Firstly, I presume that you can legally live here.  From there, what the authorities will want to ensure is that you pay your AVS (social security) and your taxes.  As an independent, you should register as such with the "Registre de Commerce" as an independent.  This will cost you a couple hundred francs.  You should then register with an AVS caisse (ie FER).  Presto and you are in business.

About rates, surely you can pitch yourself at something more than baby-sitter or cleaning lady rates (no offence to either of these two working fields) as I am assuming that you have some technical skills as well as creative capacities.  Probably best to just quote the job as a fixed fee, and learn from trial and error.  Good luck.

Yes, unreasonable, as in quite a bit on the low side for qualified work, such as graphic design. As a freelancer, your rate must cover pension, vacation days, VAT, expenses, time spent and time not booked for a job, as well as the time spent for admin work, add to that a premium covering lack of job security.

That's why it seems expensive to hire freelancers and consultants.

What you can charge in practice is another matter..  especially, if you are dealing with individuals. I recommend dealing with companies..

Lubica, I pay my cleaning lady25chf/hour so I guess you can be charge higher.

may be this will help you :

Doctors : 120chf/ consultation

Lawyer : 250 to .... will be indecent to tell you :)

Natural therapist : 90 to 120 chf/ hour

Personal trainer ; 150 to 300 chf/h

Also. you don t need to go to registre du commerce if your total revenue is less than 100 000chf .

You just need to register to AVS office and take an accountant to control and pay your tax.

Good luck

The doc and lawyer fees include professional liability insurance not usually applicable to webdesigners and, of course, many years of study, hence the high prices for docs and lawyers. It's apples and oranges compared.

Also, in France, the doc consultation fee is 33€, mostly refundable.

I would also like to point out, that, since you appear to live in Prevessin (France), you should ask for advice pertinent to Prevessin, France and not to Geneva, Switzerland. A frontalier tax advisor might be a good idea, too.

Best of luck with your budding business! :)

well, the aim is not to explain why doc and lawyer cost this or that, but just to give her an idea of pricing in Geneva, as she s new comer. 

I get it, but I think it's not a good comparison. I don't have the prices for graphic or web design, though.

Thank you all for great advice. I will definitely rethink my hourly rate :).

So I will actually have to register with both countries right? as I live in France but also want to be able to expand my client base to Geneva and surrounding areas.

Has anybody got experience with this?

Thank you all again.

ouch... you live in France, that s complicated a bit as I m not sure that a "G" permit can be independant in Switzerland.

Portage salariale : was created to give some security to freelancer  You become an employee of the compagny, they charge your client at your place and give you back an icome with salary sheet, so you have the security of the employee ( paying for retirement, unemployement, health insurance). it s also simplified your accounting as you don t need to do anything, the compagny take care of every thing, souds great like this but it s usually expensive, specially if you are in a french "portage". If you charge your client 1000€ expect to receive an income of 400€ if you re in portage.

Going to a swiss portage salarial compagny can resolve the issue of the "working permit" and also the fees are less expensive in Switzerland ( for 1000€ you will receive 700€ income), the issue is most of the time, if you don t have big bill, poratge compagny are not interested to take you....

I have a friend in Zurich who s in this business... so feel free to send me an email.

Cheers 

I’m working also in the IT industry as a Freelancer. The rates depend on the nature of the work and project.

Designing a website takes less effort as compare the development.

So if you are just going to design a website (including static websites) you can charge  (30-40 CHF)

If you are going to work on a CMS which doesn't require any template/extensions modification, just need to install and configure Pre-designed/ Developed templates/extensions. (30 CHF)

CMS Template/Extension modifications (50 CHF)

Fully customized Template/Extensions for CMS (60-70 CHF) 

Fully custom coded project requires everything from scratch, structuring the database design to layout and then integration with any system, so it depends on the project, you may charge above (120 CHF)

Configuring/troubleshooting the servers/machines (30-60 CHF)

So you may have an idea how much you should charge for your project. But I would suggest you to charge per project instead of charging hourly. Sometimes it really becomes messy.  

I'm having trouble quoting for a client. He asked me to redesign a bunch of sites for him and some print work. Here's an example of a site that he wants me to convert from actionscript to HTML, CSS, Javascript:

http://www.pegeng.ch/#/home

I just moved here from the USA and don't really know how much to quote for it. He wants a flat rate. Do any of you guys have any recommendations? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

If you work from France, it is recommended to check the procedures for registering with the French social security and taxes (direct taxes and business tax - "taxe professionnelle"). For the value added tax, you should probably only worry if the turnover starts to become significative.

The social security is managed by the URSSAF, but I'm not a specialist about French formalities.

In principle, you do not have to register in Switzerland for the taxes or the social security, even if you have Swiss clients, as long as you do not open a Swiss permanent establishment in Switzerland (such as an office, shop or branch, etc) and as long as you do not perform your services from Switzerland (such as being employed by a Swiss company).

Lubica, I had to deal with graphic designers a few years ago, and their hourly rate was at least 150.- CHF.

The work is not that complicated, just a piece of cake. if the whole works is just about converting the site to html/CSS etc.. I assume that you have all the graphics/contents and you are good in your work. It may take you in between 6-8 hours. So you may charge in between 1500-2000 CHF and never go with hourly rates. It will be a headache.  

Note:

If the work is given to you by another developer. Don't expect more than 1500CHF if you are lucky enough. But if you are getting this project directly from the company and the company seems big, You can have more than 5000 CHF or sky is the limit. One more thing, if you really want to get into this field and intended to make money. Talk your clients. Convince them to add more functionalities in their websites. Make it dynamic, will help you in future, blah blah. it’s all about your presentation and how you convince them. it really works.  

Thank you everyone for your helpful replies!!!!

Sounds like we need a web designers group/forum. :) 

Lubica:

Before starting to register and incur costs, see if you can get paying clients. If you start and see that money is coming in, then go and register and make it all 110% clean.

In your early days you'll be making so little money anyway, that the tax authorities won't really care about you.

So don't get tangled in the set up stuff. Go out there, see if you can get clients, and only if you see you have a business, register the whole thing.

Nir

Lubica: after all this advice, let's see some of your work...(-; Any sites you can refer us to, in order to see your work?

Yeah, my site is www.vanessajohodesigns.com. Hope you enjoy :)

Wow Vanessa, you're multi-talented! Photoshop, animation, programming...I wish I had even just 1 of those skills! Great site and impressive work, thanks for sharing.

Thanks!!! And I'm actually starting Grad School in September for Interactive Media Technology, so in 2 years I'll know A LOT more programming languages then I do now. That's the field I feel most comfortable in. Web design and development. It will be intense but, as nerdy as this may sound, I'm kinda excited :) 

Hi Vanessa. I've been really interested in this thread - for reasons that have to do with freelancing and registering etc etc. But now that I see your work, I'd like to meet and discuss the prospect of working with you to create my website(s). Please get in touch (being a freelancer myself - writer/editor, my time is veerrrry flexible!)