Hi,

I am pretty new here and wondered if anyone could give me some simple advice.

I am a British Civil Engineer, currently living in Australia but I am looking to move to Switzerland to be with my girlfriend who is Swiss and lives in Bern.

I don't speak great German yet and am therefore struggling to find a suitable job. I do have one offer on the table with a Swiss based engineering consultancy who provide services across Europe. They were ideally looking for someone to be based in either UK or Austria and paid accordingly in (GBP / Euros) but have agreed to base me in Switzerland if I compromise on salary.

They are currently offering me CHF 70,000 per year gross salary which is way below what a Civil Engineer could earn here. Having said that, they are doing me a big favour by allowing me to be based here.

So what I would really like to know is whether regardless of profession, this is considered a good or a crap salary for living in Switzerland. I am getting very mixed reports from people I speak to, including my girlfriend. People seem to be preoccupied with the fact that my profession "should" attract a bigger salary. I am more interested in just how far that money will go!

Opinions and advice please

Thanks,

Gav

Oh, Gav !

Quick before someone else sees this...
Edit your post to make it non-conspicuous...and use the search function to find your answer.
You will find it.

Why, you ask me ? You'll see...

1000TH POST COMING NEXT!!!! Make it good!!!

Crap. Esp for a professional engineer

I dont know about civil engineering, but the salary seems low for a qualified person working in Switzerland. That said, as you will see from other threads, it is still an above-average salary in Switzerland.

I guess, the equivalent amount converted into pounds or euros, represents a really decent salary in the UK or Eurozone - so I can see why the company is offering you this.

I guess the questions for you are:
how quickly you want to move over to Bern?
how important money is for you, as opposed to being with your girlfriend (assuming together you have enough to live off)?
and how strongly you rate your chances of finding a better paid job with a different company.

Assuming there is no minimum term in your contract, you could always accept the job, then work on your German whilst you are here and then apply for other jobs and move. With a EU passport and the 5-year B Permit you should get with it, you can change jobs without any problem. However, bear in mind that any new employer will probably ask your existing salary, and therefore may also try to 'underpay' you.

In any event good luck.
Plus, I hope you realise the Gold Coast and Bern are worlds apart

You mean they don't have beaches and palm trees and year round temperatures above 20?

Yeah I am fully aware of the difference in cultures! Much as I love Oz, I don't really fit in over there. It is tooooo laid back if that makes any sense!!

I miss Europe!

Anyway, thanks for the answers! In particular @ Fox...... I share exactly the same point of view as you and I think I should take the job (although I will try and hold out for a little more!) I am sorry if I contravened any protocol by posting the way I did! I consider this matter closed!

Cheers,

Gav

The first two links in this post should give you a good idea of what a comparable salary is here:

FAQ: A brief guide to salaries in Switzerland

And I'll pre-empt your next question about whether it's enough to live on...

FAQ: Is CHF100'000 a good salary?

Is CHF 70,000 a good salary to get by in Basel?

Good luck!

(PS - along with the other posters, I agree that it looks low. I would have thought that anyone professionally-qualified would be earning north of 100k)

Short answer: I worked for a MNC that is world famous for paying crap salaries... and 70k is what they paid to fresh graduate engineers without any work experience whatsoever. I guess you should not get less than 100k as a permanent and since you work as a consultant it should be a bit more.

The problem is of course the low Euro. For 70k Euro can one hire a fairly experienced and well qualified engineer in Germany. So if you do in fact work abroad and your employer bills customers in EUR, you can probably not score as Swiss salary in return.