Hello ~

This is my first post here on the forum. Sorry it is so long. We are in a rather difficult situation and are hoping for help from some of you who may have gone through a similar phase in life.

These are the basics: My husband is American with a B permit (Mit Erwerbstätigkeit); I'm a EU citizen. We have a young child. We moved here for my husband's job. He got laid off unexpectedly. He has the choice of being terminated or he can resign. His last day on the books is end of April and his permit expires end of June 2013.

We are in shock to say the least! We would like to stay, but are not sure if possible. We have not been here for a whole year, so my understanding is he is not eligible for unemployment. So, basically if I understand it correctly, if my husband doesn’t find a job by the end of June that makes enough to support us, we will have to leave the country. Is that right?

We are going through different scenarios, but have some questions that are very specific. I hope someone can shed some light on me.

Here are my questions:
- He is considered highly skilled; does he have to find a job again that they can’t find a Swiss employee for?
- Is it of any advantage to us that I am a EU citizen?
- Is it possible to work as an independent contractor as a US citizen with a B Permit, or would he need to apply for a different type of visa? On the back of his permit it says independent work needs authorization – Selbst. Erwberbstätigkeit ist bewilligungspflichtig. What does that mean?
- Would it be possible to stay and extend his permit for another year (to give him some more time to find a new job) if I work part-time and he continues to look? I wouldn't make enough money to fully support us, but with savings taking into the equation it would work. In this case what would be more favorable termination or resignation? Would it matter to the immigration office in any case?
- When should we contact the immigration office?
- And worst-case scenario: How quickly would we have to leave once the B permit has expired and if neither of us found a job? Is there something like a "grace period"?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Thank you.

You will be treated (together) as EU. He should get his CV up to date and out there for jobs.

Financial support may not be available.

What does he do? What do you do?

If he has the choice, then he should choose to be terminated.

As far as I know (I could be wrong), if you quit your job, you have to wait a few months before you can claim unemployment. If you are terminated, you can receive unemployment benefits from day 1.

Einsundalles,

The question of unemployment assistance is a bit of a moot point as he does not have sufficent contributions to claim anything and I assume he does not want to delcare his family as destitute.
The main problem is having a reason to remain in Switzerland for example a property or a spouse with a job. If you as his wife have gainful employment then this would reinforce this argument. As an EEC citizen it is easier to have a residency permit. His current permit, as an American is linked to his job and subsequently those of his family to a regroupment of the family in his country of residence and employment.

If you are German speaking as you forum name suggest finding a job should be easy enough.

Regards

John

Is that the case if he is the primary permit holder?

EU is EU is EU. There is no semblance of "primary".

Thank you for your response! Does that mean that we can stay and just change our status/permit (permit not based on his job, but based on my EU nationality)? I can't seem to find a good source for that kind of information online. If you know of any websites, please let me know. I've been to the website of the Bundesamt für Migration, but can only find basic info. I've also read several of the threads here, but none of them are like us.

Be assured, my husband is networking and looking for jobs like crazy right now. However, it won't be easy for him to find something suitable quickly (unless he gets VERY lucky) since he is very specialized (as he must be to find a job here in the first place).

Thinking off the top of my head here, so bear with me. Let's suppose you change your permits to be based off the fact you're EU rather than his job. That might then mean your hubby gets working privileges with his permit...which would then mean he doesn't have to be SO specialized.

Anyone else care to elaborate? Am I way off base?

As it turns out, the post I'm about to make won't actually help you, but it will comfort you that I've had this very 'hypothetical' conversation with my HR department (I'm also a B permit Non-EU), and the long and the short of it all is........ "it's complicated".

Key points are:
all time frames are flexible and conditional
It is possible to stay in Switzerland after your B-Permit expires for up to 6 months (but again, it's conditional).

As indicated earlier, I think the best course of action is to be 'terminated' so that there is no ambiguity as to why his employment ceased.
One of the conditions is that it will depend on 'why' you were terminated.
(i.e. if you were sacked for doing something illegal, then it's not going to be good).

How long you can stay in Switzerland after your permit expires also depends on how long you have lived here.

Your eligibility of unemployment benefits also depends on:
How long you have been employed to start with
How much you earn
How many dependants you have
How well you choose to cooperate with the system regarding information.

Everybody has to pay towards unemployment support, so unless your husband hasn't been here very long, he should in some way be eligible.

Basically, there are enough loopholes here that the Swiss can do whatever they want, so it's best not to do anything wrong, and things should go relatively smoothly.

You being married, and an EU citizen, and have a child together..... PLUS it's not your husband's fault that he is being made redundant are all quite positive really.

Your best bet would be to pop down to your local Geminder and have a chat. There is nothing more the Swiss love than a clear registered letter, and they will most likely know how to handle your situation the best.

As others have said, you being EU, married, and with a kid, I'm quite sure things won't go so badly.

Good luck

I really don't know. Here's a recent thread, where the dependent wasn't able to change to an independent one:

where is easy to apply B permit? Zurich or Basel?

But they are both non-EU, so it's not exactly the same situation as yours. The best answer is to check with your local authorities regarding the situation. They're going to be the ones who have the final say after all.

As far as his B permit and independent work needing authorisation, it's because they issue a different B permit for self employed I believe. Again, check with the authorities as to whether he would be allowed to change to this type of permit.

This is what I was hoping for! The only thing is, does that mean I need to find a job before we make those changes (if they are possible)? And would a part-time job be enough? We need to figure out what our priorities are. Him finding a job or me finding a job...

Could someone please confirm that if that's not possible that with his current B permit he would have to find a job that can't be done by a Swiss/EU citizen.

No. He is not subject to any of these restrictions as he already has a permit those restrictions are for new permits. And then he is married to an EU citizen so his permit is (or should be) an EU-B.

Is there anyway he can negotiation one more month so he can be terminated end May instead of end April? If he finds another job, any job and works one more month that would be good too. His salary will be averaged out over the course of the last 12 months.


You should be making over the minimum that is used to calculate social welfare. For a family of 4 I think it's +/- 3600CHF per month.
Really, both of you should look, but he really needs to find ANYTHING for at least a month or two to qualify for unemployment should it be needed.

__________________

The cantonal authorities will have the definitive answers.

By doing ANY work the OP's husband could become entitled to unemployment pay. He needs to do some work for at least 12 months, insured salary will be the AVERAGE of the last 12 months.

They won't, you have to claim, if they don't like your claim they will get a court decision. The RAV's advise will likely be inaccurate in this matter as it's non standard.

The law states 12 months work in the last 24 months, salary is usually based on the LAST 12 months, some of those months could be ZERO. Sometimes last 6 months is it's a higher amount, but the Kasse decides.

I was talking about the permit issue, not the unemployment.

We have a couple of friends who were in a similar situation: husband non-EU B permit working. Wife, EU citizen and no job.

First the wife got her own EU B permit (again she wasn't working).
Then, the husband (still with a job) switched to be her "dependent" (EU B permit).

Now, this was back in 2009 so I'm not sure how things would turn out nowadays.

Hope that helps and wishing the best of luck to you guys!

Einsundalles,

Do you have a non-eu regroupment visa or did you get your own visa? As I understand it, you were not the original permit holder and you may have a non-eu permit because you were not the worker in this case. Do you have the right to work granted on your permit already? If you do...go find work now as a minimum level of protection.

It's sad to hear that someone who is so specialized is having to part ways...was this performance issue or downsizing issue? What field of work is involved exactly?

Sorry for all of the questions. We have a unique permit situation ourselves and I might be able to help in someway with a bit more detail. As they say...the devil is in the details.

The first thing I would recommend is that you go down to your local town hall (Gemeinde) and check your permit is based on your EU citizenship. If not, then you need to apply immediately to do this (wife, child and husband).

Your permits get switched over, and that solves the worry that you will be kicked out in June.

Secondly, and this might be on a tangent, you *both* start looking for work. So you have a fall-back position for a few months if he can't find anything!

Thirdly, you start looking very seriously at your finances and downsize if you can, make some very careful financial decisions.

Fourthly, his employer should actively terminate his contract, rather than making it by 'mutual agreement' - and they should also give him whatever time off he needs to go to interviews etc.

Fifthly, I'd suggest speaking to the RAV anyway, even if he's not entitled to money, he may be able to access their services and particularly the jobs database and get his profile into the system. The RAV cross-matches jobs against registered unemployed people, and links the two together.

If it's a 'redundancy' rather than a 'performance issue' then he should try to twist their arm to extend his contract to the 12 month mark. What is his required notice period (I'm guessing 3 months)...otherwise, at the very least he needs to fill that gap with any sort of work, so that he meets the unemployment insurance criteria.

Did he previously work in Europe ? That might also count, depending on how they treat his visa situation.

And thirdly, the permission to work as a contractor/independently, may easily be granted. Especially as you are EU. So he should find out how to get that permission. I know someone who did it when they first arrived with their EU-spouse and it didn't seem complicated at all...

Thank you all for your responses! Please keep them coming!

swisspea, thanks for your very helpful step-by-step walk-through. We will do that next week and see what happens.

I guess I have the EU visa. It states that I'm allowed to work and it expires in 2017!

He did work in another EU country within the last 24 months, so maybe there is hope for some unemployment payment. We will talk to RAV.

We are both getting ready to apply for jobs. I just haven't worked in 3 years and need to get myself all organized. And then there is the challenge to find child care...

Thanks again for all of your time and efforts to help us!!!