Honestly... the grief I get of my Swiss friends and colleagues for not being fluent in German (I am learning and want to be able to communicate in German). Then I sit there and listen to them chat to each other in English because one is Swiss German speaking, one French speaking, one Italian speaking...
When asking them why they speak English so well, but not another of their national languages the answer is "because English is easy... French/German/Italian is so hard" .... I have to laugh. One rule for the Swiss another for the Auslander
I once had a Swiss friend have a go at an English speaking friend for not having yet learnt German. The guy turned around and replied in French "We can speak in French, that is a Swiss national language" the Swiss guy looked a bit shocked at this fluent French and replied... "It's ok, English is good".
I went to the doctor last week. He spoke in Swiss German. I replied in bad German. He carried on speaking Swiss German at the same speed. no idea what is wrong with me, but I got a Zeugnis for 2 weeks of work.
For bad German ( to the point of butchering their language ), they would switch to High German first and as a last resort to English ( often far better than my German ).
The good part of it in CH is that one is allowed to make mistakes in language and they will attempt to decipher what you mean instead of what you ( poorly ) state verbally. Any attempt to speak in their language is encouraged, by them and invites you to learn and to continue attempts in German.
English has become Switzerland's inofficial 5th language and will become the language used to communicate with. There's no getting around it. English is being taught as of the 3rd grade in the Innerschweiz. French is introduced in the 5th grade and most children abhor it.
However, English is still not spoken fluently by all and there is still no excuse not to learn the local language if you plan on living here.
Even the Germans have to get used to the local dialect in the German-speaking parts or they will have problems. No one expects them to speak Swiss German but they should understand it.
English is easy to learn. The grammar is not overly complex (die, der and das and the effect of this on how sentences are formed) and english is seen in all types of media. Just about everybody on the planet listens to it with so much english music going around. And I have seen many advertisements in english in many countries. It's the only global language I know of. Glad I live in Basel.
Switzerland may have 4 official languages. But I wouldn't mind betting that more Swiss are English speaking than Italian or Romansch... Not sure about French!
It used to have a difference (at least I think) between the swiss german part and the swiss french part.
The swiss germans used to speak french in a quite good manner (if I believe the rumours when i was a teenager) when the french side were not really passionate about German.
I think it was particularly the case in with us, genevans as we made some *school exchange with a swiss-german class*. They spoke french, we almost didn't spoke german....
I met Sutter's husband (swiss guy) once and I was really surprised about his really good french. I spoke French with him and not English. (My german is still inexistant, even if I started to learn it again)
Understanding Swiss German - as in one of the official Swiss languages, which is Standard German amended by helvetisms - is no issue at all for most Germans.
In case you were referring to Mundart (local dialects) I am happy to comply with your demands once the Swiss Germans agree on what Swiss German Mundart is: BaslerDütsch, ZüriDütsch, BernDütsch, Walliserdütsch... (the list is endless).
Until then I can't be bothered to learn a new dialect just because I move 50 km within Switzerland.
Finally, you are aware of the fact that some Swiss Germans don't understand people speaking another Swiss German dialect ? I have heard Bernese people not understanding people from the Emmental (which is also part of Bern).
Have you ever heard us using -ing forms of verbs and make the difference preterit/perfect correctly ? I haven't. Me included. There are many reasons why English is spoken everywhere at different levels. Easy grammar is not one of them.
For -ing forms, I use the russian rules for aspects and for preterit/perfect, I use the Danish rules. No English grammar book ever helped me understand it better. That's how "easy" English grammar is. Grammar freak talking.
As for English used among Swiss... the situations where they actually speak to other Swiss from other language areas are so rare that it doesn't make English that necessary either.
That I have a hard time believing. I speak the Bernese dialect. However I do have trouble understanding some older people from the mountain villages in Valais.
And I think I'd feel out of place in Eastern Switzerland with my Bernese accent, lol, but I can understand them.
As far as English goes, it is really easy to start speaking relatively fluently and making yourself understood, however, to do so correctly is immensely difficult. English grammar is very complex, especially tenses.