Federal Act
on Administrative Procedure
(Administrative Procedure Act, APA)¹

¹ This Act ap­plies to the pro­ced­ure in ad­min­is­trat­ive mat­ters that are to be dealt with by rul­ings of fed­er­al ad­min­is­trat­ive au­thor­it­ies of first in­stance or on ap­peal.

² Au­thor­it­ies in terms of para­graph 1 are:

a.⁵

the Fed­er­al Coun­cil, its de­part­ments, the Fed­er­al Chan­cellery and the ser­vices sub­or­din­ate to it, and busi­nesses, in­sti­tu­tions and oth­er pub­lic of­fices of the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­tra­tion;

b.⁶

or­gans of the Fed­er­al As­sembly and of the fed­er­al courts re­spons­ible for rul­ings in the first in­stance and ap­peal de­cisions in ac­cord­ance with the Pub­lic Of­fi­cials Act of 30 June 1927⁷;

c.

autonom­ous fed­er­al in­sti­tu­tions or busi­nesses;

c^bis.⁸ the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court;

d.

the fed­er­al com­mit­tees;

e.

oth­er au­thor­it­ies or or­gan­isa­tions out­side the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­tra­tion, provided they are is­su­ing an rul­ing in ful­fil­ment of the fed­er­al pub­lic law du­ties as­signed to them.

³ Only Art­icles 34−38 and 61 para­graphs 2 and 3 on the no­ti­fic­a­tion of rul­ings and Art­icle 55 para­graphs 2 and 4 on the with­draw­al of sus­pens­ive ef­fect ap­ply to the pro­ced­ure of the can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies of fi­nal in­stance that is­sue rul­ings based on fed­er­al pub­lic law that are not fi­nal rul­ings. Art­icle 97 of the Fed­er­al Act of 20 Decem­ber 1946⁹ on the Old-Age and Sur­viv­or’s In­sur­ance re­lat­ing to the with­draw­al of the sus­pens­ive ef­fect of ap­peals against rul­ings is­sued by the com­pens­a­tion funds is re­served.^{10 11}

¹ Art­icles 12–19 and 30–33 do not ap­ply to tax pro­ceed­ings.

² Art­icles 4–6, 10, 34, 35, 37 and 38 ap­ply to the test­ing pro­ced­ure in pro­fes­sion­al edu­ca­tion and train­ing ex­am­in­a­tions.

³ Com­puls­ory pur­chase pro­ced­ures are gov­erned by this Act un­less the Fed­er­al Act of 20 June 1930¹² on Com­puls­ory Pur­chase provides oth­er­wise.¹³

⁴ The pro­ced­ure be­fore the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court is gov­erned by this Act, un­less the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court Act of 17 June 2005¹⁴ provides oth­er­wise.¹⁵

This Act does not ap­ply to:

a.

the pro­ced­ures of au­thor­it­ies in terms of Art­icle 1 para­graph 2 let­ter e if a dir­ect ap­peal to a fed­er­al au­thor­ity against their rul­ings is in­ad­miss­ible;

b.

in re­la­tion to fed­er­al per­son­nel, the pro­ced­ure in the first in­stance re­lat­ing to the es­tab­lish­ment of an em­ploy­ment re­la­tion­ship, to the pro­mo­tion of fed­er­al per­son­nel, and to em­ploy­ment re­lated dir­ect­ives to fed­er­al per­son­nel¹⁶ and the pro­ced­ure for the au­thor­isa­tion of the pro­sec­u­tion of fed­er­al per­son­nel;

c.

ad­min­is­trat­ive crim­in­al pro­ceed­ings and re­lated crim­in­al in­vest­ig­a­tion pro­ceed­ings;

d.¹⁷

the pro­ced­ure for the ad­min­is­tra­tion of mil­it­ary justice in­clud­ing the ad­min­is­tra­tion of mil­it­ary dis­cip­line, the pro­ced­ure in mil­it­ary com­mand mat­ters in terms of Art­icle 37 as well as the pro­ced­ure in terms of Art­icles 38 and 39 of the Armed Forces Act of 3 Feb­ru­ary 1995¹⁸,¹⁹ ...²⁰;

d^bis.²¹

the pro­ced­ure in so­cial in­sur­ance mat­ters, provided the Fed­er­al Act of 6 Oc­to­ber 2000²² on the Gen­er­al Pro­vi­sions of So­cial In­sur­ance law is ap­plic­able;

e.²³

the pro­ced­ure for cus­toms clear­ance;

e^bis.²⁴

...

f.

pro­ceed­ings in the first in­stance in oth­er ad­min­is­trat­ive mat­ters, if due to their nature they must be dealt with by an im­me­di­ately en­force­able rul­ing.

Pro­vi­sions of fed­er­al law that reg­u­late a pro­ced­ure in more de­tail ap­ply provided that they are not con­tra­dict­ory to the pro­vi­sions of this Act.

¹ Rul­ings are de­cisions of the au­thor­it­ies in in­di­vidu­al cases that are based on the pub­lic law of the Con­fed­er­a­tion and have as their sub­ject mat­ter the fol­low­ing:

a.

the es­tab­lish­ment, amend­ment or with­draw­al of rights or ob­lig­a­tions;

a.

a find­ing of the ex­ist­ence, non-ex­ist­ence or ex­tent of rights or ob­lig­a­tions;

c.

the re­jec­tion of ap­plic­a­tions for the es­tab­lish­ment, amend­ment, with­draw­al or find­ing of rights or ob­lig­a­tions, or the dis­missal of such ap­plic­a­tions without en­ter­ing in­to the sub­stance of the case.

² Rul­ings are also en­force­ment meas­ures (Art. 41 para. 1 let. a and b), in­ter­im or­ders (Art. 45), de­cisions on ob­jec­tions (Art. 30 para. 2 let. b, 46 let. b, and 74 let. b), ap­peal de­cisions (Art. 61 and 70), de­cisions in a re­view (Art. 68) and on ex­plan­at­ory state­ments (Art. 69).²⁵

³ De­clar­a­tions made by au­thor­it­ies on the re­jec­tion or rais­ing of claims that must be pur­sued by tak­ing leg­al pro­ceed­ings do not con­sti­tute rul­ings.

Parties are per­sons whose rights or ob­lig­a­tions are in­ten­ded to be af­fected by the rul­ing and oth­er per­sons, or­gan­isa­tions or au­thor­it­ies who have a leg­al rem­edy against the rul­ing.

¹ The au­thor­ity shall as­sess its jur­is­dic­tion ex of­fi­cio.

² The es­tab­lish­ment of jur­is­dic­tion by agree­ment between the au­thor­ity and the party is not per­mit­ted.

¹ An au­thor­ity that re­gards it­self as not hav­ing jur­is­dic­tion shall refer the mat­ter without delay to the com­pet­ent au­thor­ity.

² If an au­thor­ity re­gards its jur­is­dic­tion as doubt­ful, it shall im­me­di­ately enter in­to an ex­change of views with the au­thor­ity which it con­siders to have jur­is­dic­tion.

¹ An au­thor­ity that re­gards it­self as hav­ing jur­is­dic­tion shall con­firm this in a rul­ing if a party con­tests its jur­is­dic­tion.

² An au­thor­ity that re­gards it­self as not hav­ing jur­is­dic­tion shall is­sue a rul­ing that the mat­ter is in­ad­miss­ible if a party claims that it has jur­is­dic­tion.

³ Jur­is­dic­tion­al con­flicts between au­thor­it­ies, with the ex­cep­tion of jur­is­dic­tion­al con­flicts with the Fed­er­al Su­preme Court, the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court or with can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies, shall be de­cided by the joint su­per­vis­ory au­thor­ity, or in the ab­sence of such, the Fed­er­al Coun­cil.²⁶

¹ Per­sons who are re­spons­ible for pre­par­ing or is­su­ing a rul­ing shall re­cuse them­selves from the case, if they:

a.

have a per­son­al in­terest in the mat­ter;

b.²⁷

are re­lated to a party either by mar­riage or re­gistered part­ner­ship or by be­ing the co­hab­it­ee of that party;

b^bis.²⁸ are re­lated to a party by blood or by mar­riage in a dir­ect line or col­lat­er­ally to the third de­gree;

c.

are the rep­res­ent­at­ive of a party or if they have ac­ted for a party in the same mat­ter;

d.

could be re­garded for oth­er reas­ons as lack­ing im­par­ti­al­ity in the mat­ter.

² In the event of any dis­pute over with­draw­al, the su­per­vis­ory au­thor­ity shall de­cide, or if the dis­pute relates to the re­cus­al of a mem­ber of a col­legi­al au­thor­ity, then the board shall de­cide in the ab­sence of the mem­ber con­cerned.

¹ At any stage in the pro­ced­ure, a party may, if he is not re­quired to act per­son­ally, be rep­res­en­ted, or, provided the ur­gency of an of­fi­cial in­vest­ig­a­tion does not pre­clude it, be as­sisted by leg­al coun­sel.³⁰

² The au­thor­ity may re­quire the rep­res­ent­at­ive to provide a writ­ten power of at­tor­ney.

³ As long as the party does not re­voke the power of at­tor­ney, the au­thor­ity shall ad­dress any com­mu­nic­a­tions to the rep­res­ent­at­ive.

¹ If more than 20 parties ap­pear in a case with joint or in­di­vidu­al sub­mis­sions in or­der to as­sert the same in­terests, the au­thor­ity may de­mand that they ap­point one or more rep­res­ent­at­ives to act on their be­half in the pro­ced­ure.

² If this de­mand is not com­plied with with­in a reas­on­able peri­od, then the au­thor­ity shall it­self ap­point one or more rep­res­ent­at­ives.

³ The pro­vi­sions on the re­im­burse­ment of the rep­res­ent­a­tion costs in ap­peal pro­ceed­ings are ap­plic­able in an ana­log­ous man­ner to the costs of such rep­res­ent­a­tion. The party against whom the sub­mis­sions are dir­ec­ted must make a pay­ment to ac­count to­wards the costs of of­fi­cial rep­res­ent­a­tion if ordered to do so by the au­thor­ity.

¹ Parties who make an ap­plic­a­tion in pro­ceed­ings must in­dic­ate their place of res­id­ence or re­gistered of­fice to the au­thor­ity. If they live abroad, they must in­dic­ate an ad­dress for ser­vice in Switzer­land, un­less in­ter­na­tion­al law or the com­pet­ent for­eign body per­mits the au­thor­ity to serve doc­u­ments dir­ectly in the state con­cerned.³³

² The parties may also in­dic­ate an elec­tron­ic mail ad­dress and de­clare that they con­sent to ser­vice by elec­tron­ic mail. The Fed­er­al Coun­cil may provide that for elec­tron­ic mail ser­vice fur­ther de­tails of the parties are re­quired.

The au­thor­ity shall es­tab­lish the facts of the case ex of­fi­cio and ob­tain evid­ence by means of the fol­low­ing:

a.

of­fi­cial doc­u­ments;

b.

in­form­a­tion from the parties;

c.

in­form­a­tion or testi­mony from third parties;

d.

in­spec­tion;

e.

ex­pert opin­ions.

¹ The parties are ob­liged to co­oper­ate in es­tab­lish­ing the facts of the case:

a.

in pro­ceed­ings that are ini­ti­ated on their own ap­plic­a­tion;

b.

in any oth­er pro­ceed­ings in which they make their own in­de­pend­ent ap­plic­a­tions;

c.

if they are sub­ject to a more ex­tens­ive duty to provide in­form­a­tion or duty of dis­clos­ure un­der an­oth­er fed­er­al act.

^1bis The co­oper­a­tion ob­lig­a­tion does not ex­tend to the han­dover of items and doc­u­ments used in com­mu­nic­a­tions between a party and his or her law­yer provided the law­yer is en­titled to rep­res­ent cli­ents be­fore the Swiss courts in ac­cord­ance with the Law­yers Act of 23 June 2000³⁴.³⁵

² The au­thor­ity shall not be re­quired to con­sider an ap­plic­a­tion in terms of para­graph 1 let­ter a or b if the parties re­fuse to provide the re­quired and reas­on­able co­oper­a­tion.

¹ If it is not pos­sible to es­tab­lish the facts of the case suf­fi­ciently in any oth­er way, the fol­low­ing au­thor­it­ies may or­der the ex­am­in­a­tion of wit­nesses:

a.

the Fed­er­al Coun­cil and its de­part­ments;

b.

the Fed­er­al Of­fice of Justice³⁶ of the Fed­er­al De­part­ment of Justice and Po­lice;

c.³⁷

the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court;

d.³⁸

the com­pet­i­tion au­thor­it­ies in terms of the Car­tels Act of 6 Oc­to­ber 1995³⁹;

e.⁴⁰

the Swiss Fin­an­cial Mar­ket Su­per­vis­ory Au­thor­ity;

f.⁴¹

the Fed­er­al Audit Over­sight Au­thor­ity;

g.⁴²

the Fed­er­al Tax Ad­min­is­tra­tion,

h.⁴³

the Fed­er­al Ar­bit­ra­tion Com­mis­sion for the Ex­ploit­a­tion of Copy­rights and Re­lated Rights.

² The au­thor­it­ies men­tioned in para­graph 1 let­ters a, b, d–f and h shall in­struct a suit­ably qual­i­fied pub­lic of­fi­cial to ex­am­ine the wit­nesses.⁴⁴

³ The au­thor­it­ies men­tioned in para­graph 1 let­ter a may au­thor­ise per­sons out­side an au­thor­ity that has been in­struc­ted to con­duct an of­fi­cial in­vest­ig­a­tion to ex­am­ine the wit­nesses.

Every­one is ob­liged to testi­fy.

¹ The right to re­fuse to testi­fy is gov­erned by Art­icle 42 para­graphs 1 and 3 of the Fed­er­al Act of 4 Decem­ber 1947⁴⁵ on Fed­er­al Civil Pro­ced­ure (FCP).

^1bis The me­di­at­or is en­titled to re­fuse to testi­fy on mat­ters that have come to his at­ten­tion in the course of his activ­it­ies in terms of Art­icle 33b.⁴⁶

² A per­son who has know­ledge of a pro­fes­sion­al or trade secret in terms of Art­icle 42 para­graph 2 FCP may the re­fuse to testi­fy un­less he is re­quired to testi­fy by an­oth­er fed­er­al act.

³ ...⁴⁷

Any per­son who may be ex­amined as a wit­ness must also co­oper­ate in the gath­er­ing of oth­er evid­ence; in par­tic­u­lar he must hand over any doc­u­ments that are in his pos­ses­sion. Art­icle 51a FCP⁴⁸ is re­served.⁴⁹

¹ The parties have the right to at­tend the ex­am­in­a­tion of wit­nesses and to ask sup­ple­ment­ary ques­tions.

² To safe­guard es­sen­tial pub­lic or private in­terests, the wit­nesses may be ex­amined in the ab­sence of the parties, who may also be re­fused the right to in­spect the tran­script of the ex­am­in­a­tion.

³ If they are re­fused the right to in­spect the tran­script of the ex­am­in­a­tion, Art­icle 28 ap­plies.

Art­icles 37, 39–41 and 43–61 FCP⁵⁰ also ap­ply by ana­logy to the pro­ced­ure for ob­tain­ing evid­ence; in place of the pen­al­ties that the FCP provides for de­fault­ing parties or third parties, the pen­al­ties in Art­icle 60 of this Act ap­ply.

¹ If a peri­od is cal­cu­lated in days and if no­tice there­of must be giv­en to the parties, it be­gins to run from the day fol­low­ing that day on which no­tice is giv­en.

² If no no­tice need be giv­en to the parties, the peri­od be­gins on the day fol­low­ing the day on which it is triggered.

^2bis A no­tice that may only be served against the sig­na­ture of the ad­dress­ee or of an­oth­er au­thor­ised per­son is deemed to have been served at the latest on the sev­enth day fol­low­ing the first un­suc­cess­ful at­tempt at ser­vice.⁵¹

³ If the last day of the peri­od is a Sat­urday, a Sunday or a pub­lic hol­i­day re­cog­nised un­der fed­er­al or can­ton­al law, the peri­od ends on the next work­ing day. The law of the can­ton in which the party or its rep­res­ent­at­ive is res­id­ent or has its re­gistered of­fice is au­thor­it­at­ive.⁵²

II. Com­pli­ance

¹ Writ­ten sub­mis­sions must be filed with the au­thor­ity or con­signed for de­liv­ery to swiss Post⁵⁴ or a Swiss dip­lo­mat­ic or con­su­lar mis­sion at the latest on the last day of the peri­od.

^1bis Writ­ten sub­mis­sions to the Fed­er­al In­sti­tute of In­tel­lec­tu­al Prop­erty⁵⁵ may not be val­idly filed via a Swiss dip­lo­mat­ic or con­su­lar mis­sion.⁵⁶

² If the party files the sub­mis­sion in time but with an au­thor­ity that is not com­pet­ent, the peri­od is deemed to have been com­plied with.

³ The peri­od al­lowed for an ad­vance pay­ment to be made is com­plied with if the pay­ment in fa­vour of the au­thor­ity is made in time to Swiss Post or if a postal or bank ac­count in Switzer­land is deb­ited.⁵⁷

¹ Sub­mis­sions may be sent to the au­thor­ity elec­tron­ic­ally.

² The sub­mis­sion must be fur­nished with a qual­i­fied elec­tron­ic sig­na­ture of the party or its rep­res­ent­at­ive in ac­cord­ance with the Fed­er­al Act of 18 March 2016⁵⁹ on Elec­tron­ic Sig­na­tures.

³ For com­pli­ance with a dead­line, the de­cis­ive time is that when the re­ceipt was is­sued con­firm­ing that all pro­ced­ur­al steps re­quired of the party or its rep­res­ent­at­ive for trans­mis­sion have been com­pleted.

⁴ The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall reg­u­late:

a.

the format of the sub­mis­sion and its ac­com­pa­ny­ing doc­u­ments;

b.

the form and meth­od of trans­mis­sion;

c.

the re­quire­ments by which doc­u­ments may be re-sub­mit­ted on pa­per in the event of tech­nic­al prob­lems.

¹ A stat­utory peri­od may not be ex­ten­ded.

² A peri­od fixed by an au­thor­ity may be ex­ten­ded where there are reas­on­able grounds provided the party re­quests the ex­ten­sion be­fore ex­piry of the peri­od.

¹ Stat­utory or of­fi­cial peri­ods that are stip­u­lated in days do not run:

a.

from the sev­enth day be­fore East­er up to and in­clud­ing the sev­enth day after East­er;

b.

from 15 Ju­ly up to and in­clud­ing 15 Au­gust;

c.⁶¹

from 18 Decem­ber up to and in­clud­ing 2 Janu­ary.

² Para­graph 1 does not ap­ply in pro­ceed­ings re­lat­ing to:

a.

the grant­ing of sus­pens­ive ef­fect and oth­er pre­cau­tion­ary meas­ures;

b.

pub­lic pro­cure­ment.⁶²

The au­thor­ity that fixes a peri­od shall at the same time in­dic­ate the con­sequences of the fail­ure to com­ply with that peri­od; in the event of non-com­pli­ance, only the con­sequences in­dic­ated shall ap­ply.

¹ If the ap­plic­ant or his rep­res­ent­at­ive is pre­ven­ted through no fault of his own from act­ing be­fore the ex­piry of the peri­od, the peri­od shall be re­in­stated provided he re­quests the same stat­ing the reas­ons there­for with­in 30 days of the dis­con­tinu­ation of the im­ped­i­ment and car­ries out the leg­al act re­quired; Art­icle 32 para­graph 2 is re­served.⁶³

² Para­graph 1 does not ap­ply to peri­ods that must be com­plied with in pat­ent cases be­fore the Fed­er­al In­sti­tute of In­tel­lec­tu­al Prop­erty.⁶⁴

¹ The au­thor­ity com­pet­ent in the mat­ter may, ex of­fi­cio or on ap­plic­a­tion, is­sue a de­clar­at­ory rul­ing on the ex­ist­ence, the non-ex­ist­ence or the ex­tent of pub­lic law rights or ob­lig­a­tions.

² The ap­plic­a­tion for a de­clar­at­ory rul­ing must be gran­ted if the ap­plic­ant demon­strates an in­terest that is worthy of pro­tec­tion.

³ No party may be pre­ju­diced by act­ing in jus­ti­fied re­li­ance on a de­clar­at­ory rul­ing.

¹ Any per­son who has an in­terest that is worthy of pro­tec­tion may re­quest from the au­thor­ity that is re­spons­ible for acts that are based on fed­er­al pub­lic law and which af­fect rights or ob­lig­a­tions that it:

a.

re­frains from, dis­con­tin­ues or re­vokes un­law­ful acts;

b.

rec­ti­fies the con­sequences of un­law­ful acts;

c.

con­firms the il­leg­al­ity of such acts.

² The au­thor­ity shall de­cide by way of a rul­ing.

¹ The party or his rep­res­ent­at­ive has the right to in­spect the fol­low­ing files re­lat­ing to his case at the of­fices of the au­thor­ity is­su­ing the rul­ing or of a can­ton­al au­thor­ity that it des­ig­nates:

a.

sub­mis­sions from parties and the com­ments made there­on by the au­thor­it­ies;

b.

any doc­u­ments serving as evid­ence;

c.

cop­ies of rul­ings already is­sued.

^1bis The au­thor­ity may make the doc­u­ments avail­able for in­spec­tion elec­tron­ic­ally provided the party or his rep­res­ent­at­ive is in agree­ment.⁶⁶

² The au­thor­ity is­su­ing the rul­ing may charge a fee for the in­spec­tion of the files of a case that has been con­cluded; the Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall reg­u­late the as­sess­ment of the fee.

¹ The au­thor­ity may re­fuse to al­low the in­spec­tion of the files only if:

a.

es­sen­tial pub­lic in­terests of the Con­fed­er­a­tion or the can­tons, and in par­tic­u­lar the in­tern­al or ex­tern­al se­cur­ity of the Con­fed­er­a­tion, re­quire that secrecy be pre­served;

b.

es­sen­tial private in­terests, and in par­tic­u­lar those of re­spond­ents, re­quire that secrecy be pre­served;

c.

the in­terests of an of­fi­cial in­vest­ig­a­tion that has not yet been con­cluded so re­quires.

² Any re­fus­al to al­low in­spec­tion may only ex­tend to the doc­u­ments that must re­main con­fid­en­tial.

³ At no time may a party be re­fused the right to in­spect his own sub­mis­sions, the of­fi­cial doc­u­ments he has sub­mit­ted in evid­ence or rul­ings is­sued to him; he may be re­fused the right to in­spect the tran­scripts of his own state­ments only if the in­vest­ig­a­tion has not yet been con­cluded

If a party is re­fused the right to in­spect a doc­u­ment, this doc­u­ment may be re­lied on to the pre­ju­dice of that party only if the party has been no­ti­fied by the au­thor­ity either verbally or in writ­ing of the con­tent of the doc­u­ment that is rel­ev­ant to the case and the party has been giv­en the op­por­tun­ity to state his po­s­i­tion on the doc­u­ment and to provide counter evid­ence.

The parties shall have the right to be heard.

¹ The au­thor­ity shall hear the parties be­fore is­su­ing a rul­ing.

² It is not re­quired to hear the parties be­fore is­su­ing:

a.

in­ter­im or­ders that can­not be con­tested sep­ar­ately by ap­peal;

b.

rul­ings that are con­test­able by ob­jec­tion;

c.

rul­ings in which the au­thor­ity grants the ap­plic­a­tion of the parties in full;

d.

en­force­ment meas­ures;

e.

oth­er rul­ings in pro­ceed­ings of first in­stance if there is a risk in any delay, the parties have the right to ap­peal against the rul­ing and no oth­er pro­vi­sion of fed­er­al law guar­an­tees the right to pre­lim­in­ary hear­ing.

¹ If it is prob­able that a rul­ing will af­fect nu­mer­ous per­sons or if it is not pos­sible to identi­fy all the parties without in­cur­ring un­reas­on­able ex­pense, the au­thor­ity, be­fore is­su­ing its rul­ing, may pub­lish the ap­plic­a­tion or the in­ten­ded rul­ing without stat­ing the grounds in an of­fi­cial gaz­ette while at the same time mak­ing the ap­plic­a­tion or the in­ten­ded rul­ing with the grounds there­for avail­able for pub­lic in­spec­tion, giv­ing no­tice of where it may be in­spec­ted.

² It shall hear the parties, by al­low­ing them an ap­pro­pri­ate peri­od to file their op­pos­i­tion.

³ The au­thor­ity shall give no­tice in its pub­lic­a­tion of the ob­lig­a­tion of the parties to ap­point an agent where ne­ces­sary and to pay pro­ced­ur­al costs and leg­al costs.

In a case where sev­er­al parties have con­flict­ing in­terests, the au­thor­ity shall hear each party on the ar­gu­ments of a re­spond­ent that ap­pear to be rel­ev­ant and that do not ex­clus­ively fa­vour the oth­er parties.

¹ The au­thor­ity shall as­sess be­fore it is­sues a rul­ing all ar­gu­ments of the parties that are rel­ev­ant and filed in time.

² Ar­gu­ments filed late by the parties that ap­pear to be cru­cial may be con­sidered des­pite the delay.

¹ The au­thor­ity shall ad­mit the evid­ence offered if it ap­pears re­li­able for de­term­in­ing the facts of the case.

² If tak­ing the evid­ence en­tails com­par­at­ively high costs, and if the party will be li­able for costs if the rul­ing is not in his fa­vour, the au­thor­ity may make the tak­ing of evid­ence de­pend­ent on the party mak­ing an ad­vance pay­ment, with­in a spe­cif­ic peri­od, of the costs that may reas­on­ably be in­curred; a party without fin­an­cial means shall be ex­emp­ted from the ob­lig­a­tion to make ad­vance pay­ment.

¹ The pro­ceed­ings shall be con­duc­ted in one of the four of­fi­cial lan­guages, and nor­mally in the lan­guage in which the parties have filed or would file their ap­plic­a­tions.

² In ap­peal pro­ceed­ings, the lan­guage of the con­tested de­cision is de­cis­ive. If the parties use a dif­fer­ent of­fi­cial lan­guage, the pro­ceed­ings may be con­duc­ted in this lan­guage.

³ If a party files of­fi­cial doc­u­ments that are not in an of­fi­cial lan­guage, the au­thor­ity may with the con­sent of the oth­er parties waive the re­quire­ment of a trans­la­tion.

⁴ If ne­ces­sary, the au­thor­ity shall or­der a trans­la­tion to be ob­tained.

¹ The au­thor­ity may sus­pend the pro­ceed­ings with the con­sent of the parties in or­der that the parties may agree on the con­tent of the rul­ing. The agree­ment should state that the parties waive their right of ap­peal and how the parties in­tend to al­loc­ate the costs.

² In or­der to en­cour­age an agree­ment, the au­thor­ity may ap­point a neut­ral and suit­ably qual­i­fied nat­ur­al per­son to be a me­di­at­or.

³ The me­di­at­or shall be bound only by the law and his man­date from the au­thor­ity. He may take evid­ence; for in­spec­tions, re­ports from ex­perts and the ex­am­in­a­tion of wit­nesses, he shall re­quire pri­or au­thor­isa­tion from the au­thor­ity.

⁴ The au­thor­ity shall make the agree­ment the con­tent of its rul­ing, un­less the agree­ment is de­fect­ive in terms of Art­icle 49.

⁵ If an agree­ment is reached, the au­thor­ity shall not charge any pro­ced­ur­al fees. If no agree­ment is reached, the au­thor­ity may dis­pense with im­pos­ing the costs of me­di­ation on the parties, provided the in­terests in­volved jus­ti­fy this.

⁶ A party may at any time re­quest that the sus­pen­sion of the pro­ceed­ings be re­voked.

¹ The au­thor­ity shall no­ti­fy the parties of its rul­ings in writ­ing.

^1bis With the con­sent of the party, no­ti­fic­a­tion of a rul­ing may be giv­en by elec­tron­ic means. The rul­ing must carry an elec­tron­ic sig­na­ture in ac­cord­ance with the Fed­er­al Act of 18 March 2016⁷¹ on Elec­tron­ic Sig­na­tures. The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall reg­u­late:

a.

the form of sig­na­ture to be used;

b.

the format of the rul­ing and its ac­com­pa­ny­ing doc­u­ments;

c.

the form and meth­od of trans­mis­sion;

d.

the time at which no­ti­fic­a­tion is deemed to have been giv­en.⁷²

² The au­thor­ity may verbally no­ti­fy the parties present of in­ter­im or­ders, but it must con­firm the rul­ing to them in writ­ing if any party re­quests this at the time; the peri­od al­lowed for ap­ply­ing for leg­al rem­ed­ies in this case be­gins from the time of writ­ten con­firm­a­tion.⁷³

¹ Writ­ten rul­ings must, even if the au­thor­ity is­sues them in the form of a let­ter, be des­ig­nated as such, must state the grounds on which they are based and con­tain in­struc­tions on leg­al rem­ed­ies.

² The in­struc­tions on leg­al rem­ed­ies must in­dic­ate the or­din­ary rem­ed­ies, the com­pet­ent au­thor­ity and the peri­od for ap­ply­ing for leg­al rem­ed­ies.

³ The au­thor­ity may dis­pense with stat­ing the grounds for the rul­ing and provid­ing in­struc­tions on leg­al rem­ed­ies if it grants the ap­plic­a­tions of the parties in full and no party re­quests that the grounds be stated.

The au­thor­ity may no­ti­fy its rul­ings by pub­lic­a­tion in an of­fi­cial gaz­ette:⁷⁴

a.

to any party whose place of res­id­ence is un­known and who has no con­tact­able rep­res­ent­at­ive;

b.⁷⁵

to any party who resides abroad and has no con­tact­able rep­res­ent­at­ive provided ser­vice at their place of res­id­ence is im­possible or if the party, in con­tra­ven­tion of Art­icle 11b para­graph 1, has failed to in­dic­ate a dom­i­cile for ser­vice in Switzer­land;

c.⁷⁶

in any case with nu­mer­ous parties;

d.⁷⁷

in any case which the iden­ti­fic­a­tion of all the parties would en­tail un­reas­on­able ex­pense.

No party may be pre­ju­diced by a de­fect in the no­ti­fic­a­tion pro­ced­ure.

The au­thor­ity may en­force its rul­ings provided:

a.

the rul­ing may no longer be con­tested through leg­al rem­ed­ies;

b.

the rul­ing may still be con­tested, but the per­mit­ted leg­al rem­edy does not have a sus­pens­ive ef­fect;

c.

the sus­pens­ive ef­fect of the leg­al rem­edy has been re­voked.

Rul­ings on the pay­ment of money or the pro­vi­sion of se­cur­ity must be en­forced by means of debt col­lec­tion pro­ceed­ings in ac­cord­ance with the Fed­er­al Act of 11 April 1889⁸⁰ on Debt Col­lec­tion and Bank­ruptcy.

¹ In or­der to en­force oth­er rul­ings, the au­thor­ity shall take the fol­low­ing meas­ures:

a.

sub­sti­tute per­form­ance by the au­thor­ity is­su­ing the rul­ing it­self or by a third party in­struc­ted at the ex­pense of the party li­able; the costs must be de­term­ined by spe­cial rul­ing;

b.

dir­ect en­force­ment against the party li­able in per­son or against his prop­erty;

c.

pro­sec­u­tion in the event that an­oth­er fed­er­al act provides for a pen­alty;

d.

pro­sec­u­tion for con­tempt un­der Art­icle 292 of the Crim­in­al Code⁸¹ if no oth­er crim­in­al law pro­vi­sion ap­plies.

² Be­fore the au­thor­ity takes any en­force­ment meas­ure, it shall give no­tice there­of to the party li­able and al­low him a suit­able peri­od in which to com­ply, in­dic­at­ing the stat­utory pen­al­ties in the cases re­ferred to in para­graph 1 let­ters c and d.

³ In the cases re­ferred to in para­graph 1 let­ters a and b, it may dis­pense with giv­ing no­tice of the en­force­ment meas­ure and al­low­ing a peri­od for com­pli­ance if there is a risk in any delay.

The au­thor­ity must not use a more rig­or­ous en­force­ment meas­ure than the cir­cum­stances re­quire.

The can­tons shall provide the fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies with mu­tu­al as­sist­ance in en­for­cing rul­ings.

Any rul­ing shall be sub­ject to an ap­peal.

¹ An ap­peal is per­mit­ted against sep­ar­ately no­ti­fied in­ter­im or­ders on jur­is­dic­tion and on re­quests for re­cus­al.

² These rul­ings may not be con­tested at a later date.

¹ An ap­peal is per­mit­ted against oth­er sep­ar­ately no­ti­fied in­ter­im or­ders:

a.

if they may cause a non-re­dress­able pre­ju­dice; or

b.

if grant­ing the ap­peal would im­me­di­ately bring about a fi­nal de­cision and thus would ob­vi­ate sig­ni­fic­ant ex­pendit­ure in time or money in pro­longed evid­en­tiary pro­ceed­ings.

² If an ap­peal un­der para­graph 1 is not per­mit­ted or if such right of ap­peal has not been ex­er­cised, the in­ter­im or­ders con­cerned shall be con­test­able by ap­peal against the fi­nal rul­ing, provided they have an ef­fect on the con­tent of the fi­nal rul­ing.

An ap­peal may be filed against the un­law­ful re­fus­al of or delay in is­su­ing a con­test­able rul­ing.

¹ The ap­pel­late au­thor­it­ies are:

a.

the Fed­er­al Coun­cil un­der Art­icles 72 ff.;

b.⁸⁶

the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court un­der Art­icles 31–34 of the Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court Act of 17 June 2005⁸⁷;

c.⁸⁸

oth­er au­thor­it­ies that are des­ig­nated as ap­pel­late au­thor­it­ies by a fed­er­al act;

d.⁸⁹

the su­per­vis­ory au­thor­ity if an ap­peal to the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court is in­com­pet­ent and fed­er­al law does not des­ig­nate any oth­er ap­pel­late au­thor­ity.

² If an ap­pel­late au­thor­ity not re­spons­ible for the fi­nal de­cision has is­sued an in­struc­tion in an in­di­vidu­al case that a lower in­stance should de­cide or has is­sued that in­stance with in­struc­tions on the con­tent of that de­cision, the rul­ing must be re­ferred dir­ectly to the next highest ap­pel­late au­thor­ity; at­ten­tion must be drawn to the fore­go­ing in the in­struc­tions on leg­al rem­ed­ies.⁹⁰

³ ...⁹¹

⁴ In­struc­tions that an ap­pel­late au­thor­ity is­sues if it de­cides in the case and refers the same back to the lower in­stance are not re­garded as in­struc­tions with­in the mean­ing of para­graph 2.

¹ A right of ap­peal shall be ac­cor­ded to any­one who:

a.

has par­ti­cip­ated or has been re­fused the op­por­tun­ity to par­ti­cip­ate in pro­ceed­ings be­fore the lower in­stance;

b.

has been spe­cific­ally af­fected by the con­tested rul­ing; and

c.

has a in­terest that is worthy of pro­tec­tion in the re­voc­a­tion or amend­ment of the rul­ing.

² Per­sons, or­gan­isa­tions and au­thor­it­ies who are gran­ted a right of ap­peal by an­oth­er fed­er­al act shall also be en­titled to ap­peal.

In the ap­peal, the ap­pel­lant may con­tend that:

a.

there has been a vi­ol­a­tion of fed­er­al law in­clud­ing the ex­ceed­ing or ab­use of dis­cre­tion­ary powers;

b.

there has been an in­cor­rect or in­com­plete de­term­in­a­tion of the leg­ally rel­ev­ant facts of the case;

c.

the rul­ing is in­ad­equate; a plea of in­ad­equacy is in­ad­miss­ible if a can­ton­al au­thor­ity has ruled as the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity.

¹ The ap­peal must be filed with­in 30 days of no­ti­fic­a­tion of the rul­ing.

² An ap­peal may be filed at any time against the un­law­ful re­fus­al of or delay in is­su­ing a rul­ing.

¹ The ap­peal pe­ti­tion must con­tain the ap­plic­a­tion, the grounds of ap­peal with de­tails of the evid­ence and the sig­na­ture of the ap­pel­lant or his agent; the of­fi­cial copy of the con­tested rul­ing and doc­u­ments cited as evid­ence must be at­tached, provided they are in the ap­pel­lant’s pos­ses­sion.

² If the ap­peal fails to sat­is­fy these re­quire­ments, or if the ap­plic­a­tion made by the ap­pel­lant or the grounds there­for lack the re­quired clar­ity but the ap­peal is not clearly in­ad­miss­ible, the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity shall grant the ap­pel­lant a short ad­di­tion­al peri­od to re­vise the ap­peal pe­ti­tion.

³ It shall at the same time no­ti­fy the ap­pel­lant that if there is not re­sponse with­in the ad­di­tion­al peri­od, it shall de­cide on the basis of the case files or in the ab­sence of an ap­plic­a­tion, grounds or a sig­na­ture, to de­clare the ap­peal in­ad­miss­ible.

If the un­usu­al com­plex­ity or spe­cial dif­fi­culty of an ap­peal case so re­quires, the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity shall grant an ap­pel­lant who so re­quests in his oth­er­wise prop­erly filed ap­peal a suit­able ad­di­tion­al peri­od with­in which to sup­ple­ment his grounds of ap­peal; in such cases, Art­icle 32 para­graph 2 does not ap­ply.

The right to deal with the case that is the sub­ject of the rul­ing be­ing con­tested on ap­peal is as­signed to the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity when the ap­peal is filed.

¹ An ap­peal shall have a sus­pens­ive ef­fect.

² If the rul­ing does not re­late to the pay­ment of money, the lower in­stance may re­voke the sus­pens­ive ef­fect of any ap­peal in its rul­ing; once the ap­peal has been filed, the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity, its pres­id­ent or the in­struct­ing judge has the same power.⁹⁶

³ The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity, its pres­id­ent or the in­struct­ing judge may re­in­state the sus­pens­ive ef­fect re­voked by the lower in­stance; an ap­plic­a­tion for the re­in­state­ment of the sus­pens­ive ef­fect must be de­cided im­me­di­ately.⁹⁷

⁴ If the sus­pens­ive ef­fect is re­voked ar­bit­rar­ily or an ap­plic­a­tion for the re­in­state­ment of the sus­pens­ive ef­fect is ar­bit­rar­ily not gran­ted or gran­ted late, the pub­lic cor­por­a­tion or autonom­ous in­sti­tu­tion on whose be­half the au­thor­ity has is­sued the rul­ing shall be li­able for any loss or dam­age in­curred thereby.

⁵ The pro­vi­sions of oth­er fed­er­al acts un­der which an ap­peal does not have a sus­pens­ive ef­fect are re­served.⁹⁸

Once the ap­peal has been filed, the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity, its pres­id­ent or the in­struct­ing judge may take oth­er pre­cau­tion­ary meas­ures ex of­fi­cio or in re­sponse to an ap­plic­a­tion by a party, in rul­ing to pre­serve the cur­rent situ­ation or to tem­por­ar­ily safe­guard in­terests that are at risk.

¹ The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity shall im­me­di­ately no­ti­fy the lower in­stance and any re­spond­ents or oth­er parties in­volved of any ap­peal that is not fun­da­ment­ally in­ad­miss­ible or ground­less, al­low them a peri­od with­in which to re­spond and at the same time re­quest the lower in­stance to pro­duce its case files.¹⁰⁰

² It may in­vite the parties to ex­change writ­ten sub­mis­sions at any stage of the pro­ceed­ings or ar­range an or­al de­bate with them.

¹ The lower in­stance may re­con­sider its con­tested rul­ing at any time pri­or to mak­ing a form­al re­sponse to the ap­peal.

² It shall no­ti­fy the parties im­me­di­ately of any new rul­ing and in­form the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity of the same.

³ The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity shall pro­ceed with the ap­peal un­less it is rendered ground­less by the new rul­ing of the lower in­stance; Art­icle 57 ap­plies if the new rul­ing is based on facts that are sub­stan­tially dif­fer­ent or cre­ates a leg­al po­s­i­tion that is sub­stan­tially dif­fer­ent.

The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity may not ap­point per­sons to hear the ap­peal who serve the lower in­stance or who par­ti­cip­ated in the draft­ing of the con­tested rul­ing; if the con­tested rul­ing is based on an in­struc­tion from the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity, Art­icle 47 para­graphs 2–4 also ap­ply.

¹ The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity may is­sue a rep­rim­and to or im­pose a dis­cip­lin­ary fine of up to 500 francs on parties or their rep­res­ent­at­ives who of­fend against the pro­pri­ety or dis­rupt the con­duct of the pro­ceed­ings.

² In cases of vex­a­tious or ir­re­spons­ible lit­ig­a­tion, the party and his rep­res­ent­at­ive may be is­sued with dis­cip­lin­ary fine of up to 1000 francs or of up to 3000 francs in the event of re­offend­ing.

³ The per­son presid­ing over a hear­ing may have per­sons who re­fuse to com­ply with his in­struc­tions re­moved from the room and may im­pose a dis­cip­lin­ary fine of up to 500 francs.

¹ The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity shall it­self make the de­cision in the case or in ex­cep­tion­al cases shall refer the case back to the lower in­stance and is­sue bind­ing in­struc­tions.

² The ap­peal de­cision shall con­tain a sum­mary of the rel­ev­ant facts of the case, a state­ment of the grounds for the de­cision and the op­er­at­ive part of the de­cision.

³ No­ti­fic­a­tion of the de­cision must be giv­en to the parties and the lower in­stance.

¹ The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity may amend the con­tested rul­ing in fa­vour of a party.

² It may amend the con­tested rul­ing to the pre­ju­dice of a party, provided the rul­ing vi­ol­ates fed­er­al law or is based on an in­cor­rect or in­com­plete de­term­in­a­tion of the facts of the case; the con­tested rul­ing may not be amended to the pre­ju­dice of a party on the grounds that it is in­ad­equate, oth­er than in the case of an amend­ment in fa­vour of a re­spond­ent.

³ If the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity in­tends to amend the con­tested rul­ing to the pre­ju­dice of a party, it shall no­ti­fy the party of this in­ten­tion and al­low him the op­por­tun­ity to re­spond.

⁴ In no event do the grounds for the ap­plic­a­tion bind the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity.

¹ In its judg­ment, the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity shall nor­mally im­pose the pro­ced­ur­al costs, con­sist­ing of the au­thor­ity's own fees, the re­gis­trar’s fees and cash out­lays on the un­suc­cess­ful party. If the party is only partly un­suc­cess­ful, the pro­ced­ur­al costs shall be re­duced. In ex­cep­tion­al cases, they may be re­mit­ted.

² No pro­ced­ur­al costs shall be im­posed on lower in­stances or ap­pel­lant fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies that are un­suc­cess­ful; per­sons oth­er than fed­er­al au­thor­it­ies that file an ap­peal and are un­suc­cess­ful shall be re­quired to pay pro­ced­ur­al costs provided the dis­pute relates to the pe­cu­ni­ary in­terests of pub­lic cor­por­a­tions or autonom­ous in­sti­tu­tions.

³ Pro­ced­ur­al costs may only be im­posed on a suc­cess­ful party if the costs were in­curred through a vi­ol­a­tion of pro­ced­ur­al du­ties.

⁴ The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity, its pres­id­ent or the in­struct­ing judge shall ob­tain from the ap­pel­lant an ad­vance pay­ment to cov­er costs equi­val­ent to the ex­pec­ted level of the costs. The ap­pel­lant must be al­lowed a suit­able peri­od with­in which to make pay­ment, sub­ject to the case be­ing dis­missed without en­ter­ing in­to its sub­stance in the event of non-pay­ment. If there are spe­cial reas­ons, the ad­vance pay­ment to cov­er costs may be waived in full or in part.¹⁰²

^4bis The au­thor­ity's own fees are gov­erned by the ex­tent and dif­fi­culty of the mat­ter in dis­pute, the form of the pro­ceed­ings and the fin­an­cial cir­cum­stances of the parties. They shall amount to:

a.

100–5000 francs in non-pe­cu­ni­ary dis­putes;

b.

100–50 000 francs in oth­er dis­putes.¹⁰³

⁵ The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall reg­u­late the de­tails of the cal­cu­la­tion of the fees.¹⁰⁴ Art­icle 16 para­graph 1 let­ter a of the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court Act of 17 June 2005¹⁰⁵ and Art­icle 73 of the Law En­force­ment Au­thor­it­ies Act of 19 March 2010¹⁰⁶ are re­served.¹⁰⁷

¹ The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity may award the suc­cess­ful party ex of­fi­cio or on ap­plic­a­tion a pay­ment in re­spect of all or part of the costs that he has in­curred that were reas­on­able and ne­ces­sary.

² The award shall be quan­ti­fied in the de­cision and im­posed on the pub­lic cor­por­a­tion or autonom­ous in­sti­tute in whose name the lower in­stance is­sued its rul­ing, un­less it may be im­posed on an un­suc­cess­ful re­spond­ent.

³ It may be im­posed on an un­suc­cess­ful re­spond­ent, de­pend­ing on his abil­ity to pay, provided the party par­ti­cip­ated in the pro­ceed­ings by fil­ing an in­de­pend­ent ap­plic­a­tion.

⁴ The pub­lic cor­por­a­tion or autonom­ous in­sti­tu­tion in whose name the lower in­stance is­sued its rul­ing shall be li­able for the pay­ment of an award im­posed on an un­suc­cess­ful re­spond­ent in the event that it is found to be un­re­cov­er­able.

⁵ The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall reg­u­late the cal­cu­la­tion of the award.¹⁰⁸ Art­icle 16 para­graph 1 let­ter a of the Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court Act of 17 June 2005¹⁰⁹ and Art­icle 73 of the Law En­force­ment Au­thor­it­ies Act of 19 March 2010¹¹⁰ are re­served.¹¹¹

¹ After the ap­peal has been filed, the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity, its pres­id­ent or the in­struct­ing judge shall on re­quest re­lieve a party who does not have the re­quired fin­an­cial means of the re­quire­ment to pay pro­ced­ur­al costs, un­less his ap­plic­a­tion ap­pears to have no pro­spect of suc­cess.¹¹²

² If it is ne­ces­sary in or­der to safe­guard his rights, the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity, its pres­id­ent or the in­struct­ing judge shall ap­point a law­yer to rep­res­ent the party.¹¹³

³ The li­ab­il­ity for the law­yer's costs and fees is de­term­ined in ac­cord­ance with Art­icle 64 para­graphs 2–4.

⁴ If the party later ac­quires suf­fi­cient fin­an­cial means, he shall be re­quired to re­im­burse the pub­lic cor­por­a­tion or autonom­ous in­sti­tu­tion that has paid the law­yer's fees and costs.

⁵ The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall reg­u­late the as­sess­ment of fees and costs.¹¹⁴ Art­icle 16 para­graph 1 let­ter a of the Ad­min­is­trat­ive Court Act of 17 June 2005¹¹⁵ and Art­icle 73 of the Law En­force­ment Au­thor­it­ies Act of 19 March 2010¹¹⁶ are re­served.¹¹⁷

¹ The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity shall re­view their de­cision ex of­fi­cio or on the ap­plic­a­tion of a party if the de­cision has been in­flu­enced by a felony or mis­de­mean­our.

² It shall also re­view its de­cision on the ap­plic­a­tion of a party if:

a.

the party in­tro­duces rel­ev­ant new facts or evid­ence;

b.

the party demon­strates that the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity over­looked rel­ev­ant facts that were on re­cord or spe­cif­ic ap­plic­a­tions;

c.

the party demon­strates that the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity vi­ol­ated the pro­vi­sions of Art­icles 10, 59 or 76 on re­cus­al, Art­icles 26–28 on the in­spec­tion of files or the Art­icles 29–33 on the right to be heard; or

d.¹¹⁹

the European Court of Hu­man Rights has held in a fi­nal judg­ment that there has been a vi­ol­a­tion of the Con­ven­tion of 4 Novem­ber 1950¹²⁰ for the Pro­tec­tion of Hu­man Rights and Fun­da­ment­al Freedoms (ECHR) or of the pro­to­cols thereto, or if the case has been con­cluded by means of a friendly set­tle­ment (Art. 39 ECHR), provided an award of dam­ages is not suf­fi­cient to rem­edy the con­sequences of the vi­ol­a­tion and the re­view is ne­ces­sary in rul­ing to re­dress the vi­ol­a­tion.

³ The grounds re­ferred to in para­graph 2 let­ters a–c are not re­garded as grounds for a re­view if the party had the op­por­tun­ity to in­voke them in the course of pro­ceed­ings pri­or to the ap­peal de­cision, or by means of an ap­peal that he was en­titled to bring against the ap­peal de­cision.

¹ The ap­plic­a­tion for a re­view must be filed with the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity with­in 90 days of be­com­ing aware of the grounds for a re­view, but at the latest with­in 10 years of re­ceipt of writ­ten no­ti­fic­a­tion of the ap­peal de­cision.¹²¹

^1bis In the case re­ferred to in Art­icle 66 para­graph 2 let­ter d, the ap­plic­a­tion for a re­view must be filed with­in 90 days of the rel­ev­ant judg­ment of the European Court of Hu­man Rights un­der Art­icle 44 the European Con­ven­tion on Hu­man Rights of 4 Novem­ber 1950¹²² tak­ing full leg­al ef­fect.¹²³

² If 10 years have elapsed since no­ti­fic­a­tion of the ap­peal de­cision, an ap­plic­a­tion for a re­view is only ad­miss­ible on the grounds cited in Art­icle 66 para­graph 1.

³ The con­tent, form, cor­rec­tion and amend­ment of the ap­plic­a­tion for a re­view are gov­erned by Art­icles 52 and 53; the state­ment of grounds must in par­tic­u­lar in­dic­ate the grounds for the re­view and con­firm­a­tion that the ap­plic­a­tion for a re­view has been filed in time. This must also con­tain the ap­plic­a­tion in the event that a new ap­peal de­cision is made.

¹ If the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity de­cides to ad­mit the ap­plic­a­tion for a re­view and if it re­gards the same as jus­ti­fied, it shall re­voke the ap­peal de­cision and make a new de­cision.

² Art­icles 56, 57 and 59–65 also ap­ply to the con­sid­er­a­tion of the ap­plic­a­tion for a re­view.

¹ The ap­pel­late au­thor­ity shall at the re­quest of any party ex­plain the ap­peal de­cision if there are any in­con­sist­en­cies or con­tra­dic­tions in the op­er­at­ive part of the de­cision or between the op­er­at­ive part and the state­ment of grounds.

² A new peri­od for fil­ing an ap­peal be­gins from the date of the ex­plan­at­ory state­ment.

³ Ty­po­graph­ic­al or arith­met­ic­al er­rors or ad­min­is­trat­ive omis­sions that have no in­flu­ence on the de­cision or on the es­sen­tial con­tent of the grounds may be cor­rec­ted by the ap­pel­late au­thor­ity at any time.

¹ Any­one may at any time re­port mat­ters to the su­per­vis­ory au­thor­ity that re­quire ac­tion to be taken ex of­fi­cio in the pub­lic in­terest against an au­thor­ity.

² The per­son mak­ing the re­port does not have the rights of a party.

An ap­peal to the Fed­er­al Coun­cil is ad­miss­ible against:

a.

rul­ings re­lat­ing to the in­tern­al and ex­tern­al se­cur­ity of the coun­try, neut­ral­ity, dip­lo­mat­ic pro­tec­tion and the oth­er mat­ters re­lat­ing to ex­tern­al re­la­tions, un­less in­ter­na­tion­al law con­fers the right to have the mat­ter judged by a court;

b.

first in­stance rul­ings on the per­form­ance-re­lated ele­ment of the salar­ies of fed­er­al per­son­nel.

An ap­peal to the Fed­er­al Coun­cil is ad­miss­ible against rul­ings:

a.

is­sued by the de­part­ments and the Fed­er­al Chan­cellery;

b.

is­sued by au­thor­it­ies of fi­nal in­stance of autonom­ous in­sti­tu­tions and of busi­nesses of the Con­fed­er­a­tion;

c.

is­sued by can­ton­al au­thor­it­ies of fi­nal in­stance.

An ap­peal to the Fed­er­al Coun­cil is in­ad­miss­ible against rul­ings that may be con­tested by ap­peal to an­oth­er fed­er­al au­thor­ity or by ob­jec­tion.

¹ The Fed­er­al De­part­ment of Justice and Po­lice shall con­duct the ap­peal brief­ing pro­ced­ure.

² The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall del­eg­ate the ap­peal brief­ing pro­ced­ure in ap­peals against rul­ings of the Fed­er­al De­part­ment of Justice and Po­lice to an­oth­er de­part­ment.

³ The brief­ing de­part­ment shall sub­mit its pro­pos­als to the Fed­er­al Coun­cil and shall ex­er­cise the powers held by the Fed­er­al Coun­cil as ap­pel­late au­thor­ity un­til the de­cision is made.

¹ The mem­ber of the Fed­er­al Coun­cil against whose de­part­ment the ap­peal is filed shall not par­ti­cip­ate in the de­cision of the Fed­er­al Coun­cil.

² His de­part­ment may par­ti­cip­ate in the pro­ceed­ings be­fore the Fed­er­al Coun­cil as if it were an ap­pel­lant and also with­in the frame­work of the joint re­port­ing pro­ced­ure un­der Art­icle 54 of the Ad­min­is­tra­tion Or­gan­isa­tion Act of 19 Septem­ber 1978¹³³.

³ If the joint re­port­ing pro­ced­ure leads to new fac­tu­al or leg­al sub­mis­sions be­ing made, the ap­pel­lant, any re­spond­ents or oth­er parties in­volved must be heard on these sub­mis­sions.

Art­icles 45–70 also ap­ply.

¹ If the Fed­er­al Coun­cil is­sues a rul­ing as the sole or first in­stance, the de­part­ment that is com­pet­ent in the mat­ter shall provide it with a pro­pos­al on the rul­ing.

² The de­part­ment shall ex­er­cise the powers held by the Fed­er­al Coun­cil un­til the rul­ing has been is­sued.

³ Art­icles 7–43 also ap­ply.

¹ An ap­peal to the Fed­er­al As­sembly is ad­miss­ible against ap­peal de­cisions and rul­ings if a fed­er­al act so provides.¹³⁷

² The ap­peal must be filed with the Fed­er­al As­sembly with­in 30 days of no­ti­fic­a­tion of the ap­peal de­cision or the rul­ing.

³ The ap­peal shall have no sus­pens­ive ef­fect un­less a re­lated pro­vi­sion­al rul­ing has been is­sued by the Fed­er­al Coun­cil.

On com­mence­ment of this Act, the fol­low­ing are re­pealed:

a.

Art­icle 23^bis of the Fed­er­al Act of 26 March 1914¹³⁸ on the Or­gan­isa­tion of the Fed­er­al Ad­min­is­tra­tion;

b.

Art­icles 124–134, 158 and 164 of the Fed­er­al Justice Act¹³⁹;

c.

con­tra­dict­ory pro­vi­sions of the fed­er­al law; sup­ple­ment­ary pro­vi­sions un­der Art­icle 4 are re­served.

This Act does not ap­ply to dis­putes be­fore au­thor­it­ies of ad­min­is­trat­ive justice at the time of its com­mence­ment and to ap­peals or ob­jec­tions against rul­ings is­sued be­fore its com­mence­ment; in such cases, the pre­vi­ous pro­vi­sions on pro­ced­ure and pro­vi­sions ap­ply.

The Fed­er­al Coun­cil shall de­term­ine the date on which this Act comes in­to force.

Com­mence­ment date: 1 Oc­to­ber 1969¹⁴⁰