I'm not really to sure where to post this so apologies in advance if ye think I should stick it in family section or where ever. I will do if necessary.
In general, what time do people in CH finish work? Would it be 6pm or later?
What time do schools finish at/creche's close at in general?
I'm used to starting at 8am, finishing at 4pm and getting the kids from creche at 5.30pm but my husband was talking to a friend of his who started work in Geneva 2 weeks ago and their finish time is 6.30pm (after loooonnnnggggg lunch breaks!) I'm also used to having a 30min lunch break in work and finishing that bit earlier.
I know it depends on the employer but are companies in your experience flexible?
It depends. On the type of business, type of work, kindness of your boss, etc. Banking can be very inflexible, but public sector jobs more accomodating for example, but there are no real generalisations, and it will depend on your work contract and particular situation.
Public schools and public creches, on the other hand, are notoriously inflexible to working parents. Private schools/creches generally give you more options.
Many work places have a system called flexitime- where you can more or less choose your hours, providing you work the hours required. But by no means all. The other problem is the age of your children. Many areas have bizarre school hours that change almost every day- and most school kids of all ages and all areas, have Wednesday afternoon off. The system is stacked against working mums/parents, I'm afraid
Our creches in our area finish at 7pm, I think even parascolaire the latest pick up is 6:45. Now, to make it even more confusing, you will most likely register for placement in a creche, the town will give you the soonest spot, we were placed in private but still on the list of public, since Commune subsidizes. We could have gone to private directly since it's the same cash, but the placement was faster and more organized.
The long pick ups were novelty to me as well, home - you pick up your kiddo at 5pm and you already feel bad for letting the kiddo stay there too long. But a friend who has lived here and compared for a while said we are more South, little kids in general go to bed later, they start a little later too (8:30 or 9am would be really late back home). Parents get later from work.
The system is opening up and getting more flexible, just negotiate at work if 30min difference would be ok for them. But I would only do this after I had a sure placement in any kind of daycare. You might want to use maman du jour, nanny first, if you want to orientate yourself first and take more time to find a daycare you like. But the waiting lists are huge in some areas, it was 2/3 years in ours for some people. Both parent working 100% and in the Commune will push you up the list asap.
I get the impression that there is also a big difference between "traditional" Swiss companies and international companies that are based here.
The traditional Swiss working day seems to be something like 7:30 to 16:30, whereas it is likely to start and finish later in non-Swiss companies. I have worked for a couple of American companies here where the hours were 100% flexible and where nobody batted an eyelid if you arrived at 10 in the morning, had to go out for an hour in the middle of the afternoon or decided to work from home occasionally. The counterpart to that of course being the expectation that you would be available to take a conference call from home at 9 in the evening if needed.
School times seem to vary a lot... when my daughter was at school here, some days she started as early as 7:15.
I manage a long-day-care programme and we offer care from 7:00 - 18:00. We have a 'school policy' that all children must arrive by 8:30. For most parents, that's not a problem - most drop their children around 8 and start work at 9:00. Often one parent works 'early' and one works 'late' so you will see one parent drop the child and the other do the pick-up.
One thing to watch here is that the 'standard' working hours can be around 42 hours a week - and that's not including your compulsory unpaid lunch break - so a 8.5 - 9 hour working day is fairly common. For someone coming from a 37-38 hour working week, those days do become long...
My husband works for a internation company in Zurich. He starts work at 8ish and leaves at 5.30 to 6.00ish.
I manage out home life (Im a housewife).
The kids leave for school at 7.45 to 8.00. They return home at 12ish. They leave again at 1.15ish. The oldest returns home 3.30 to4.30 depending on his timetable.
My oldest has no afternoon school on Wednesdays and Thursdays. My younger one is in Kindergarten so he only has afternoons on Tuesdays. He finishes at 3.15
There is a facility to stay for lunch and also monday homework club. But I dont use this.
It isn't even cantons - it can vary by gemeinde, so that's a lot of replies!
Generally, it's fair to say lunch is not usually offered by the school system, but many gemeinde do some sort of lunch club which is equivalent. It may or may not incur a fee, be in the school or nearby, and offer food or not.
For example in our case they introduced it five or six years ago, it's free for the lunch period, they offer food (at a cost) or you take a packed lunch, and they also offer before and after school care at an hourly cost.
It's pretty common that the kids have a long lunch-break. Many (if not most) schools provide a "mittagstisch" - where the kids can stay at school and eat lunch there. You pay for this seperately and is subject to availability...
Also remember you may work for a company with a long lunch break or which closes for lunch too. So if you’re not that far away from home you can come back and have lunch with the kids at your place. Many business here will close between either 11.30am and 1pm or from noon until 1.30-2pm for lunch.
Flexitime means you’ll usually have what are called “core hours” when you have to be in the office or whatever, but you can work around those to make up the rest of your working week if you want to start earlier or leave later.
But each company will have it’s own rules on work time, lunches, etc, so until you actually get an employment contract you won’t know exactly what that company does.
Our daughter goes to school in the morning, then has lunch in the after-school care (Mittagtisch), goes back and then again stays in the after-school care.
Works pretty good but places are limited and you need to register good in time.
no, depends on the commune for asylum and elementary schools especially.
if you have a flexi time contract with core hours 9-11 am 2-4 pm for example you can go home for lunch and go to work earlier or work later.
>11 years they can bring food from home and stay at school or go buy kebab/go home with free public transportation, again depends on the canton, but i think after 12 they're considered independent everywhere.
I live in a village where they have "blockzeiten" this means the kids are cared for by the school from 8:10 until 11:50 from Monday to Friday. Then there is a Mittagstisch close to the school where the kids can get lunch and stay until about 1.30pm (before afternoon school).
However there are also some tagesschule . I know there is one in Kyburg for example. Here they have the kids from school start until ? 5pmish