Standard deductible

What is the standard deductible?

The standard deductible is the lowest deductible available to adults in Swiss basic health insurance. It is CHF 300 per calendar year. Until your bills for a year reach this amount, you pay them yourself. After that your health insurer contributes, and you only pay the 10% retention fee.

“Standard” here means that this is the basic form set by law. All higher levels are optional deductibles, which the law treats as a special form of insurance. If you do not choose a deductible when you register, you automatically have the standard deductible. In everyday language it is also called the minimum deductible or simply “the 300 deductible”; in German it is the ordentliche Franchise.

The standard deductible is the same for adults aged 26 and over and for young adults aged 19 to 25. No deductible is charged for children up to 18. Parents can, however, choose a children’s deductible of CHF 100 to CHF 600 for them and receive a lower premium in return.

The standard deductible only concerns basic health insurance under the Health Insurance Act (KVG). Supplementary insurance under the Insurance Contract Act (ICA) has its own excess arrangements, which are set out in the contract.

How it works

Every bill covered by basic health insurance is first counted towards the deductible: doctor’s visits, medicines from the pharmacy, laboratory tests, physiotherapy on prescription, hospital stays. What matters is the date of treatment, not the date of the invoice. A treatment on 20 December therefore counts towards the previous year’s deductible, even if the bill only arrives in January.

As soon as CHF 300 is reached, you pay a 10% retention fee on every further bill. For adults the retention fee is capped at CHF 700 a year. With the standard deductible your total co-payment is therefore at most CHF 1,000 a year. For a hospital stay you also pay a contribution of CHF 15 per day; children, young adults in education and women around childbirth are exempt (Art. 104 KVV).

The optional deductibles for adults are CHF 500, 1,000, 1,500, 2,000 and 2,500. The higher the level, the lower the premium. For each level the insurer may grant at most 70% of the additional risk as a discount, measured against the standard deductible. At CHF 2,500 you take on CHF 2,200 more risk, so the discount may be at most CHF 1,540 a year. The standard deductible is therefore the reference point for all discounts.

A special case: if you are insured for less than a calendar year, for example during a short stay in Switzerland, the insurer can charge a flat amount of CHF 250 within 90 days instead of the deductible and retention fee.

Legal basis

Art. 64 para. 2 let. a KVG requires insured persons to contribute to the costs with a fixed annual amount, the deductible. Under Art. 64 para. 3 KVG the Federal Council sets the amount. It has done so in Art. 103 para. 1 KVV: the deductible is 300 francs per calendar year. Art. 103 para. 2 KVV sets the maximum retention fee at CHF 700 for adults and CHF 350 for children, and Art. 103 para. 3 KVV makes the date of treatment decisive.

Art. 64 para. 4 KVG states that no deductible is charged for children. The higher levels are listed in Art. 93 para. 1 KVV. Changes are governed by Art. 94 KVV: you can only choose a higher deductible with effect from the start of a calendar year (para. 1). A switch to a lower deductible is possible at the end of a calendar year, subject to the notice periods under Art. 7 para. 1 and 2 KVG (para. 2). The 70% cap on the discount is set out in Art. 95 para. 2bis KVV. The flat amount for a short period of insurance is governed by Art. 103 para. 5 KVV.

Example: CHF 300 or CHF 2,500 in Zurich

Lukas is 36 and lives in the city of Zurich. He compares the standard deductible with the highest optional deductible. The premiums come from the FOPH’s official data: premiums 2026, municipality of Zurich (region 1), born in 1990, with accident cover, in each case the cheapest offer in the municipality. With a CHF 300 deductible it costs CHF 517.70 a month, with a CHF 2,500 deductible CHF 389.40. Per year that is CHF 6,212.40 compared with CHF 4,672.80, a difference of CHF 1,539.60.

The table shows the annual costs (premium plus deductible and retention fee) at different levels of healthcare costs:

Healthcare costs in the year	Total with CHF 300	Total with CHF 2,500
CHF 0	CHF 6,212.40	CHF 4,672.80
CHF 1,000	CHF 6,582.40	CHF 5,672.80
CHF 2,000	CHF 6,682.40	CHF 6,672.80
CHF 3,000	CHF 6,782.40	CHF 7,222.80
CHF 10,000	CHF 7,212.40	CHF 7,872.80

The premium difference of CHF 1,539.60 is just below the maximum discount of CHF 1,540 allowed by law. At other insurers and in other models the difference is often smaller. The threshold then moves down, and the standard deductible already pays off at lower costs. You can see your own figures in the premium calculator.

What this means for you

Choosing the standard deductible is not a question of being “cautious” or “bold”; it is a calculation. Three questions help you decide:

1. How high were your costs in recent years? The statements of benefits from your insurer show the total. If they were regularly above CHF 2,000, there is a strong case for CHF 300.
2. Is a major treatment foreseeable? A planned operation, a pregnancy or a longer course of therapy push costs above any deductible. In that case, with CHF 300 you pay at most CHF 1,000 in co-payments.
3. Could you cover CHF 3,200 yourself in one year? If not, the standard deductible is the safer choice, even though it costs more in premiums.

If you want to return to the standard deductible for next year, your notice must reach the insurer by 30 November when there is a premium change. The dates are listed under deadlines. How to report the change in practice is explained in the entry change your deductible. If you also want to switch insurer at the same time, you will find the providers and their key figures under health insurers.

For children it is worth taking a closer look: because there is no standard deductible for them, CHF 0 is the basic form. A children’s deductible lowers the premium but only pays off if they rarely see a doctor.

Common mistakes

• Thinking the standard deductible is expensive. The premium is higher, but the co-payment is capped at CHF 1,000 a year. With high costs it is the cheaper level.
• Giving notice of the change too late. You can only go back to CHF 300 with effect from 1 January. If you miss the deadline, you stay on the higher level for a whole year.
• Looking only at the monthly premium. Always compare the annual premium plus the possible co-payment, as in the table above.
• Keeping bills under CHF 300 to yourself. Submit small bills too. Only then do they count towards the deductible, and the insurer pays from the amount that exceeds CHF 300.
• Confusing the deductible with the hospital contribution. You pay the contribution of CHF 15 per day in hospital on top of the deductible.

How we calculate premiums and examples is explained under How we calculate.