AHV refund calculation when leaving Switzerland
 

Hey I'm considering leaving Switzerland for UK and trying to estimate how much of pillar 1 (AHV) contributions I can potentially cash out upon emigration. I have a third world passport so should be allowed to cash out my pillar 1.

From what I've been able to gather online, AHV refund would be minimum of:

• pension part of AHV payments: roughly 82% of them (=4.35% of 5.275% as of 2020), times 2 to account for employer-side contributions.
• "Barwert" (net present value) of my future pension cashflows.

I've had a well paying job and plowed a good fortune into AHV contributions over the years, so I suspect Barwert calculation will be the main limiting factor for me:

• Assuming I'm 35yo male, no kids, no wife, with 10 years of AHV contributions.
• Normally I'd be entitled to 28440/40*10 = 7110 Fr/year pension at 65 with my 10 years of contributions
• To calculate its Barwert, I take a factor B1(x) from fancy tables over here (Barwert einer lebenslangen Rente für Männer / Sofort beginnende), and discount it further by 1.5% for 30 years that I have till pension age.
• This gives me Barwert: 28440/40*10 * 35.289 / 1.015^(65-35) = 160519 Fr

Does this make sense and is in the right ballpark? Anyone here have experience with AHV refunds and can share how they calculated Barwert for you?

Also, what kind of tax would I have to pay on AHV refund? Would UK try to tax me as well?

Re: AHV refund calculation when leaving Switzerland
 

Hi Spark,

I am also will be leaving to my home country (Non-EU, with no agreements with Switzerland). Did you manage to find out if your calculation was correct?

I am trying to find out the meaning of "Current value of all OASI benefits accruing to a beneficiary in the same personal circumstances" as written in the following links:
https://www.zas.admin.ch/zas/en/home...tisations.html

Thank you.

Re: AHV refund calculation when leaving Switzerland
 

I am actually contemplating of moving to Australia after living in Switzerland for around 3 years. I also have a passport with no mutual pension arrangement with swiss govt entiteling me to a refund.

What I found useful is the link below

https://www.zas.admin.ch/zas/en/home...otisation.html

I sent them the request for the calculation. The reply somewhat disappointment me :msnshock:. Bottom-line, it was almost the amount that I personally contributed, which was lower than I expected, taking into consideration the employer contribution.

Hope it helps. Cheers

Re: AHV refund calculation when leaving Switzerland
 

Re: AHV refund calculation when leaving Switzerland
 

Ok, I got this figured out. I wrote to that office in Geneva for preliminary calculation and the formula they used was

round(<number of full years of work in CH> / 44 * 2370) * 12 * B20(current age)

Here 2370 is the maximum possible monthly AHV pension for full 44 years of contributions, it's 2370 Fr as of 2020. And this is assuming a good paying job, >86k, low earners get less than 2370 Fr. It then gets prorated linearly according to actual full years of contribution made and rounded. Multiply by 12 (months in year) and by the factor for the current age at time of withdrawal from table B20 (or B21 for female) from https://sozialversicherungen.admin.c.../6130/download

The other limiting factor is the actual amount of contributions made, both employer and employee parts. They won't pay more than you and your employer paid them.

Wrong kind of pension

Re: AHV refund calculation when leaving Switzerland
 

My advise as a Swiss living in Africa.
Dont withdraw yr AHV!
If you have to take out yr bvg ok but thats also not such a great idea?
Why? Ahv stays forever & when u r pensioned or disabled u get something. If possible continue paying in. If u work in EU yr pension there can be combined with ahv. (Eu agreement)
Bvg has good interest ( better than 0)

Re: AHV refund calculation when leaving Switzerland
 

I have 30+ years till retirement, pension I earned thus far here is tiny (a few hundred frank a month) and the interest for withdrawal purposes is 1.5%. No thanks

Planning to cash it all out and invest.