Switzerland scraps electric car tax exemption

The number of electric cars on Swiss roads is increasing. © Keystone / Christian Beutler

Anyone who owns an electric car in Switzerland will have to pay automobile tax from January 1. 

The Federal Council decided on Wednesday to repeal this tax exemption for electric cars, which has been in effect since 1997.

The state government decided to make a corresponding change to the automobile tax ordinance on Wednesday, as it announced on Wednesday. The authorities justify the change in three ways: Firstly, it is important to counteract tax losses. The number of electric cars on Swiss roads has increased significantly.

Secondly, it is important to secure the deposits for the national highway and urban transport fund. Thirdly, the Federal Council wants to improve the state budget. The change to the automobile tax ordinance is part of a plan for streamlining the state budget, which the Federal Council decided on in January of this year.

Electric cars have been exempt from this tax since the automobile tax was introduced in 1997.

How we work

This news story has been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team. At SWI swissinfo.ch we select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools such as DeepL to translate it into English. Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles. You can find them here. 

If you want to know more about how we work, have a look here, and if you have feedback on this news story please write to [e-mail].