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RAV & unemployment

48 questions · 30 pages

• How many job applications does the RAV require per month?No federal number exists: your canton and RAV adviser set it. Bern at least 8, St. Gallen at least 12, Zurich usually 10–12 — with sources.
• Where do I record my job search efforts in Switzerland?You record efforts in Job-Room (job-room.ch): open the section, click record, save. Transmitted to your RAV on the 5th–6th. Paper form as fallback.
• How much is unemployment benefit in Switzerland?80% of insured earnings with children under 25, low earnings or a disability pension — otherwise 70%. Plus waiting days and the benefit-duration ladder, with legal sources.
• Do I have to apply for jobs during my notice period in Switzerland?Yes — the duty to look for work starts when you learn of the termination, not on your last working day. Waiting risks suspension days. What SECO requires, what counts as proof, and which part of the market you miss.
• Do I get unemployment benefit in Switzerland if I resigned myself?In principle yes, but with suspension days: where unemployment is self-inflicted, the suspension runs from 1 to 60 days depending on fault. Entitlement, amount and waiting periods, from SECO's official rules.
• Can I turn down a job assigned to me by the RAV?Can I turn down a job assigned to me by the RAV? · Does a verbal offer count as an offer — and what happens if I decline after the interview?
• Which RAV mistakes cost the most money?The costliest mistakes happen in the first weeks — registering late, starting applications late, collecting evidence late. Up to 60 suspension days, calculated on your insured earnings.
• Tracking and proving job applications for the RAVWhat is the best job application tracker for the RAV? · Is there a free job application tracker? · How do I track my applications systematically? · How do I keep track of many applications?
• RAV deadlines: what has to be in, and by whenWhen is the RAV deadline each month? · What happens if I submit my efforts late?
• Working while unemployed in Switzerland: what is allowed and what it costsCan I work part-time while unemployed? · What are interim earnings (Zwischenverdienst)?
• RAV appointments: how often, how to move one, and what missing one costsHow often do I have to attend the RAV? · What are control-free days? · What happens at the first RAV appointment? · How do I prepare for the RAV advisor meeting? · Does the RAV actually advise you, or does it only check?
• RAV courses and measures: when attendance is compulsory, who pays, and how to propose a better oneYes, once the RAV instructs you to attend — Article 17 AVIG turns it into a duty. What a refusal costs in suspension days, what the office must take into account when choosing a measure, why you pay nothing, how to apply for a course yourself, and how often Swiss adverts actually ask for further training.
• Unemployed and abroad: holidays, interview trips and exporting your benefitTravel is allowed, but only three routes leave your daily allowance intact: control-free days, an approved exemption, or exporting your benefit to an EU/EFTA state. What each one requires, which deadlines run, and why the day you report back is the most expensive day of the trip.
• Proof of job-search efforts: what makes an application countHow do I evidence an application with no advert? · What counts as a job-search effort for the RAV? · Where do I record my job-search efforts? · What details does an application record need? · How do I document a phone call as an effort? · What if the job advert goes offline?
• How many job applications does the RAV require per month?Federal law names no figure. SECO guidance puts the number inside your RAV adviser's discretion; seven cantons publish eight to twelve. What counts as one application, what falling short costs in benefit days, and whether your field has twelve adverts to apply to.
• How does Job-Room work?Job-Room is the Swiss public employment service's job platform. Who can search it, what the login actually buys you, which occupations end up behind the five-day wall, and what our own open advert stock shows.
• Does a speculative application count?Yes — it goes on the monthly proof like any other effort. But the federal guide for insured persons says applications made without a concrete vacancy can only serve as a supplement. What supplement means, where the real limit sits, and why the same federal office recommends speculative applications.
• Suspension days: what triggers them, and how manySwiss unemployment insurance grades suspensions by fault: 1 to 15 days for slight, 16 to 30 for medium, 31 to 60 for serious. SECO's scale sets a range for every situation, from a missed advisory meeting to a refused permanent job.
• How much is Swiss unemployment benefit?70 or 80 percent of insured earnings, capped at CHF 12’350 a month. What that means in francs, why the month has 21.7 days, and what disappears between gross and bank account.
• How long does Swiss unemployment benefit last? Daily allowances, the two-year frame, and what happens afterHow long do I get unemployment benefit in Switzerland? · What is the benefit period (Rahmenfrist)? · What is the contribution period in Swiss unemployment insurance? · Unemployment benefit after maternity leave?
• What happens if I move canton?Your entitlement moves with you: the two-year frame, the daily allowance and the contribution period are federal. What changes is the RAV, possibly the fund — and for B permit holders, the fact that there is no right to change canton while you are unemployed.
• Ill or injured while unemployed in Switzerland: the deadlines, the daily allowances and what comes afterReport the incapacity to your RAV within one week or you lose the days before the report. The unemployment insurance then pays until the 30th day and at most 44 daily allowances per benefit window — but after an accident it pays three days and Suva takes over. Deadlines, figures and sources.
• Which unemployment fund should I choose?The fund does not change your daily allowance — only who handles your file. 32 recognised funds, 154 counters, and in six cantons the federal directory lists just one. What the choice really turns on, and what the Confederation measures about it.
• Where do cross-border commuters register as unemployed?Lose the Swiss job entirely and it is your country of residence that pays and checks your job search, not the RAV. What Article 65 actually says, when you can still sign on in Switzerland, and where the English-language sources stop.
• Unemployment benefit after a fixed-term contract?A contract reaching its agreed end date is normally not unemployment through your own fault. But every official leaflet describes the run-up in terms of a notice period you do not have, and the rule that replaces it sits only in the SECO directive: at least the last three months.
• Can I register with the RAV and study?Registering with the RAV and being paid unemployment benefit are two separate decisions, and only the second one turns on your studies. The test is placement capacity under Article 15 AVIG. For a course the insurance has not approved, your own promise to drop it is explicitly not enough — the directive requires written confirmation from the school, including what dropping out would cost you.
• Unemployment benefit if self-employed?Sole traders pay no unemployment-insurance contributions in Switzerland and cannot opt in. Founders of a GmbH or AG do pay — and are still excluded, by a rule that is not in the law but in a SECO directive. What the directive says, which route stays open, and what the ALV actually pays when you start a business.
• What happens when unemployment benefit runs out in Switzerland?Aussteuerung ends the daily allowance, not the support. What continues, what quietly stops, the Suva deadline of 31 days — and why the official English pages get two of the numbers wrong.
• How do I deregister from the RAV?Swiss law has no deregistration. It has a duty to report a change — to two separate offices. What to tell whom, which deadline actually bites, and why none of the official guidance exists in English.
• How do I appeal an RAV decision?Thirty days, in writing, to the office that issued the decision, free of charge, with a petition and a short statement of grounds. Before that, the step most people miss — and the reason the English-language version of the official guidance cannot be your source.