Doctors for Swiss hospitals, clinics and practices.

Nothing, at any stage: the conversation, the work on your dossier, arranging the interviews and answering your questions up to your first day are all free for you. The employer pays our fee, and it arises only once you have taken up the post. Where no appointment results, no invoice is issued to anyone. Nor do you take on any obligation towards us: you can apply on your own account at the same time and stop your search whenever you want.

Nobody outside our office, unless you tell us otherwise. Your dossier goes to the one employer you have agreed to beforehand, and to no other. Your present employer hears nothing from us, and referees are contacted only after you have named the ones we are allowed to approach. If you prefer, we approach a hospital anonymously first and give only your specialty, level and availability. Your dossier follows once the hospital shows interest and you have said yes.

Recognition is decided by MEBEKO, the medical professions commission at the Federal Office of Public Health. It examines medical degrees and specialist titles from EU and EFTA states, and German and Austrian titles can as a rule be recognised. Not every title maps one to one onto a Swiss one, because a few specialties are drawn differently here, and whether, and as what, a title is recognised is then MEBEKO's decision in the individual case. How long the procedure runs depends above all on how complete the papers are when they are filed. We look through your documents at the outset and tell you which step comes first in your case.

Two things need to be kept apart. The licence to practise, the Berufsausübungsbewilligung, comes from the canton in which your workplace lies, usually through the cantonal medical officer or the health directorate; it holds good in that canton alone, and the requirements vary from canton to canton and according to whether you work under professional supervision or on your own professional responsibility. Separate from that is the immigration permit: nationals of an EU or EFTA state who move to Switzerland normally receive a residence permit B, while those who keep their home just across the border and travel in to work need a cross-border commuter permit G. They are handled by the cantonal migration office, with the State Secretariat for Migration (SEM) behind it. The cross-border commuter permit is normally applied for by the employer; for the residence permit you register with your municipality after the move, and it forwards the application. Neither immigration permit can be applied for without a signed employment contract.

The requirement is normally B2 in the region's own official language, which in the German-speaking cantons means German. The proof forms part of the application for the licence to practise, and anyone who studied and worked in that language normally covers it through their training record. Employers and cantons may ask for more than the minimum, particularly in specialties with a great deal of patient contact and at senior level. In daily work there is Swiss German as well: understanding it is something you pick up over time, and nobody has to speak it. What the individual hospital expects is something we establish before you apply.

Contributions to the social insurance schemes are deducted from the gross salary first, along with those to the occupational pension. Anyone who holds no settlement permit C, and anyone living abroad, normally pays income tax as Quellensteuer, deducted at source by the employer; the rate depends on the canton, on the income and on the family situation. Health insurance is compulsory, is taken out per person and is paid privately, so it does not come off the salary. Housing at the place of work comes on top, and rents differ widely between regions. We work an offer through with you before you accept it.

There is no single figure for it; the order of magnitude is several months. Within Switzerland the notice period sets the pace, and at senior level it is often longer than in a contract during specialist training. If you are coming from Germany or Austria, recognition, the licence to practise and the residence or cross-border permit are added, partly in sequence, because one procedure needs the decision from another. We therefore begin them early and warn the future employer in good time if a start date looks like slipping. After the first conversation we can give you a timetable that fits your own situation.

We work on a success-fee basis. Nothing is invoiced until the doctor we introduced has started work, and we ask for no advance payment. The basis for it is the gross annual salary of the post that has been filled. We name the rate in the requirements call and put it in writing before the mandate begins, together with the arrangement covering the probation period. There is no exclusivity obligation with us: you can keep advertising and work with other partners at the same time.

It begins with the requirements call, in which we go through the duties, the level, the team and what your hospital is able to offer. Within five working days you receive our search plan in writing: where we intend to look, by what route we approach doctors, and what timing is realistic. If the post as described does not match the market, we say so at that point and suggest how it could be adjusted. Dossiers follow by arrangement, in a number you can genuinely work through, each one setting out the recognition status, the language level that has been proven, and a start date that allows for the procedures still running. When the first profiles arrive depends on the specialty and on the region.

We use your details and your documents for the placement itself: to handle your enquiry, to look for posts that fit and to talk them through with you. They reach an employer only once you have agreed to that step, and only the employer that step concerns. We pass nothing on for advertising, and we sell no data. You can ask at any time what we hold about you, have it corrected, or ask for it to be deleted, in which case your CV and your details are removed from our systems. How long we keep each kind of record is set out in the privacy policy.