Sole proprietorship
The sole proprietorship is the business form of a single natural person; it has no legal personality of its own, no minimum capital, and the owner is liable with their entire private assets.
Definition
For bookkeeping the CHF 500,000 annual turnover line is decisive: below it a statement of receipts, payments and net assets suffices; above it double-entry bookkeeping with balance sheet and income statement is required. Registration in the commercial register is mandatory from CHF 100,000 of turnover.
The owner draws no salary in the social insurance sense: they are self-employed, pay AHV, IV and EO on the business result and are not compulsorily insured against accidents. That shapes every payroll software question — for the owner themselves none is needed.
The numbers
- CHF 500,000
- turnover limit from which double-entry bookkeeping is required Art. 957 para. 2 CO
- CHF 100,000
- turnover from which registration in the commercial register is mandatory Art. 36 HRegV
Where to read it
What the software must be able to do
For a sole proprietorship two things that dominate every comparison are often dispensable: payroll and VAT. Whoever has no staff and stays below the turnover limit can consider solutions that would fail a general comparison.
Checked Aug 2026
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