From January 1, 2020, a wedding ceremony can be performed without a ten-day waiting period after the marriage preparation procedure has been successfully completed. Under the previous law, the wedding ceremony could only take place ten days after notification of the completion of the preparation procedure at the earliest. After Parliament approved the abolition of this waiting period on September 28, 2018, the Federal Council will bring it into force on January 1, 2020. However, the marriage ceremony must still take place no more than three months after the preparation procedure has been completed. This does not change the marriage preparation procedure. In the preparatory procedure, the following requirements for marriage will be checked as before:

• The bride and groom have reached the age of 18 and are capable of judgment.
• If the bride or groom is not a Swiss citizen, he or she must provide proof of his or her legal residence in Switzerland during the preparation procedure and by the wedding ceremony at the latest.
• Relatives in the direct line, siblings and half-siblings may not marry each other.

Furthermore, it is excluded that any obstacles to marriage or grounds for invalidity prevent a marriage. This includes, in particular, investigations into suspected forced or sham marriages. The abolition of the ten-day period between the end of the preparatory procedure and the marriage ceremony will make the marriage procedure quicker and more streamlined.