A Swiss-based trading company receives a purchase order from a long-standing customer. The goods are industrial components covered by Switzerland's autonomous sanctions measures. The customer's bank account sits in a jurisdiction subject to a Swiss ordinance. The compliance officer asks: can this transaction proceed, and if so, what must the company do before it ships?
A specific licence (a case-by-case authorisation granted by the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, known as SECO, permitting a transaction that would otherwise be prohibited under a Swiss sanctions ordinance) is the mechanism that keeps legitimate commerce alive within a controlled regime. SECO administers Switzerland's autonomous sanctions programme under the relevant Swiss embargo legislation, reviewing each application on its individual facts. As of mid-2026, the programme spans multiple country-specific and thematic ordinances, and the licensing procedure – while distinct from those of OFAC or OFSI – follows a structured sequence that applicants must navigate precisely.
This guide sets out each stage of that sequence, identifies where applications typically fail, and explains how the Swiss position compares with the equivalent procedures in the EU, the United Kingdom, and the United States – a comparison that matters because many applicants under SECO also have parallel exposure under one or more of those regimes.
What authority administers specific licence applications in Switzerland, and on what legal basis?
SECO – the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs – is the competent authority for licensing decisions under Switzerland's autonomous sanctions regime. It acts under the relevant federal embargo legislation and the ordinances that implement each country-specific or thematic programme. SECO sits within the Federal Department of Economic Affairs, Education and Research, and its sanctions unit has responsibility for both the day-to-day maintenance of the ordinances and the licensing decisions that individual operators require.
The legal basis for a specific licence is found in the applicable sanctions ordinance itself, which typically provides that SECO may authorise acts that are otherwise prohibited where defined conditions are met. Those conditions vary by ordinance – humanitarian grounds, the absence of any circumvention risk, the nature of the goods or services, and the interests of the persons affected by the prohibition all feature. Applicants who treat each ordinance as interchangeable will be disappointed: the grounds available under one programme are not automatically available under another.
One structural point sets the Swiss position apart from the approach of the European Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Switzerland is not an EU member state, so the EU Council regulations that bind French, German, or Spanish operators do not bind a Swiss company directly. A Swiss entity trading into the EU single market, however, must attend to both regimes. In our practice, we regularly advise on exactly that overlap, where a transaction requires a SECO authorisation on the Swiss side and a separate EU-law analysis on the counterparty's side.
The position above covers the standard case. Your facts – the counterparty's nationality, the goods classification, the payment route, and the specific ordinance in force – can change the analysis significantly. For an initial review of a proposed transaction, contact Calder & Vance at info@caldervance.com.
Step 1 – Identify the applicable ordinance and confirm the prohibition
Before an application can be prepared, the operator must confirm which Swiss sanctions ordinance applies and satisfy itself that the proposed act is genuinely prohibited by that ordinance rather than merely subject to controls under a parallel regime. This sounds obvious; in practice it is the step most often compressed or skipped.
Switzerland maintains a series of autonomous ordinances that do not always mirror the EU or UN measures with which most compliance practitioners are familiar. The scope of a Swiss ordinance – the persons covered, the assets frozen, the transactions prohibited – is defined by its own terms. An operator who screens only against the EU Consolidated List and concludes "no hit" may still face a Swiss-law prohibition if the counterparty or the asset falls within a Swiss-specific entry.
The practical checklist for this step is short but disciplined. First, identify every ordinance that could reach the proposed transaction by subject matter – country-specific, thematic, or both. Second, map the proposed acts (payment, delivery, provision of services, making funds available) against the prohibitions in each relevant ordinance. Third, confirm whether any general exemption already covers the act. If no general exemption applies and the prohibition is engaged, a specific licence is required before the transaction may proceed.
One common error at this stage is to assume that a transaction structured through a non-Swiss entity falls outside Swiss reach. Swiss law applies to acts performed in Switzerland and, in some cases, to acts by persons or entities with a sufficient Swiss nexus. Where there is any doubt about territorial scope, that question should be resolved before an application is filed.
Step 2 – Assess eligibility and gather the documentary foundation
SECO will only grant a specific licence where the applicant can demonstrate that the proposed act meets the conditions prescribed in the applicable ordinance. The eligibility assessment is therefore not a procedural formality but the analytical core of the application. Rushing to file without completing it is among the most common reasons applications stall or fail.
The grounds most frequently available include: a humanitarian purpose, a necessity to satisfy basic needs of the persons affected by the measure, a legal proceeding, or – in some programmes – the absence of any adverse effect on the objectives of the sanctions regime. The precise list differs by ordinance, and some grounds carry additional conditions. Where the humanitarian ground is invoked, for example, the applicant will normally be expected to demonstrate that the goods or services in question will reach the intended beneficiary and that the relevant funds or assets will not, directly or indirectly, become available to a designated person.
We have acted for applicants who arrived at the licensing stage with a strong underlying case but an incomplete documentary file. The result in those matters was not outright refusal but a request for additional information that extended the process by weeks. What documentation will SECO require? The answer is not set out in a single published checklist; it depends on the ordinance, the ground relied upon, and the nature of the transaction. As a practical guide, the file should typically include: a clear description of the proposed act; identification of all parties, including any intermediaries; documentary evidence of the humanitarian or other ground; evidence of the transaction structure and payment route; and a statement explaining why no general exemption applies. Certified translations may be required for documents not in a Swiss national language.
The comparison with the United Kingdom is instructive here. Under OFSI's licensing regime, a specific licence application follows a broadly similar logic – purpose, parties, and transaction – but OFSI publishes more granular guidance on what each licence category requires. SECO's approach is more text-of-ordinance-driven, which places a heavier analytical burden on the applicant's counsel to construct the right documentary scaffold without a pre-set form.
Step 3 – Prepare and submit the application to SECO
The application is addressed to SECO's sanctions unit and submitted in writing. SECO accepts applications in German, French, Italian, and English, though official Swiss-language submissions are generally preferable for clarity and pace. The application must identify the applicable ordinance, the specific prohibition engaged, the licence ground relied upon, and the evidence supporting the grant of the licence.
Structure matters. A well-organised file that leads with the ground, sets out the relevant facts in chronological order, and annexes the documentary evidence in a clear sequence is processed more efficiently than a submission that requires the reviewing officer to extract the key facts from a narrative. In our experience, applications drafted as a single discursive letter – common practice among first-time applicants – tend to produce information requests that could have been avoided by a tabular presentation of the key facts up front.
The applicant should also consider at the outset whether the application needs to be coordinated with a parallel filing in another jurisdiction. A European exporter also subject to EU Council regulations may need to approach the relevant EU member-state authority simultaneously, and the two applications may require consistent but not identical framing – the grounds available under EU law and Swiss law are not always the same. In our cross-border practice, we regularly advise on the sequencing of parallel licence applications to ensure that a grant in one jurisdiction does not create inconsistency problems in the other.
If a transaction has already been flagged by a bank or a logistics partner, or a filing has been refused, an early review can preserve options that narrow with time. To discuss an urgent matter, write to info@caldervance.com.
How long does a SECO specific-licence application take, and what happens while it is pending?
SECO does not publish a standard processing timeline for specific-licence applications. The duration depends on the complexity of the case, the completeness of the file, and the volume of applications under review at the relevant time. Based on our experience of Swiss licensing matters, a straightforward application on a well-documented humanitarian ground can expect a determination within several weeks; a more complex transaction involving multiple parties, a contested nexus to a designated person, or a novel legal question will take longer. Applicants should not assume that filing constitutes permission to proceed.
While the application is pending, the prohibition remains in force. The applicant may not carry out the prohibited act. This stands in contrast to some other regimes where a submitted application or a general exemption for "pending licence" transactions permits limited interim activity. Under the Swiss position, the licence must be in hand before the transaction is executed – and this point has practical consequences for commercial contract drafting. Any supply agreement or financial arrangement that could be caught by a Swiss sanctions ordinance should include a conditions-precedent structure that suspends performance until the required authorisation is obtained. We have seen transactions exposed to breach claims because this structure was not in place from the outset.
The comparison with OFAC is worth making. OFAC similarly requires that the licence be obtained before the prohibited act takes place. The US regime does, however, publish indicative processing times for certain categories of specific-licence application, giving applicants a planning baseline. SECO's less-published approach means that practitioners must build in wider contingency and communicate realistic timelines to commercial counterparts from the start.
What are the principal risk flags in a SECO specific-licence application?
Several risk factors consistently produce adverse outcomes – outright refusal, lengthy information requests, or post-grant enforcement scrutiny. Recognising them before filing is the most effective form of risk management.
The first and most common risk is applying for the wrong ground. An applicant who invokes a ground that is not available under the specific ordinance in force will receive a refusal, not a correction. A thorough reading of the applicable ordinance text – not a generic understanding of Swiss sanctions law – is essential before the ground is selected. This is not a task well suited to a compliance checklist designed for EU or UK licensing; the Swiss texts require their own analysis.
The second risk is inadequate evidence of the proposed beneficiary's position. Where the licence ground is that the transaction serves the basic needs of natural persons affected by a measure, SECO will examine whether the funds or goods can realistically reach those persons without passing through a designated person's control. Applicants must address this proactively, not reactively. Evidence of the distribution chain, the identity of the end recipient, and the oversight arrangements are all relevant.
Third, applicants sometimes underestimate the effect of related-party structures. An entity that is not itself designated but is owned or controlled by a designated person may be caught by the ordinance's prohibitions. The ownership and control concept – under which a non-listed entity can be captured through a listed person's ownership or control of it – applies under Swiss law as well as under the EU and UK regimes. A licence application that does not address the ownership chain of all relevant parties risks a request for information that reopens foundational questions about whether the proposed licensee itself is a permissible counterparty.
Fourth, secondary-sanctions risk is real for applicants whose transaction also has a US nexus. OFAC's secondary-sanctions measures can reach non-US persons who engage with certain designated persons or in transactions connected to specific programmes, even where no US jurisdiction would otherwise apply. A SECO licence authorises the Swiss-law position; it does not resolve a US secondary-sanctions exposure. Applicants in industries with significant US-dollar flows, US-manufactured content, or US-person involvement must assess both questions in parallel.
How does Switzerland's specific-licence process compare with EU, UK, and US equivalents?
Practitioners who handle licensing across multiple regimes will find both parallels and material differences when they approach a SECO application for the first time. The comparison is worth making in structured terms.
Under the EU regime, specific-licence applications are addressed to the competent authority of the relevant member state, which then applies the criteria set out in the relevant Council regulation. The substantive grounds are broadly similar – humanitarian necessity, legal proceedings, basic needs – but the procedural path and the quality of published guidance vary significantly across member states. An application in one member state can produce a different outcome than the same application presented in another, even under an identical Council regulation. Switzerland's unitary authority – SECO – avoids that variability. There is one competent authority, one procedural path, and one set of ordinance texts.
Under the UK regime, OFSI is the competent authority for financial-sanctions licences. OFSI publishes detailed guidance on its licensing categories, specifies what evidence it requires for each, and provides written determinations. The OFSI process is in some respects more transparent, with published service standards for processing times. SAMLA – the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act – provides the overarching legislative basis, and specific licences under that framework operate on similar purpose-driven grounds to the Swiss ordinances. A material difference is that OFSI's guidance can be relied upon as a safe-harbour planning document; SECO's more text-driven approach does not offer the same degree of advance certainty.
Under the US regime, OFAC issues specific licences through a centralised application process. The grounds are enumerated in OFAC's licensing guidance, and the agency distinguishes clearly between the licence application and the related question of whether a voluntary self-disclosure – a VSD (a formal self-report of an apparent violation to the regulator, available under OFAC's enforcement framework) – may also be warranted. OFAC's programme-specific guidance is detailed and publicly available. The US regime also distinguishes between specific licences and general licences (standing authorisations for defined categories of transactions) more explicitly than the Swiss ordinances, which rely more on individual-case authorisations.
The practical upshot for a business operating across more than one of these regimes is that a transaction requiring a SECO authorisation will likely also require separate analysis under whichever other regimes are engaged. A single submission to SECO does not discharge the obligation under OFAC, OFSI, or the EU. Parallel filing, coordinated evidence packages, and consistent framing are all planning items that counsel must address from the outset.
Related practices
- Frozen account management under BIS and the EAR – managing blocked assets and licensing under US export-control authority
- Specific licence applications under Singapore's regime – a comparable step-by-step guide for the MAS and MTI licensing process
A common misconception: SECO licensing is a formality for genuine humanitarian transactions
The most persistent myth we encounter is that a transaction with a clearly humanitarian purpose will receive a SECO licence as a matter of course. The argument runs: the goods are medicines, or food, or civil infrastructure equipment; no reasonable authority would refuse. It is an understandable assumption. It is also wrong as a guide to how to prepare an application.
SECO applies the conditions in the applicable ordinance, not a general assessment of the transaction's merits. A humanitarian purpose satisfies the threshold question of whether a relevant ground exists; it does not displace the applicant's obligation to demonstrate that the specific conditions are met. Is the proposed distribution chain adequate? Are there designated persons in the ownership or management of the recipient organisation? Are the payment flows properly documented? These questions must be answered affirmatively and evidentially, not assumed.
In a recent matter, a logistics operator sought a licence for the onward movement of medical equipment. The humanitarian ground was clearly engaged. What was not in the initial application was adequate documentation of the final-mile distribution arrangements. SECO issued a request for information on exactly that point. We advised on the supplementary submission, addressed the distribution-chain question with structured evidence, and the licence was subsequently granted. The matter resolved – but it took longer than it would have done had the distribution documentation been built into the original file. The lesson is straightforward: assume that SECO will test every element of the applicable ground, not merely accept the recited purpose.