Anyone in Graubünden who starts sex work first looks for a form. There isn’t one. The canton has no prostitution law of its own, no cantonal permit for sex workers, no register, no office where you register. In its response to a parliamentary question by Rutishauser (submitted on June 13, 2025, answered on August 12, 2025, discussed in the Grand Council on October 21, 2025), the government itself admitted that it does not collect systematic and complete data on the number of sex workers in the canton.
Many draw the wrong conclusion from this: if nobody wants anything, you don’t have to register anywhere. The opposite is true. In Graubünden, there are indeed two offices that expect registration as soon as money flows regularly – and neither has anything to do with police or morality laws: the compensation fund and the tax office. These two registration channels are the only ones that practically affect everyone, regardless of whether you work in a salon, hotel room, club, or on the street.
This article takes exactly this axis: sex work in the canton of Graubünden in 2026 as income that is insured, declared, and taxed. The other jurisdictions – construction, police, migration – are only touched on as far as they factor into the calculation.
What Graubünden does not regulate – and what that means for registration
The degree of regulation in the canton is low, but not zero. It just sits somewhere else than expected:
- The location is determined by building law. A salon in an apartment is regularly a change of use requiring a permit – this is the point at which a building permit effectively decides on the workplace.
- The time is regulated in a single case by the municipality: Chur permits street prostitution under Article 26 of the municipal police law only between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. One can see most clearly there how much a municipal regulation determines working hours.
- The residence is handled by the Migration and Civil Registry Office. For self-employed EU/EFTA citizens, the registration procedure applies with a maximum of 90 days per calendar year – a framework that hits particularly hard in a seasonal canton.
What is not in any of these three categories: the question of who remits social insurance contributions for your income and who taxes it. This question is not answered by Graubünden law, but by federal law – and it answers it for sex work exactly the same as for a physiotherapy practice or a ski school. Cantons with their own law, like Ticino, link permits and status verification, which makes the process more visible; there, a whole chain of procedures hangs on the cantonal registration. In Graubünden, this anchor is missing – the obligations remain nonetheless, but you have to navigate them yourself.
A historical point is relevant here: The dancers’ statute was abolished on January 1, 2016. Since then, EU/EFTA sex workers have been treated under immigration law like all other employed persons – another reason why the canton no longer has its own registration.
The first real registration: contribution status with SVA Graubünden
The Social Insurance Institution of the Canton of Graubünden (SVA GR, Ottostrasse 24, P.O. Box, 7001 Chur) is where you register as a self-employed person. The procedure is the same as for any other new business – anyone who knows it from another canton will hardly notice any differences; in Uri, for example, you sit at the same counter as any other start-up.
Self-employed or employed? That’s not your decision
The trickiest point comes at the very beginning. The compensation fund independently checks the contribution status and issues a ruling – your self-assessment is only one element. It examines whether you bear genuine entrepreneurial risk: own price setting, own collection, multiple clients, own advertising, own infrastructure, free organization of working hours.
Federal court practice on this distinction has become narrower over the years, and that hits the industry hard. According to this jurisprudence, even minimal authority to give instructions by the business – specifications for clothing, set attendance times, decisions about who can work in the establishment, or advertising the business places – can lead to classification as dependent employment. Several cantonal compensation funds have adjusted their practice accordingly. No concrete Graubünden leading decision on this has been published; therefore, only one thing is reliable: SVA GR assesses each individual case and issues an appealable ruling.
The consequences are significant. If the activity is classified as dependent employment, the salon or club business is the employer – with accounting obligations, employer contributions, and the risk of back payments for previous years. For you, it means: payroll statement instead of invoice, deductions instead of advance contributions – and depending on your immigration status, additional source tax.
If you initiate a status review, you should prepare for it: rental contract or sublease for the workspace, your own advertisements, your own price list, proof that you serve multiple clients, your own control over scheduling.
What self-employment costs in 2026
The figures for the contribution year 2026 are uniform nationwide:
- Old-age, survivors’ and disability insurance (AHV/IV/EO): maximum 10.0 percent of net income, in full from an income of CHF 60,500. Below that, the sliding contribution scale applies down to 5.371 percent.
- Minimum contribution: CHF 530 per year – even with very small or negative earnings.
- Administrative costs: The fund may legally charge a maximum of 5 percent of contributions as an additional surcharge.
- Small ancillary income from self-employment under CHF 2,500 per year are generally contribution-free. Whether this applies in your case is decided by the fund – you should still register the activity.
Then there’s the cantonal part. The Graubünden Family Compensation Fund made two adjustments effective January 1, 2026: the contribution rate for employers and self-employed persons was reduced from 1.6 to 1.5 percent of AHV-taxable payroll, and the allowances were increased by CHF 10 each – the child allowance to CHF 240, the training allowance to CHF 290 per month. If you have children and settle accounts with the cantonal fund, you benefit twice over.
Accounting is done with advance contributions, usually quarterly. The final accounting occurs later when the tax administration reports the legally established income to the fund. This is the classic pitfall: if you set your advance contributions too low, you get a back payment two or three years later for a year that’s already been spent. SVA GR offers an online form for adjusting advance contributions – reporting an increase is unpleasant, a back payment over several years is worse.
What self-employment does not cover
Self-employed persons are not insured against unemployment – there is simply no unemployment insurance for them. Occupational pensions (second pillar) are voluntary, as is income protection insurance. However, the large pension contribution deduction is available: without a pension fund, up to 20 percent of earned income can flow into pillar 3a, a maximum of CHF 36,288 in 2026 (unchanged from 2025). In a profession with irregular income and practically no employer coverage, this is less a tax trick than the actual replacement for the missing second pillar.
Taxes: three bills from a single return
Income from sex work is declared as income from self-employment. This generates three taxes from a single return: federal income tax, cantonal tax, and municipal tax (plus possibly church tax).
The cantonal part became cheaper in 2026. In its December 2023 session, the canton reduced the tax rate for income, wealth, and source taxes from 100 to 95 percent – the first step in implementing the Hohl mandate, effective from tax year 2024. The second step, a partial revision of the tax law, was approved by the Grand Council on August 28, 2025; the referendum deadline expired unused on December 9, 2025, and the changes came into force on January 1, 2026. Among other things, the child deduction, the deduction for third-party childcare, and the second earner deduction were increased – relevant especially for sex workers with children or with a second income alongside self-employment.
The municipal portion is the biggest lever you can influence yourself. Chur levies 88 percent of the simple cantonal tax, Davos 95 percent. Across all approximately 100 Graubünden municipalities, the variation is enormous – tourist communities with high tax revenues are sometimes at half the rate, financially weak valley municipalities well above. If you want to compare your own burden, use exclusively the official list „Municipal and Church Tax Rates“ from the cantonal tax administration; figures from comparison websites are often outdated. Tax domicile is determined by residence, not workplace – a point that regularly needs clarification with split residence.
Deadlines. The tax return for individuals in the Canton of Graubünden must be submitted by March 31; for non-residents with property in the canton, the deadline is September 30. Extensions are handled either through the municipal tax office or the cantonal tax administration ([email protected], tel. 081 257 34 93), depending on the municipality. If in doubt, first ask at the municipal tax office which process applies to your municipality – this is one of the places where jurisdiction genuinely differs from place to place.
Records. Double-entry bookkeeping is not required, but a traceable record of income and expenses plus receipts is necessary. Business-related expenses are deductible – room rent, advertisements and portal fees, work materials, travel between work sites, consulting and accounting costs, the AHV contributions themselves. If documentation is missing, the authority estimates at its discretion, and discretionary assessments generally do not favor the taxpayer. The fact that the income is legal and enforceable was clarified by the Federal Court in ruling 6B_572/2020 of January 8, 2021: prostitution contracts are not immoral, the agreed compensation is judicially enforceable. Legally, this income exists fully – and so does it for tax purposes.
Value-added tax. You are liable if you generate more than CHF 100,000 in taxable annual sales within the country. For most individuals, this is out of reach; for businesses, it is not. If you exceed this amount, you can account for up to CHF 5.024 million in sales and CHF 108,000 in tax liability per year using the simplified method. The key is the attribution question: in one well-known case, the operator of a contact bar had to pay back approximately CHF 440,000 in value-added tax for 2007 through 2010 because the sexual services appeared outwardly as services of the business and were therefore attributed to it. As a self-employed person working in other people’s spaces, you should therefore also ensure for this reason that your own presentation – advertisement, price agreement, collection – is clearly your own.
Source tax: who pays it and who doesn’tMost of the misinformation happens here. The withholding tax captures income from dependent employment: foreign employees without Settlement Permit C, short-term residents, cross-border commuters. The employer deducts it from wages and remits it. Graubünden’s rates are updated annually on January 1st (those for 2026 were published on December 15, 2025); the canton’s tax administration’s fact sheet is binding. From a gross annual salary of CHF 120,000, ordinary assessment automatically follows — the withholding tax then becomes an advance payment, and a regular tax return is filed.
Anyone working self-employed does not fall under this regime. For persons without tax domicile or residence in Switzerland who pursue gainful activity here, Article 5 of the Federal Direct Tax Act establishes tax liability based on economic attachment — handled through ordinary assessment, not withholding tax deduction. What this looks like in practice depends on duration, structure, and any applicable double taxation agreement. This is the point where a brief inquiry with the cantonal tax administration is worth more than any forum advice.
The point most frequently overlooked in Graubünden concerns social insurance for short-term assignments. Self-employed persons from the EU/EFTA area who temporarily pursue similar activity in Switzerland remain insured in their home state under Article 12 (2) of Regulation (EC) 883/2004, provided the activity is expected to last no longer than 24 months — evidenced by an A1 certificate requested from the home insurance fund before departure. Without a valid A1, the employment location principle applies: social insurance contribution liability then exists from day one of work in Switzerland. During a twelve-day tour in Engadin, this sounds theoretical — until the compensation fund bills retroactively years later.
Three typical scenarios in the canton
Self-employed with Graubünden residence. Registration with SVA GR, status clarification, advance contributions, tax return by March 31st, municipal tax rate of residence. Check Pillar 3a, check daily sickness benefits. The work location must comply with zoning law — that’s a separate question, but it gets asked as soon as neighbors complain.
Self-employed touring, EU/EFTA, notification procedure. 90 days per calendar year via the Migration and Civil Rights Office, clarify A1 question beforehand, keep income in home country and Switzerland clearly separate. Keep records of assignment locations and dates — they are the only evidence in any subsequent status question.
Employed in club, bar, or cabaret. Payroll accounting with social insurance deductions, possibly withholding tax, employment contract. If you receive a payroll statement without deductions or nothing in writing at all, while the business determines prices, presence times, and advertising, this suggests bogus self-employment — a situation that is almost always corrected retroactively to the disadvantage of both parties.
Where support exists in the canton
Graubünden has no specialized cantonal contact point for sex workers — the government confirmed this in its response to the Rutishauser inquiry. What does exist:
- Aids-Hilfe Graubünden, Lürlibadstrasse 15, 7000 Chur: cantonal specialized office for sexual health since 1987, with outreach prevention for sex workers and testing available Mondays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Counseling is also possible on questions beyond health, and they know the paths to other offices.
- Victim Support Graubünden and regional social services for violence, emergency, and existence questions.
- SVA Graubünden for contribution and status questions, municipal tax office and cantonal tax administration for deadlines, deductions, and withholding tax.
- A trustee person who works with micro-entrepreneurs. For a few hundred francs a year, that typically saves more than it costs — especially when setting advance contributions.
Conclusion: The absence of a permit is not an absence of obligations
Graubünden does not require sex workers to obtain a cantonal permit and keeps no register. What the canton does require, however, is what it requires of every self-employed person: registration with the compensation fund, contributions from the first franc above the exemption threshold, a tax return by end of March, and traceable records. The only real Graubünden peculiarity in this calculation is how much the place of residence shifts the outcome — and that the difference between the lowest and highest municipal tax burden in the canton exceeds that of some cantonal comparisons.
Anyone needing binding information on figures, deadlines, or contribution status gets it where it is issued: from SVA Graubünden, the cantonal tax administration, and the tax office of their own municipality. Everything else is orientation — useful, but not legally binding.