VIAC 3a Review 2024 – Pros & Cons
| Updated: |(Disclosure: Some of the links below may be affiliate links)
There are many third pillar providers in Switzerland. Some are good, but most are too expensive. You do not want to waste your retirement bank on fees. Therefore, you need to choose the best third pillar provider.
In 2018, VIAC started on the market of third pillars. VIAC is the first mobile third pillar. And they are really interesting! VIAC has very low fees and lets you invest up to 99% exposure in stocks. It is significantly better than what I have found before in other third-pillar providers.
In this article, I do an in-depth review of VIAC! Among other things, we will look at this service’s investing strategies and fees.
| Total Fee | 0.41% per year |
|---|---|
| Maximum portfolios | 5 |
| Stock allocation | Up to 99% |
| Maximum foreign exposure | 60% |
| Maximum investment in cash | 100% |
| Investment Strategy | Index funds |
| Fund providers | Credit Suisse and Swisscanto |
| Languages | English, French, German, and Italian |
| Sustainable option | Yes |
| Mobile Application | Yes |
| Web Application | Yes |
| Custodian Bank | WIR |
| Established | 2018 |
| Foundation’s domicile | Basel |
VIAC
VIAC is a recent actor in the third pillar area. It was launched in 2018 and is becoming increasingly popular.
It is pretty new compared to other big banks. It is essential to mention that VIAC is not a bank. The money you have with them is stored in the WIR bank. As such, you will have complete protection up to 100’000 CHF like the other banks. This protection is critical. Without that, I would not consider this provider at all. You want your money to have maximum protection.
VIAC is quite different from the other providers. You will only have access through a mobile application or web application. They do not have offices where you can do operations with them. This absence of bank offices is what makes them offer very low fees.
They started with only a mobile application. But since then, VIAC has added support for a web application. The web application is great for people like me who are not fond of mobile phones. Most people will probably like mobile applications since they are fond of phones.
To learn more about VIAC, you can read my Interview of Daniel Peter, CEO of VIAC.
So, we will see how good VIAC is as a third pillar in Switzerland.
Investing Strategies
For long-term investors, the investing strategy of a third pillar is essential.
VIAC offers three sets of strategies:
- Global – Investing in the entire world.
- Switzerland – Investing in Switzerland
- Global Sustainable – Investing in the whole world but omits some stocks such as tobacco or weapons stocks. This is called sustainable investing.
Each strategy has five variants: 20, 40, 60, 80, and 100. These variants specify the allocation to stocks.
You can also define your strategy by composing it with their different underlying funds. This customization is an excellent way to choose exactly what you want to invest in. But then, you need to have a good idea of how to create a custom portfolio. I would not recommend this to a starter investor.
The fact that we can go up to 100% invested is great! For a long-term aggressive investor, this is ideal. It is investing only 99% since they keep 1% in cash in each portfolio. But 99% is already a great amount invested in stocks.
Interestingly, they allow you to invest in either cash or bonds if you do not fully invest in stocks. This is great for people who do not think bonds will overperform cash.
You can also have several portfolios, up to five. Having five accounts is great for optimizing taxes by making staggered withdrawals.
VIAC Global 100 Fund
The most interesting strategy is the VIAC Global 100 strategy, which I chose for my VIAC account when I used it.
This fund invests 99% in stocks. Out of these stocks, 40% are Swiss stocks. Because of regulations, each portfolio is limited to 60% in foreign currency exposure. This is not a limitation on Swiss stocks since you could use CHF-hedged funds to get more foreign exposure while keeping under the limit. However, the default portfolio uses Swiss Stocks for 40%. The rest is invested in the entire world based on market-cap weight. The remaining 1% is allocated to cash.
This strategy’s TER is 0.45%, and there are no other fees, making it a very cheap solution for Switzerland!
Here is the allocation by region of the Global 100 fund:
And there is the exact allocation of each sub-fund (as of September 2018):
- SMI (Swiss): 27.75%
- SPI Extra (Swiss): 9.25%
- Europe ex-CH: 10.60%
- S&P 500: 31.51%
- Canada: 1.93%
- Pacific ex-Japan: 2.54%
- Japan: 4.46%
- Emerging Markets: 8.96
- Cash: 3.00%
This offer is great. It is better than most other candidates:
- The allocation to stocks is high
- The allocation to international stocks is the maximum permitted by their regulations.
In the long term, this nice allocation to stocks and the relatively low fees will result in significantly more returns.
VIAC Fees
When investing long-term, it is important to look at the fees.
The base fee of VIAC is 0.52% per year. But you only pay this fee on the invested part (the stocks). So, if you have more cash, you get fewer fees.
In 2021, VIAC introduced a fee cap on its administration fee. So, you cannot end up with more than a 0.40% administration fee. If your strategy has a higher fee, it is reduced to 0.40%.
Now, some of the strategies also have product costs. These products can make the strategy more expensive than 0.40%; only VIAC’s administration fee is capped.
The fees at VIAC are different for each universe and strategy. For instance, here are the fees for the global strategies:
- Global 20: 0.17% per year
- Global 40: 0.28% per year
- Global 60: 0.39% per year
- Global 80: 0.41% per year
- Global 100: 0.41% per year
Fees for Switzerland strategies are slightly higher:
- Switzerland 20: 0.17% per year
- Switzerland 40: 0.28% per year
- Switzerland 60: 0.39% per year
- Switzerland 80: 0.42% per year
- Switzerland 100: 0.43% per year
And the sustainable strategies are the most expensive:
- Global Sustainable 20: 0.16% per year
- Global Sustainable 40: 0.28% per year
- Global Sustainable 60: 0.39% per year
- Global Sustainable 80: 0.43% per year
- Global Sustainable 100: 0.44% per year
Overall, these are excellent fees! Compared to most offers in Switzerland, this is better!
Life and disability insurance
VIAC has something special that differentiates it from other third-pillar providers.
Indeed, with VIAC, you can get life or disability insurance. With each 10’000 CHF invested in your account (only the invested part counts), you get 2’500 CHF insurance.
You have to choose in your account whether you want disability (in case of at least 70% disability) insurance or life insurance. In the case of life insurance, this will be paid to your beneficiaries with the money of your third pillar. In case of disability, you will get the insurance payment directly from yourself.
It is a nice bonus, but this is not life-changing. This will only be useful if you die or get disabled (and you have to choose) before your retirement age. And the amount is still quite limited, so, for many people, this will not replace proper life or disability insurance. But this could still be very useful. And since it is free, it is not a bad deal for VIAC users.
Sustainability of VIAC
More and more people are interested in investing sustainably. They want their money to work for a better future and not invest in companies that are not sustainable for our world. But does VIAC offer a sustainable option?
When you choose the sustainable option, VIAC will invest in different funds. It will invest in two different types of funds:
- Socially Responsible Investing (SRI) funds.
- Environmental Social Governance (ESG) funds.
These two kinds of funds are very similar. They select companies based on sustainable factors. For instance, they will not invest in companies that make weapons or in companies that exploit children.
While this sounds good in theory, there are many issues with these funds. For instance, it was shown that about 80% of sustainable funds had exposure to fossil fuel companies. These companies are the antithesis of sustainable investing.
Also, the criteria for selecting companies in these funds are not very transparent or even agreed upon between different funds.
Finally, these funds are not very selective. Indeed, it was shown that nearly 90% of the companies in the S&P500 are present in ESG funds. So, very few companies are excluded.
Regarding VIAC, these options are likely more sustainable than the default options. However, this sustainable option is not very sustainable. I would not call this greenwashing, but this is level zero of sustainable investing. The only advantage is that this is simple and cheap.
So, I would not say sustainable investing is very sustainable, but it is better than nothing.
Security
We can also look at the security of the VIAC third pillar.
The applications’ technical security (web and mobile) is pretty good. All communications are encrypted between the application and the server. And since you cannot do anything with your third pillar until you retire (or in a few other special cases), the apps are well protected.
The only thing I would like is a proper second factor of authentication on the web application. But again, since you cannot do much, it is unimportant.
If you hold cash, it will be held by WIR Bank, the custodian bank of VIAC. This cash will be privileged in case of bankruptcy up to 100’000 CHF. This protection is the same as the bankruptcy protection of other Swiss banks. If you are an aggressive investor, this should not matter much since you should have very little cash.
The securities themselves are invested in institutional funds. These funds are very stable and are held in your name. The funds are not directly on the balance sheet of VIAC but on the balance sheet of the foundation. So, if VIAC goes bankrupt, these funds are safe in the foundation. It will be up to the foundation to find a new manager for these funds and to get you access to this money again.
Finally, I have never heard of any data leak that would have occurred at VIAC. This is always a good sign, even for recent companies.
Overall, I think that VIAC’s security is quite good and well-regulated. The applications are well-made, and the foundation is organized, so your assets are well-protected.
Alternatives
In Switzerland, there are many alternatives.
Compared to third pillar accounts from banks, VIAC is a great third pillar, much better than anything a bank proposes.
Finpension 3a is the best third pillar in Switzerland.
Use the FEYKV5 code to get a fee credit of 25 CHF*!
*(if you deposit 1000 CHF in the first 12 months)
- Invest 99% in stocks
However, compared to other independent third pillar providers, VIAC is not the best available. Finpension 3a is currently the best third pillar available. Finpension 3a has several advantages over VIAC:
- The fees are slightly lower.
- You have more freedom in designing your portfolio.
- You can avoid all currency hedging.
However, Finpension 3a has one slight disadvantage over VIAC. With VIAC, you could invest in stocks and cash and save a little on fees compared to investing in stocks and bonds.
To learn more, read my detailed comparison of VIAC and Finpension 3a.
VIAC FAQ
Is VIAC regulated?
Yes, VIAC is regulated in Switzerland as a third pillar foundation.
Is VIAC safe?
VIAC is well regulated and assets of the investors are fully segregated from the main entity. In case of bankruptcy, the foundation would have to find an alternative manager but investor funds would be safe.
How much fees will I pay with VIAC?
VIAC has an administration fee of 0.52% per year (currently capped at 0.44%). On top of that, you also currency exchange fees, at around 0.05%.
Who is VIAC 3a good for?
The VIAC third pillar is a good third pillar for conservative people or people that do not have a very long term horizon.
Who is VIAC 3a not good for?
VIAC 3a is not the best for aggressive investors, with a long term horizon. Indeed, you can invest more aggressively with some alternatives.
VIAC Summary
VIAC is a good third pillar, with good fees. It is a great third pillar for conservative investors.
Product Brand: VIAC
4
VIAC Pros
Let's summarize the main advantages of VIAC:
- You can allocate up to 97% in Stocks
- Very low fees
- VIAC is very transparent
- A small interest rate on the cash part
- Strategies with low allocation to stocks are cheaper
- Mobile and web applications
VIAC Cons
Let's summarize the main disadvantages of VIAC:
- You need a minimum of 40% in Swiss Francs (CHF)
- You need to keep 3% in cash
- Not the cheapest third pillar
Conclusion
The conclusion is pretty simple! VIAC is an excellent third pillar provider in Switzerland. The fees are very low, and VIAC offers a high stock allocation. These facts are great for long-term investors. And since most third pillar investors are in for the long-term, this is excellent.
I also like VIAC’s transparency. They communicate well and share as much information as possible. VIAC is the best third-pillar provider for this information. It is also very clean and modern. They do not try to hide fees, and they have been quite helpful in answering my questions for this article.
When VIAC was introduced, they were the best third pillar available. Now, there are other competitors. If you want to keep up to date, I have an article about the best third pillars in Switzerland. I moved my third pillar from VIAC to Finpension 3a, but both are great options.
If you like VIAC, you may like VIAC’s vested benefits.
Which third pillar do you use? What do you think of VIAC?
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Hello,
I have a doubt regarding VIAC or UBS. I have 3a in UBS without been invested in any funds and I would like to put in a funds. I was going to transfer my 3a pillar money from UBS to VIAC but UBS worker told me that there is no commission in you have a 3 pillar in UBS and put the money in Vivainvest fund. Please, read below the conversation I had with the UBS worker:
Hello Jesus,
Yes there is indeed fees related to the vitainvest fund but it is supported by UBS.
The client does not pay any fees/charges related to funds invested through 3rd pillar.
The fees apply for regular fund (outside of the 3rd pillar).
I hope this answer your question and I remain at your disposal for any other information.
Have a nice afternoon
Best regards
UBS Switzerland AG
Agence de Neuchâtel
Conseiller Clientèle
Anthony Ribeiro
—— Message original ——
Hi Anthony
I found fee in Vivainvest https://www.ubs.com/2/e/files/RET/FS_RET_CH0293174600_CH_EN.pdf
management fee 1,28% and ongoing charges 1,67%.
Please, can you check it. You informed me that invest my 3rd pillar in vivainves doesn´t have any fee but the brochure says yes.
Thansk
Jesus
Is it correct the info he gave me?
Thanks for your help,
Jesús Sanchez
Hi,
I can’t know for sure whether it’s correct or not. But
It’s indeed totally possible that the fees are lower for a third pillar, many banks are doing that. Now, I do not believe that fees in a fund can be zero for private investors. I would be extremely surprised (and interested) if UBS really had a 0% fee fund.
This fund is not bad (fees notwithstanding) but it’s a bit low on diversification and too much currency hedging for me.
I think the guy is just playing on words. You are not going to pay any fees yourself indeed. So he’s saying the truth. The fees of the funds are going to be paid by the fund assets, so in the end, you are still losing money due to fees, but you are not paying them directly. Fees are removed from your returns instead of from your pocket.
So, I would still move to VIAC and not listen to people telling you you will not pay any fees, it’s just not true.
Hi The Poor Swiss,
What is your investment portfolio for VIAC ?
I took the Global 100 and get about 5% loss so far.
Thank you for sharing your experiences.
BR,
Ben.
Hi Ben,
I am also using the Global 100 portfolio.
Given the current stock market results, a 5% loss is not that bad. When did you start investing?
Thanks for stopping by!
Excellent review, really convinced me to make the switch.
Hello Mr PS,
Many thanks for the insightful article as usual. I am considering to move to Viac soon as well.
I am wondering can we have multiple 3rd pillars in Viac and if yes, what is the max number? For me it will make sense to distribute evenly all 3rd pillar funds in multiple accounts which I believe may dramatically reduce the tax payable upon withdraw.
Pleased to hear your thoughts on that.
Best Regards,
Vas
Hi Vas,
Good question! You can have up to five accounts at VIAC. Yes, it makes sense to do it. But just be careful that some states allow a different number of third pillar accounts. In Fribourg, it’s 5, but I believe in Vaud, it’s only 2.
Thanks for stopping by!
Hi there,
after long deliberation (Pillar 3a or not? Wait until something ideal comes along?), I decided to give it a try, open an account with the maximum contribution allowed.
I did chose my own strategy but didn’t overdo it:
37% Swiss shares
50% World ex CH
7% Emerging Markets
VIAC is only part of my piggy bank / retirement money, so this is IMHO one of the most straightforward portfolios. (I have enough emergency cash so I somehow didn’t want nor need to have more lazy cash lying around in a pillar 3a)
Regards,
Jochen
Hi Jochen,
That sounds like a very good portfolio! Congratulations on investing your third pillar!
Good luck with your investing!
Thanks you for this great article. Just made the move to VIAC and transferred first fund :)
Thank you for the article! I think it is also worth mentioning that WIR takes 0.75% on every currency change. VIAC optimises this somehow to distribute this charge among users, but the fees are slightly more than 0.5%.
What is your opinion on Frankly?
Hi Dmytro,
That’s a good point. The 0.75% fee on currency exchange could be a large fee each time there is a rebalancing. Good point, I will try to include that on my next update on this post.
What the are doing is that they are moving assets from one customer to another in case of rebalancing when they can. This greatly reduces the fees.
For Frankly, keep in mind that I did not do full research on it.
* But from what I have seen, my main issue with them is a lack of transparency. They are advertising 0.48% fees as all-in, but if you read the small letters, you need to add at least 0.01% to 0.03% fees on top of that. So, the fee is is between 0.49% and 0.51%, which makes it almost equal to VIAC which is more transparent on that issue.
* Another transparency issue is regarding the funds they are really using. They are using a fund-of-fund from Swisscanto but it’s difficult to know exactly which one
* They changed funds on the 23rd of March 2020, at the bottom of the stock market so their new funds is only going up. For me, this is a very bad sign.
* And last but not least, Frankly is hedging to CHF most of the foreign equities. This will highly reduce the returns of the fund on the long-term.
Thanks for stopping by!
Hello there,
Thank you for this article!
You are definitely making a great case for Viac and I was ready to take the plunge and switch to this 3rd pillar provider.
Being a complete novice when it comes to investment, I actually made the uneducated mistake to go with UBS VitaInvest75 for my third pillar fund.
Strong of my newly found knowledge about investing, I have marched into my UBS branch yesterday, requesting to stop my monthly transfer to my vitainvest fund and sell all my positions so I could transfer to a new provider.
To this, my advisor told me I was mistaken as there was ,according to her, no fees associated with VitaInvest funds linked to a third pillar. I counter-argued with the TER of 1,72% and she said it doesn’t apply to the third pillar. I am at loss!
I have looked further online on their factsheet and found this mention
“Transaction costs for the purchase / sale of funds as well as custodian fees are not included in the performance. Some providers charge these costs separately. At UBS, neither transaction nor custody fees
are incurred under pillar 2 and 3”
Could you please help me understand what is happening here?
Hi Aurelie,
First, I do not have a lot of knowledge about UBS.
But, it’s probably true that they do not have any transaction fees for the third pillar. But it’s the case of almost all banks in Switzerland. And transaction fees are not TER! transaction fees are just a fee that you pay when you sell or buy new shares.
Now, either your advisor is not knowledgeable or she is just trying to move the conversation to another fee. In any case, I am sure that the TER still applies to the third pillar. It seems to be lower than 1.72 now, but still quite expensive. They just want to keep you.
I would recommend you stick to your plan and move your third pillar to VIAC.
Thanks for stopping by!
Does anyone have any experience with opening a VIAC account after leaving CH? I have my 3a with Postfinance at the moment, and am hesitating between withdrawing it and investing it personally, or transferring it to a better option e.g. VIAC. Obviously, not living in CH anymore, I won’t be contributing any more as there’s no tax advantage to do so, but managing the 3a I did contribute is equally important!
PS I opened an account anyway, and used the first of Darko’s codes above – Thanks!
Hi Jude,
I have no experience with that so take what I am going to say with a grain of salt.
It depends on what you are going to do if you withdraw it. If you invest in low-cost funds, this will save you some money. Otherwise, if you do not plan (or do not want) to invest it, you can let it live and compound at VIAC.
I hope that helps a bit.
Thanks for stopping by!
So, my experience with VIAC has been nothing short of excellent so far. I sent my request for fund transfer (to Postfinance) on the 25th Jan, and have the funds in my VIAC account already today! The support from their staff has also been excellent in setting up an account from abroad!
I also had some feedback from them regarding a 2nd Pillar option, which they hope to implement in March this year (I know that won’t help most of you who are living in CH, but if you ever leave….)
Thanks to everyone here for the tips – happy saving!
Hi Jude,
Thanks for sharing your experience!
I have had the same feeling about the transfer, it’s really fast and effortless.
I think a lot of people are interested in the second pillar option as well. This is a great option for self-employed people and early retirees.
Thanks for stopping by!
Hi,
I am planning on investing my 3rd pillar money in stocks. It currently lies on a regular 3a account at CIC where I get a (in comparison) not-so-bad 0.3% interest for no cost at all (the option without stocks is completely free just like it is at VIAC).
I was just wondering, is the the fee-model of the CIC 3rd pillar stock solution (https://www.cic.ch/en/products-and-services/private-individuals/retirement/3a-retirement-funds.html?language=en) a load-fee model as you described earlier in your post? That you recommend to avoid? And can you tell me what a typical (average) fee looks like at VIAC, e.g. for the Global 100 Strategy? Or does 0.53% mean 0.53% of the money you have invested in that strategy?
Sorry for asking basic questions, I’m only beginning to understand the fee jungle of banks and their finance products…
Thanks & kind regards
Hi Mr. Unsure,
The 0.5% fee is not a load fee, it’s an annual fee that you will pay each year on your money. And there is a minimum of 50 CHF. This means that you will pay more than 0.5% if you have less than 10’000 CHF.
Now, this is only for the management fee. You will still pay the TER of the funds that are used. And for this, you will add about 0.5 (or even more than 1% for some of the funds) depending on the funds.
So with CIC, you are looking for at least 1% per year. This is twice more expensive than VIAC when using the cheapest funds and up to three times more expensive if you choose even worse funds.
0.53% at VIAC means 0.53% of the money invested.
I hope this answers your questions :)
Let me know if this does not ;)
Thanks for stopping by!
I think I understand.. But it was not clear to me just from looking at their webpage, so thanks for clearing that up!
Maybe I’ll just switch to VIAC, I saw that they will even handle the canceling of your current account for you which is nice :)
Thanks
Hi Mr. Unsure,
You’re welcome!
Don’t hesitate to let me know if that’s not entirely clear ;)
Yes, they will send you a document to fill and then you can send it and everything is done to transfer the existing funds. This is really great I think. It was much easier than I expected.
Thanks for stopping by!