Invoicing Barter Deals (Tauschgeschäfte) in Switzerland: No Cash, Still Taxable

Sometimes a client pays in kind instead of cash: you build the website, they give you a year of desk space. Swiss law calls this a Tauschgeschäft: even when no franc moves, both sides owe VAT.[1][2]

What counts as a barter deal

A Tauschgeschäft is paid with a counter-performance or an offset counter-claim instead of money.[2] The classic example: an IT firm sets up a fiduciary's infrastructure, and the fiduciary runs its bookkeeping in return.[2]

Partly offset deals count too. Settle a 6,000-franc mandate with 4,000 in cash plus venue use, and the venue is part of your consideration, not a gift. Unequal values leave a cash difference.[2]

Legally, both parties are at once supplier and recipient.[2] Each runs the full VAT process: invoice, declare the turnover, remit the tax. Neither side can treat the swap as a favour.[2]

It stays taxable even if the counterparty is not VAT-registered: your supply is still made for consideration and stays in your return.[1][2] Agree the valuation in writing before either side starts work.

Market value is the VAT basis

Swiss VAT law settles valuation in one sentence: for barter transactions, the market value of each supply is deemed to be the consideration for the other supply.[1]

In practice that means the price independent parties would agree on: your rate card, your list price, recent comparable offers.[2] If your infrastructure work is worth 10,000 francs excluding VAT, that is the taxable consideration for the bookkeeping received.[2]

Both parties declare VAT on the whole amount — 8.1 per cent for standard-rated services[1] — with no netting one invoice against the other.[2] Each side may deduct the invoiced VAT, where its business allows full deduction.[2]

Swaps inside your own company face an extra rule: for closely related persons — owners of at least 20 per cent of the capital — the consideration is what independent third parties would agree.[1] A friendly undervaluation will not survive an audit.

Income tax and social security follow the same value

Barter does not hide income; it moves it into kind. Each party books the full value received as revenue and the full value given as an expense.[2] Your accounts show the same turnover as with a cash client.

A self-employed person's tax return is built on the annual accounts, or with simplified bookkeeping on a statement of income and expenses.[4] The market value on your invoice flows into that return.

The first pillar follows: AHV, IV and EO contributions are calculated on your income in the contribution year, and the definitive contributions are set from the tax assessment.[3] A barter kept out of the books resurfaces as unpaid contributions.

The trade is legal; the invisibility is the offence. Book both sides at the same market value and keep the paperwork together — the tax bill then matches a cash client's.

How to write the invoice for a trade

A barter invoice is a normal invoice: on request you must issue one that clearly identifies supplier, recipient and the nature of the supply, states the consideration, and shows the applicable tax rate and the tax amount.[1]

Two entries make it one: the full market value of your supply is the consideration — not the difference, not zero — and you record the settlement, for example Leistung an Zahlungs statt or a note like offset against counter-invoice no. 2026-114.[2]

Prove the valuation while the deal is fresh. The FTA publishes no schedule of market prices for swapped services,[2] so build your own audit trail: your usual rate card, a written offer, the list price on the invoice.

If the values differ, the difference travels as an ordinary payment, by bank transfer or QR-bill.[2] Run the trade through your normal invoicing routine, from VAT rate to counter-invoice reference. facturio keeps invoices, VAT rates and references in one place, so even a deal without money leaves a clean trail. Sources: [1] Federal VAT Act (fedlex); [2] PrimeTax on Tauschgeschäfte; [3] AHV Merkblatt 2.02; [4] ESTV, self-employment taxation.