Newcomers to Switzerland keep asking where to apply for their "tax number". The honest answer is that the number that follows you through the system is not a tax number at all. It is your AHV number, the Swiss social security number, and in most cases you do nothing to get it. Understanding what it is, who may ask for it and how it fits with tax will save you a few phone calls and at least one scam email.
What is the AHV number?
AHV stands for Alters- und Hinterlassenenversicherung, the old-age and survivors' insurance. In French-speaking Switzerland it is the AVS (assurance-vieillesse et survivants) and in Italian-speaking Switzerland the AVS as well, so you will see "AHV", "AVS" and the same number under both. It is the number that identifies you for the social insurance system and, in practice, for health insurance, pension funds and your employer's payroll.
According to the Federal Social Insurance Office (FSIO), the number:
- has 13 digits and starts with 756;
- is valid for life;
- is generated at random and carries no personal information about you;
- is, in principle, assigned automatically when you settle in Switzerland.
How do you get an AHV number?
For most newcomers there are no steps. You register at your commune (see moving to Switzerland: the step-by-step guide), and the system attributes the number when you establish yourself. If no number has been assigned, an employer, a university or a health insurer can ask a cantonal AHV compensation fund to issue one.
You normally discover it on your health insurance card (see health insurance in Switzerland). If you do not have it yet, ask your health fund, your employer, your compensation fund, your commune or your educational institution.
No documents are needed for the number itself, because it follows from your settlement in Switzerland, and it costs nothing.
Do you need an AHV insurance certificate?
This is where scams take root. You do not need an "AHV insurance certificate" for your registration and the authorities do not issue one automatically. Fake emails announcing that your certificate has "expired" circulate regularly, and the FSIO advises that you do not click their links. If you wonder whether a message is genuine, ask your employer or compensation fund by phone instead of replying.
A second precaution, which matters because the AHV number follows you for life: do not give your number to anyone who asks. Its systematic use outside the AHV is reserved for authorities and for cases provided by law. Your employer, health insurer and pension fund have good reasons to use it; a shop or a landlord rarely does.
Is it a tax number?
No, and this is the most common confusion for people arriving from countries with a single tax ID. In Switzerland, taxes are collected by your canton and your commune (with a federal tax on top), not by a national tax number.
The practical rules are simple:
- If you are a foreign employee living in Switzerland without a C permit, your employer withholds source tax from your salary and pays it to the canton. The rate is set by each canton.
- You can ask for an ordinary subsequent assessment with your canton's tax office, by 31 March of the following year at the latest, if you prefer to be taxed in the ordinary way (for example to deduct pillar 3a contributions).
- With a C permit you receive an annual tax return to fill in.
Your canton's tax office and the Federal Tax Administration's page on source tax explain the rest of the system.
If you work for several employers, for yourself, or across a border, who contributes and where can get complicated, and the AHV number appears on every form. Moovy can explain what each document asks for, but the compensation fund remains the body that decides your insurance status.
What does your AHV number mean for your situation?
The route to the number is the same for everyone, but the people who use it are not.
- Employees. Your employer needs the number to declare your salary to the compensation fund. Give it at the start of the job. If you do not have it yet, say so: the employer can ask the fund to issue one. More on your first weeks at work in working in Switzerland as an EU citizen.
- Students. A university can request a number for you if none has been assigned. You also need it for health insurance, where it appears on the card.
- Retirees. If you receive a pension from an EU country and nothing from Switzerland, you may be exempt from Swiss health insurance with form S1, but you still receive an AHV number once you settle. If you worked in Switzerland, you will use it for your pension claim.
- Families. Children born in Switzerland receive a number too; the health insurance is taken out within three months of birth.
If you lose track of your number, do not look for a certificate. Look at your health insurance card, an old payslip or a letter from your compensation fund, or ask one of the bodies listed above.
What does the AHV number lead to?
The number is your key to the Swiss "three pillars" system, which is worth understanding even if you are 30 and the pension is far away.
- First pillar (AHV/AI): the state pension. You contribute through your salary. The reference age is 65 for men, and for women it rises by three months a year until 2028, when it will be 65 for everyone. The pension starts the first day of the month after you reach it. Early withdrawal from age 63 is possible with a reduction, and deferring increases the pension. A 13th pension is paid each December from December 2026, equal to one twelfth of the year's old-age pension payments, to people who receive an old-age pension.
- Second pillar (occupational pension fund): compulsory for most employees above a salary threshold, run by your employer's fund.
- Third pillar (private): voluntary savings. In 2026 you can deduct up to CHF 7,258 for pillar 3a if you belong to a pension fund, or 20% of your income from work, with a ceiling of CHF 36,288, if you do not. Those deductions apply when you are taxed in the ordinary procedure.
Years spent in other EU or EFTA countries count towards your entitlement under European coordination rules. Your claim goes to the compensation fund 3 to 4 months before the reference age.
What if you are self-employed or have no job?
The number works the same way, but the contribution does not come off a payslip.
Self-employed people are recognised by their own compensation fund, which examines your real situation, not only your contract. They pay AHV/AI/APG contributions on their own, at 10.0% of income from CHF 60,500 a year, with a lower sliding scale below that (2026). People without gainful activity contribute to the AHV as well, and your obligation to pay ends at the reference age (65) or when you stop working. Ask the compensation fund of your canton which category you fall in, since the fund looks at your real situation, not only the label on your contract. If you have only one client, the fund will usually consider you an employee of that client, who will then owe the employer's share.
What mistakes should you avoid?
- Ordering a certificate you do not need or paying a website that offers to "obtain" your number.
- Clicking links in "your AHV certificate has expired" emails.
- Confusing the AHV number with a tax ID. Ask the cantonal tax office about source tax and ordinary assessment.
- Missing the 31 March deadline for ordinary subsequent assessment.
- Giving your number away to organisations with no legal reason to hold it.