I am an EU citizen and I have moved to canton Zurich in May 2015 with my boyfriend (not married) who is also a EU citizen and has a B permit. When applying for a permit at the gemeinte my boyfriend had to sign a letter that he will be taking care of the costs of living for me because I was not working and would be looking for a job. A few weeks later I received a B permit. I was pleasantly surprised because I thought that I would be receiving a L permit instead. After much difficulties I have finally found a job that required me to start as soon as possible because it required me to work on a short project. However, I just found out that the B permit states 'ohne Erwerbstatigkeit''.
So my question is: Do I request a new B permit to be able to work? Can I start working Monday while I request this new permit? Has anyone else encountered this problem? I am really confused because I did not know that there were different B permits and I told my employer that I have a B permit so I could start as soon as possible.
With all due respect but that is not a question you should ask here as I'm pretty confident you will get at least 10 different replies. Since you start work on Monday already you might want to look for quick, reliable and accurate advise.
So I suggest you take this up with your gemeinde ASAP as they will be able to reply to you very quickly and at least you will know the information is correct, although you might not like what you hear.
A bit unfortunate that you only find out about this 4 days before you have to start at your new job....
I'm pretty sure your new employer will not be too happy about this. Did he not ask to see a copy of your permit by the way??
Take your employment contract to your gemeinde admin office asap and they’ll start the process for getting your permit changed. As an EU national it’s not really a problem, you’re already registered as resident here which is the main thing. You’re fine to start work on Monday, but do get the change of permit application in to the admin office.
I am a EU citizen and my husband is an Indian citizen. We came to Switzerland because of his work and we were on issued L permits for two years. In 2015, we decided to apply for a B permit and thanks to my husband's work, we received it. Later in the year, we learnt that we could apply for a B permit valid for 5 years due to my EU citizenship and my husband who had been here on a closed, project based permit could apply for a family reunification visa, live and work in Switzerland as my spouse. Soon afterwards we received our permits, valid until 2020. However my husband's permit specifies that he can live here with gainful employment ( Berechtigt zur Erwerbstätigkeit) and that it is 'Familiennachzug'. My five year old child's (also a EU citizen) permit specifies the same thing. My permit on the other hand specifies that I can stay without gainful employment (Ohne Erwerbstätigkeit). It also does not mention the term 'Familiennachzug'. I'm confused about what this entails for us as a family and for my work. My previous B permit says that I can stay here with gainful employment. Hence I looked for and found part time work. And how can a five year old child be gainfully employed? Currently my child is in the local kindergarten. If anyone can cast any light on this, I would be so grateful. I'm feeling very frazzled as I don't know what this means for my future and once again my fate hangs in the hands of the Migrationsamt ( our previous permit took over 6 months to process!) Best wishes for the new year. Resham CB
It means that you (as EU) can stay here, with or without a job (but you have to have enough money to support yourself somehow).
Your Husband's and your child's are dependant on you "family reunification" plus they have the permission to work.... not all dependant permit holders have the right to work, but your family does.
Edit.....
Actually, I'm not 100% sure about yours, your families are fine, but I don't know if yours means you don't need work, or you are not allowed to work. I defer to someone with better knowledge.
Thank you so much for taking the time to respond to my post. I'll be heading to the Migrationsamt first thing on Monday! My husband's office told us that this could be an error or that it means that I'm suddenly not allowed to work. I hope it's the former!
As said, it’s no problem for EU nationals to change their permit. Just take the employment contracts to your gemeinde/migration office and start the process of getting it changed. The only reason yours doesn’t have employment at the moment is because you weren’t working at the time of renewal, but could support yourself financially anyway. If they decide you work enough hours to qualify as employed then the permit will be changed.
Thank you so much for taking the time to respond. Especially on New Year's Day morning! One of the main reasons for my confusion lies in the fact that when applying for this new permit,I submitted both of my employment contracts which showed that I was currently working. Admittedly neither of these jobs are particularly high flying or well paid (hence two jobs) and they probably don't constitute enough hours... In other news,Happy New Year!
It just means that you are currently not working. It does not mean you are not allowed to work. When you get a job you go down to the commune, inform them about your job and they will change your permit.
" And how can a five year old child be gainfully employed? Currently my child is in the local kindergarten. If anyone can cast any light on this, I would be so grateful."
To answer your question, a five-year-old child cannot be gainfully employed in Switzerland, ever, full stop! Although this might be contrary to the current practice in India (or in immigrant parts of the UK), work by children was abolished in Switzerland many years ago. This also applies to foreigners and children of foreigners in Switzerland.
This article explains more about Swiss law governing work by children:
Regarding your son's B-permit: I know that the formulation "Mit Erwerbstätigkeit" is funny when referring to a 5-year-old, but I think it is standard. We got exactly the same remark ("Familiennachzug - Mit Erwerbstätigkeit") on the B-permit of my (then) 2.5-months-old son and I thought it was hilarious.
Also, your B-permit does not specify "Familiennachzug", because you are the main permit holder for the whole family.
Yep that's pretty standard on children's permits. We also thought it funny when our son's permit said 'activité lucratif autorisé' (the French equivalent) when we we first arrived here and joked about sending him out to work cleaning chimneys.
1 Jugendliche dürfen für kulturelle, künstlerische und sportliche Tätigkeiten sowie zu Werbezwecken im Rahmen von Radio-, Fernseh-, Film- und Fotoaufnahmen und bei kulturellen Anlässen wie Theater-, Zirkus- oder Musikaufführungen, einschliesslich Proben, sowie bei Sportanlässen beschäftigt werden, sofern die Tätigkeit keinen negativen Einfluss auf die Gesundheit, die Sicherheit sowie die physische und psychische Entwicklung der Jugendlichen hat und die Tätigkeit weder den Schulbesuch noch die Schulleistung beeinträchtigt.
2 Die Beschäftigung von Jugendlichen unter 15 Jahren für Tätigkeiten nach Absatz 1 muss den zuständigen kantonalen Behörden 14 Tage vor deren Aufnahme angezeigt werden. Ohne Gegenbericht innert zehn Tagen ist die Beschäftigung zulässig."