Hi all,

My better half and I have decided we are going to move to Switzerland. I am a non EU national and she is a Swiss citizen, we are both currently living in Africa. So yesterday we went to the consulate to get the forms I would need to be allowed enter and work, after reading a lot of posts I figured I would be getting a B permit but the lady at the consulate insisted I apply for a D permit (long-stay) and once in Switzerland I can apply for a work permit.

I guess my question is, is this the norm, did I understand her correctly? Does anybody have experience in the time lines for each visa? More than 3 months with no pay on my currency exchange won't be easy ):

Thank you for any possible assistance

I'm currently sitting in the pretty much the exact same situation. I am trying to find out more information right now from the company that my Wife is going to be working at.

I'll let you know as soon as I find something out if somebody cant explain it first

D = visa, not a work nor residence permit. It is a visa. You need it to enter Switzerland.

B Permit - the residence and work permit you will receive once you register at the local town hall.

Swissbob is absolutely right. You need a visa in order to enter Switzerland (even if you don't need it as a tourist; this is to come here to live). With that visa in your passport, you'll then go to the appropriate authorities and be issued with a residence/work permit.

Hi all, another question (:

Does anybody know or has anybody every applied for a B permit (reside and work) while only having a Type C Visa? Background info is I'm non-EU moving to Switzerland, my spouse is Swiss. They said I should apply for type D but that would take forever to get (home affairs is not too great at home) while Type C takes 10 days.

So can I get a type C visa, arrive in Switzerland and then apply for the B permit? The permit and visa entry seem to be handled completely separately, but they might send me home after taking one look at my type C visa and tell me to wait for the the Type D.

Thank you.

But there is only Type D visa is for long-term stay in Switzerland...
The type D visa doesn't take that long, I have a friend who is Italian working in Zurich and his Chinese wife got the type D visa in 18 days! You never know Normally they said it takes 2 - 3 months.

Thanks, but does a B permit not allow you to stay as well, I mean once you have the B permit surely you don't need the Type D visa anymore?

You cant enter as a tourist (type C) and then stay on. You will have to leave the Switzerland and re-enter on a type D to get a B permit.
You could ask about getting the D visa stamped in a Swiss embassy other than the one in your home country.

Would you have to leave back to your own original country, or could you say, leave to a neighbouring EU country and just come back across the border?

There are many examples of that practice on the forum. You can collect the visa at just about any Swiss embassy. However, if you needed a tourist visa, i.e. not in the visa waiver scheme, then this option may not be available.

Well Currently my Son and I both have C Visa's for Entry into Switzerland. We have applied already for our D Visa's. Though if it takes 12 weeks, we will have a problem as we are meant to leave in 8 weeks time.

What we were told we could do from the Embassy here, was have our passports sent back to SA (as the D Visa's would be here when ready) and anyone could take them for us, and the embassy would then put the D Visa in our Passports for us, and then we could have them sent back. This would save us a plane ticket back.

Though if we have to "leave" to get the stamps put in first, I might need to look into that.

Of course, we are hoping the Visa's will be ready in time and we wont have to go through all of that.