Discretion in Swiss Relocation: What Actually Protects Your Privacy

Relocation advisers, property search agents and lifestyle managers are not bound by professional secrecy under Swiss law. Article 321 of the Criminal Code — the provision that makes disclosure a criminal offence — lists clergy, lawyers, defence counsel, notaries, patent attorneys, auditors, doctors, dentists, chiropractors, pharmacists, midwives, psychologists and certain health professionals, along with their auxiliaries. Relocation is not on that list, and no amount of assurance changes it.

We say this plainly because clients rarely ask, and the answer matters. If you are moving to Switzerland and someone will know your address before your neighbours do, your children's school, your household staff, your financial position and the reason you are moving, it is worth understanding exactly what obligation they are under.

What professional secrecy actually is

Art. 321 creates a criminal duty. A lawyer or doctor who discloses a client's secret can be prosecuted on complaint and faces up to three years' custody or a fine. The duty survives the end of the mandate and is released only by the client or a supervisory authority.

That is a specific, enumerated protection. It does not extend by analogy to adjacent professions, however sensitive their work.

What does protect you

Three things, and it is worth knowing which is which.

Contract. A confidentiality undertaking in the engagement agreement is enforceable under civil law. It is not criminal law, and the remedy is damages rather than prosecution, but it is real and it binds. Whether it also binds subcontractors, viewing agents and household staff depends entirely on how it is drafted. Data protection law. The revised Federal Act on Data Protection came into force on 1 September 2023 without a transition period. It obliges anyone processing personal data to do so proportionately, to secure it, to be transparent about it, and to report significant breaches. It is a genuine constraint, and it applies to every relocation adviser operating in Switzerland whether or not they mention it. Practice. The least formal and, day to day, the most consequential. Who inside the firm sees the file. Whether the property search reveals the client's name to owners, or only their profile. Whether staff are vetted. Whether records of a completed move are kept indefinitely or destroyed. Whether the firm publishes client names.

What to ask before appointing anyone

For someone with a public profile, these questions are more useful than any assurance of discretion.

Who exactly will see my file? In a small firm the answer should be a short list of names. If it is "our team", ask how large the team is. How am I described to owners and landlords? In a private market, a search is conducted by describing you. Ask whether that description carries your name, your employer, or only a profile. Are subcontractors bound? Search agents, cleaners, movers, school consultants. The engagement letter that binds the firm may not bind the people the firm engages. What happens to my file afterwards? A completed relocation leaves a record of an address, a family, a school and a financial position. Ask how long it is kept. Have you ever published a client's name? Not a legal question. A cultural one, and it tells you most of what you need to know.

Why this matters more in a small canton

In a place the size of Zug, information travels quickly and by short paths. The estate agent knows the school registrar; the school registrar knows the neighbour. A property viewing arranged carelessly can inform a village that a family is arriving before the family has decided to come.

This is not a reason for anxiety. It is a reason to be deliberate about sequencing — who is told what, and when. Most breaches of privacy in a relocation are not disclosures by an adviser. They are the accumulated consequence of an unstructured process: too many viewings, too many intermediaries, a name given where a profile would have done.

Handling that well is largely a matter of running fewer, better-prepared steps, and of one firm holding the whole picture rather than five holding pieces of it.

Our position

We work under contractual confidentiality, we are subject to the revised data protection act like every Swiss firm, and we do not publish client names. We are not bound by Art. 321, and we would rather tell you that than let you assume otherwise.

Where a matter genuinely requires privileged advice — a residency structure, a purchase, a family arrangement — the right answer is a Swiss lawyer, whose duty is criminal rather than contractual. We work alongside them regularly and are glad to introduce you.

If you are planning a move and want to discuss how it can be handled quietly, we are glad to talk.