Swiss Abroad forced to pay up to CHF100 for their votes to arrive

Swiss citizens abroad sometimes have to pay high postage costs to ensure their votes reach Switzerland on time. Our survey shows where voting from abroad costs the most – and when participation becomes prohibitively expensive.

“Dear Swiss Abroad in Denmark, has anyone already received their voting documents for the referendum on March 8?” asked a user in February on SwissCommunity, a platform for the Swiss Abroad.

The background to the enquiry was that these were the first voting documents from Switzerland no longer delivered in Denmark by the state postal company PostNord.

Denmark is considered a pioneer in digitalisation. At the end of 2025, it became the first European country to discontinue public letter delivery and remove all red letterboxes. Since the beginning of the year, letters – including voting envelopes from Switzerland – have been delivered by the private company DaoExternal link.

For the Swiss Abroad, the March votes were therefore a test of the new system. “I’ve read that late receipt of voting documents is a recurring problem for Swiss citizens abroad. But this is the first time it has happened to me here in Denmark,” Alice el-Wakil, who has lived in the Nordic country since 2022, told Swissinfo. As a political scientist specialising in participation and representation, el-Wakil is particularly sensitive to even small disruptions to democratic processes.

Read our article on delayed voting mail for the Swiss Abroad:

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Swiss people’s experiences with Dao vary. One Facebook user wrote: “We received the documents for both the March 8 vote and the March 29 elections in canton Bern. But they only arrived two weeks before the deadline instead of around four weeks.”

Other voters reported receiving the documents on time. Some, however, had the same experience as el-Wakil and found no voting envelope in their letterbox.

Maxime Bergamin, vice-president of Swissclub Denmark, also received feedback from Swiss citizens who did not receive their voting documents on time. “Many people, including myself, have not received a single letter for weeks. This also includes the documents for votes and elections in Switzerland,” says Bergamin.

In response to an enquiry from Swissinfo, the Federal Chancellery wrote that it had asked the Swiss foreign ministry about the impact of the situation in Denmark on postal delivery. “According to the information received, the timely delivery of mail should not be affected by the changeover.” The Federal Chancellery said it had no indications of systematic delays.

Sometimes expensive returns from abroad

In addition to late or non-delivery of voting envelopes, return postage costs are also causing concern among the Swiss Abroad community in Denmark. “It costs 46 Danish kroner (CHF5.60) to send a letter to Switzerland and takes four to 16 working days, which exceeds the voting deadlines in Switzerland,” says Bergamin.

A Facebook user expressed a similar view: “Who wants to send a letter back to Switzerland at these prices?”

CHF5.60 ($7.18) per letter may seem manageable. But over four votes a year, this adds up to around CHF22.40 annually. This raises the question: at what point does political participation become too expensive? And is it acceptable for this to vary depending on the country of residence?

As a rule, Swiss voters are called to the ballot box four times a year, with an average of ten to 15 federal proposals annually. The Swiss Abroad Act stipulates that Swiss citizens abroad can participate in Swiss democracy. More than 230,000 are currently eligible to vote and registered in the electoral roll.

In Belgium, Swiss voters have to dig particularly deep into their pockets. It costs the equivalent of CHF8.10 to return voting documents to Switzerland. “And there are regular price increases,” says Florence Roth, a member of the Council of the Swiss Abroad in Belgium.

Postage from Canada (CHF3) or Ireland (CHF3.20) is cheaper. However, if time is short, faster services are needed, costing four times as much – CHF12.80 from Ireland, for example.

According to Roland Erne, a member of the Council of the Swiss Abroad in Ireland, such postage costs may discourage some Swiss Abroad from exercising their right to vote. “I’ve heard that several times,” he says.

Ruth Perracini-Liechti, delegate from Costa Rica, shares this view. “The cost of return postage from Costa Rica is around CHF10.” The bigger problem, however, is that voting documents often do not arrive in time. “Even if we receive the documents, I assume some people choose not to vote because of the high costs.”

Delays are the biggest problem

Perracini-Liechti touches on what many Swiss Abroad see as the main issue: not the cost of returning voting envelopes, but delayed delivery in some countries. This creates the risk that votes will not arrive in Switzerland on time.

Those who want to ensure their vote is counted despite late delivery often turn to courier services. But these are expensive.

“If the documents arrive less than one week before the vote, we can only send them back by courier. That costs around CHF30 from Shanghai,” says Daniel Heusser, a member of the Council of the Swiss Abroad in China.

The situation is similar in Sri Lanka. Because he usually receives election documents only shortly before the vote, Swiss Abroad councillor Rolf Blaser says he has never tried returning them by regular post. “That leaves courier services, which cost around CHF100,” he says. Such costs discourage him from voting – “and probably all the other Swiss in this region too”.

Flurina Dünki, who lives in Mexico City, also sees distance as a major obstacle to political participation. “It takes around two to three weeks for the voting envelope to reach us.” After that, it must immediately be sent back by post to have any chance of arriving in Switzerland on time. “Private courier services are safer,” she says.

She tried this herself during the March vote. “It would have cost me around CHF60 to vote.” An amount that requires considerable political motivation – if one can afford it at all.

Dünki’s suggestion: eligible voters should join forces and send a collective envelope via private courier to a person in Switzerland, who would then handle domestic postage.

In the debate over postage costs, many Swiss Abroad point to e-voting as a possible solution. However, the e-voting debacle in Basel on March 8 weakened confidence in the system among some voters abroad.

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At the same time, a nationwide Swiss e-voting system would also involve major costs – up to CHF600 million according to the latest available estimates. The difference is that this expense would be borne by the state.

Edited by Balz Rigendinger. Translated using AI/amva/ts