct her business expenses. She was told by her accountant that carrying forward a loss is not possible as self-employed or einzelfirma(soletrader), but is possible for gmbh, and AG.

there may be benefits from forming a company for tax reasons but legitimate business expenses CAN be registered for deduction on a tax return.

Treuhand

This is the best advice I can give you. Your accountant can give you far better - do you need a recommendation?

Interesting I am outnumbered. I will check this and get back. What I do know is that to deduct expenses unless you are a registered company you need to provide receipts and an explanation for everything which is a pain in the butt. I had this with Canton Zürich and trying to deduct travelling expenses from giving Whisky presentations - in the end I gave up.

But the question posed originally actually questioned whether you can mix them with your wifes income or vice versa ie that you have negative income and I know in Aargau this is NOT possible.

Exactly. You can be self employed running your own business without a registered company and still deduct your costs and function like a company. The only thing you have to do is tell RAV and you won't get any unemployment benefits etc. You are on your own basically which I prefer.

The benefit of GMBG and AG is that if you a mess up and the client takes you to court for damages etc then as a GMBH your private property and savings won't be touched. That for my line of work is not important.

I am 100% sure that there is no need for me to set up GMBH/AG. I am just not sure if the total business expense can be deducted from joint income. I am inclined to think that the answer is "YES". Is there someone I can phone and ask this question?

Lob yes I could do with some names for next year onwards. I am small guy so no expnsive ones who dela with rich folsk :-P How much do they charge?

Check out Denise Collin at www.ubb.ch (Email: denise.collin@ubb.ch)

A lot of guys I used to work with used this lady to do Tax returns or their gmbh books.
She does my tax returns.

I've investigated gmbh for contracting and ubb charge a lot less than some Zurich town accountants ...

Edit: Tax return cost me CHF 162 (minimum charge, 1 hour) and allegedly I'm owed CHF 2.5K by the Swiss Tax people...

I used http://www.alltax.ch/html/english/default.e.htm for the first time for my 2005 return.

Rudolf Brauchli was the chap I mostly dealth with and they seem reasonable; he hinted at ~600 francs for my return (for Mr+Mrs Rockster) and seems to have kept my exposure nice and low.

I found him either on the extwats-in-zurich list or on the semi-annoying xpatxchange site.....anyway, I am not paying much tax for 2005 - but did move to a Steuerparadies in that year

What kind of $$$ are you guys earning? I might be a small fish for them :-)

So if I get an accountant (next year) will they look at out old tax returns as well and see if they could get us some money back? Do they keep everything confidential?

er... that's private.

I can say, for 2005, it was middle of the road permie IT salary.
Which is probly between (based on other posts) CHF 90K - CHF 130K

Ha! I did not mean exact figures ;-P

sorry, you're right, I should have used a smilie or some humour

I would say ask them this question. Gut feeling is - what's done is done. Your submission of a tax return is closure from your side IMO.

It's always worth getting at least one return done by an accountant; years ago when I first came, Almas did my return every year for less than 200 francs. I was a contractor so did not care.

My gut feelign about them was that they did not stretch the line in my favour, if you get my drift - so I looked for someone else to file my first year married/home owner. I might just do my own return next time based on the ruleset I see them applying to 2005

Once a tax return has been submitted and accepted as correct then you don't have much chance of changing it.

Confidentiality - one thing which is really great in Switzerland is that you can discuss whatever you like without them getting all defensive. In other countries they are obliged to report stuff to the government, be squeaky clean etc, but not here! It's great!

Can I phone the tax people directly and ask in my broken German?