By Startups.ch, May 13, 2013

Partial self-employment: Owning your own business and unemployment insurance

Principally it is not possible that one is self-employed and unemployed at the same time. It is, however, possible to be partially self-employed, where one is only part-time self-employed.

Partial self-employment, what is that?

First of all, a classification must take place to gain self-employment benefits. Benefits depend on whether a activity is being carried out which at anytime can cease in order to pursue a gainful employment in a non-independent manner. In a capacity to mitigate loss, the insures individual is carrying out some sort of activity. The requirements for work that allows for unemployment benefits are the following:

• the work must be temporary
• the work must have limited hours
• the work must require no or very little (financial) investment

The goal here is not that the individual will be self-employed in the future, but rather that he or she continues to look for an job with an employer.
In the case of partial self-employment, at least one of the aforementioned prerequisites would be unfulfilled. This means that an individual would be considered part-time self- employed. Therefore, there would be no claim to any unemployment benefits. Consequently, during the time of partial self-employment there can be no expectation of government subsidy or relief through unemployment insurance.