Or should I just make some phantom payments to have some activity on it?
And I was told by my bank (CA) that they will eventually close my account if I move out - are they allowed to do that?
Sure, they can do that. They are not obliged to keep a customer.
Banks do that all the time ......
I was told that as long as I wasn’t going to US, the account can stay open (they charge higher fees).
...a lot higher
By which bank, please?
How recently?
How high the fees?
As a frontalier, I always had a Swiss bank account and all the paperwork sent to my French home address. Now I'm no longer a frontalier, nothing has changed. UBS are perfectly happy sending everything on as before. So there are circumstances for which a Swiss bank account and being a foreigner living outside the country is not an issue.
We have Credit Suisse and recently went in to a branch to ask about closing our account since we are moving back to the US. They initially said they would close it on our departure date since they can no longer send us mail. We thought this was a bit silly since (a) we never get any mail (everything is electronic) and (b) since we signed up for mail forwarding for a year. I think the critical argument though was that we wanted to keep our account open a bit longer so we could pay our remaining bills . In the end, they agreed to let us keep our account a month after we depart (no additional fees). We left them with our bank details for the US and they are supposed to transfer the remaining balance on the agreed upon date. Fingers crossed it all works out!
I should cross your fingers they give you honest $ Fx rate....
UBS charge 30 CHF per month for keeping an account open when living outside CH. They have also just informed me that they will also start charging -0.7% interest on the balance held - so you pay them for the priviledge of keeping your money here. They said it was vecause Swiss authorities charge them negative interest on thw balances they hold and they are now passing this onto customers.
If you need/want to keep the account, domicile it in CH and redirect the mail.
Thanks Clocker good tip- will try to do this
As I have been searching into this subject as well, this thread came in useful to read.
There's an article which I just discovered and found quite informative as well, so would like to share it: " Swiss Bank Fees For Non-Resident Customers " ( https://www.moneyland.ch/en/swiss-bank-fees-abroad ).
In Postfinance the non-resident monthly fee is 25CHF. You can keep all your accounts, except the Selfservice funds.
Hello
I had lived in Switzerland where I had open a private bank account at PostFinance. Then I had left Switzerland, but didn't close my bank account. Recently I had found out that my post finance card got blocked.
1. Can I have a bank account at PostFinance as a non-resident?
2. can I have my card unblocked remotely, that is without personally coming in Switzerland and visiting PostFinance office?
3. Could Postfinance for any reason also close my bank account, making all the founds on my bank account lost?
thanks
Do you even need to re-direct the mail? I have eDocuments enabled and I don't think I've ever gotten a mail from UBS unless it was requested (new card, pins etc).