This is a hypothetical scenario I am considering. My wife lives in a third country and I live in Switzerland. Can I drive her car in Switzerland for short periods of time, i.e., fly out from Switzerland, come back by car, use the car for a month, return the car to my wife's place of residence and finally fly back to Switzerland?
Nope. The residency of your wife is not important. Ownership of the car is also not important.
All what maters is your residency in Switzerland, and that the car has not cleared Swiss customs.
https://www.bazg.admin.ch/bazg/en/ho…-benutzen.html
Yours is not one of those few special cases (unless you are willing to pay tax and duty).
It can also have insurance consequences - very very very expensive if you have a 'small accident' with another vehicle whilst driving in Switzerland.
Also a good idea to check if driving any car across international borders, whether the car is suitably insured for this purpose. Many hire cars have restrictions.
I have to disagree with the above, IMO as long as it's for a short term use it should be no problem. Is like if my brother would come to visit and I'd be driving around with his car, that's not an issue.
I was stopped once by a very picky policeman in Graubunden while driving my gf's car with foreign plates and after few questions he let me go.
It is an issue. Your brother could bring the car tax and duty free into Switzerland under the condition it is for his own use (Istanbul Convention on temporary admission). Be happy you got a clueless policeman and not someone from the Grenzwacht/Customs.
OK, sounds like 'don't do it', and I won't. Thank you for your help.
Yeah, seems I wasn't fully aware of the situation and -luckily- the coop either
So, if a brother or sister drove over from the U.K. with their family to stay with you and you went skiing with them, in their car and your sibling hurt themselves on the slopes and didn't feel up to driving back to your place that day, how would you get their car back from the slopes?
Probably drive it, but it would be illegal, strictly speaking
Yikes, OP, I asked almost the exact same question a few months ago!
You are fine driving the car as long as said sibling is with you in the car. You just can't drive it all by yourself.
Look into the Istanbul convention on temporary admission.
I asked Swiss customs, and they permit such uses. You can also chauffeur your visitors to a wine tasting tour. But, using it solely for your very own benefit is not allowed.
As you know, in UK most car insurance is for named driver only- so apart from illegal, probably not insured.
That's a good point.
So, it looks like there isn't a way around it.
In the example I gave, you'd need to employ a breakdown truck to get the vehicle back to your home.
Talk about inflexibility...