What happens if you work in Switzerland but live in a neighbouring country and then lose your job?
Are you entitled to unemployment benefits and who pays them?
Being a cross-border commuter brings a lot of advantages to G-permit holders, the biggest of which is undoubtedly higher wages than what they would earn in their own countries — money that goes much further in France, Italy, and Germany that it would in Switzerland.
But what are the rules concerning unemployment benefits?
If you are hoping the Swiss system would prevail, you will be disappointed: you will receive unemployment benefits from your country of residence.
Still, you will be better off, in a certain sense, than your compatriots who have earned their wages in their home countries.
Take Germany, for example.
While the percentage of the benefit is the same for everyone — 60 percent of your Swiss salary (subject to social security contributions) — it will still be a higher amount than the one based on German wages.
In Italy, unemployment pay is equal to 75 percent of the average monthly salary, subject to social security contributions over the last four years.
So here, too, cross-border workers have an edge over their countrymen.
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What about France?
This is where the plot thickens.
In the past, unemployed cross-border commuters received higher benefits than other workers (as based on their Swiss earnings).
Those who have worked in Switzerland received an average of €2,670 per month in 2023, compared to €1,265 for all workers receiving benefits under the French unemployment insurance scheme.
But from March 21st, a new system is in place.
Now, G-permit holders who lost their Swiss jobs will take a pay cut.
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That’s because the rules governing unemployment benefits for French cross-border commuters have changed — and not in their favour.
From now on, they must accept all reasonable employment opportunities (ORE) in France, along with salaries based on a French, and not Swiss, pay scale.
Specifically, this means that a cross-border worker previously employed in Switzerland and paid a Swiss wage will now have to accept a j a significantly lower payout
According to French authorities, the new rule states “that it will now be the salary usually paid in France which will be one of the constituent elements of the ORE and no longer the salaries paid abroad.”
READ ALSO: What unemployment benefits are foreign workers in Switzerland entitled to?
