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Bookkeeping for Solo-GmbHs

Learn how you can use Magic Heidi as a GmbH owner with no employees (except yourself).

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You created a GmbH to look more professional, to separate yourself as a legal entity from your business and to become a normal employee again.

But now, you're overwhelmed by the complexity of being a company..
Can't you just continue like a freelancer just as before, but as a GmbH?
Magic Heidi helps you to do exactly this, but you will also need the assistance of an accountant.

✅ What you need for your Swiss tax return as a GmbH owner

Let's see what is required and what Magic Heidi helps you with.

Here are the mandatory documents you must provide every year for a Swiss GmbH tax return. These are the minimum required by Swiss law and by cantonal tax authorities.

1) Annual financial statements (Jahresrechnung)

The core legal requirement under Swiss Code of Obligations (OR).

Consists of:

a) Balance sheet (Bilanz)

Shows the financial position of the GmbH at year-end:

  • Assets (cash, receivables, equipment)
  • Liabilities (debts, VAT owed)
  • Equity (share capital, retained earnings)

b) Income statement / Profit & Loss (Erfolgsrechnung)

Shows the results for the year:

  • Income
  • Expenses
  • Operating profit or loss

c) Notes / disclosures (Anhang)

A short set of required explanations, including:

  • Accounting principles used
  • Depreciation rules
  • Shareholder loans (if any)
  • Number of full-time employees (<10 simplified)
    For small GmbHs, this section is short.

2) Corporate tax forms (provided by the canton)

You must fill in and submit:

  • Kantonal/communal tax form (Steuererklärung juristische Personen)
  • Federal direct tax form (Eidg. Steuererklärung)

These include basic company details, financial figures from your annual statements, and confirmations.

3) Business bank statements for the entire year

Required to verify:

  • Cash balances in the balance sheet
  • Transactions related to income and expenses

Most cantons ask for all accounts of the GmbH.

4) Complete accounting records (Belege + Buchhaltung)

You must keep and provide if asked:

  • All invoices issued
  • All expense receipts
  • Contracts
  • Ledger entries / journal (Hauptbuch)

Even if the tax office doesn’t ask for everything upfront, these are legally mandatory and must be available.

5) VAT returns (only if VAT-registered)

If you are subject to VAT:

  • All quarterly/semester VAT declarations
  • Annual VAT reconciliation (MWST-Abrechnung)

Authorities may cross-check your revenue.

7) Depreciation schedule (Anlagenspiegel)

For assets like:

  • Laptops
  • Equipment
  • Furniture

Shows:

  • Purchase price
  • Depreciation rate
  • Remaining value

This supports the numbers in your balance sheet.

📌 Summary: Minimum required each year

Always required:

  1. Balance sheet
  2. Profit & loss statement
  3. Notes (Anhang)
  4. Corporate tax forms (cantonal + federal)
  5. Bank statements
  6. Full accounting with receipts and ledger

Required if applicable:

  • VAT returns
  • Inventory list
  • Depreciation schedule

That's a lot! In the next section, we'll see what Magic Heidi helps with, and what you'll need an accountant for.

What does Magic Heidi provide?

Because Magic Heidi is primarily focused on freelancers, our software only does what freelancers need.

General ledger (Hauptbuch)

Because freelancers only need to track their revenue and expenses, this is the only document Magic Heidi provides out of the box.

It is an Excel document that contains all your invoices, expenses and a clear summary of your revenue types, which bank accounts received how much, as well as what expense categories represented the biggest chunk of your expenses for a given year.

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This document is everything a freelancer needs for their tax return. For a GmbH, it is a starting point from which your accountant can then complete the other documents.

Additionally, Magic Heidi furnishes the complete accounting records (as a .zip file) that contains the pdfs and images for all the invoices and expenses generated that year.

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So what's missing?

What do you need an accountant for?

Since Magic Heidi is not a complete accounting solution, we don't keep records of your assets and liabilities and thus can't generate a Balance sheet.

Additionally, since we don't import the balance directly from your bank account, we can't generate Cash balance statements.

Finally, since we don't support depreciation of assets, we also can't provide Depreciation schedules.

These are all things accountants can easily generate for you if you provide them with the missing data. Expect to pay 1'500-2'000 CHF per year for this service.

In summary

If you are a GmbH, but everything really looks like a freelance business:

  • You don't have employees
  • You are not asset heavy (for example, if you are a Car Dealer, that would be an asset heavy business) and don't need to depreciate assets
  • You don't make loans or took out loans

Then Magic Heidi will work great for you! And your bookkeeper will be able to convert the exported documents from Magic Heidi into what you need for your tax returns.