Our story

We are female cleaners who came together in Zurich in July 2021 to found a platform cooperative. We are women from different cultures with different professional backgrounds. What unites us is our vision to give cleaning the financial and social appreciation it deserves.

We have experienced for ourselves how precarious working conditions can be. That was our motivation for founding Autonomía right from the start: to create good working conditions for ourselves and other cleaners. After an intensive six-month preparatory course at the Center for Care Cooperatives , seven of us founded our platform cooperative in December 2021. Platform cooperatives are cooperatives that use their own online platform to harness the potential of digitalization and shape it in a socially just way.

Wir besitzen und führen die Kooperative gemeinsam. Unsere Arbeitsbedingungen haben wir uns selbst gegeben und jede weitere Frau, die sich uns anschliesst, profitiert von einem würdevollen Einkommen und einer guten sozialen Absicherung. Der Geschäftsstart war im Februar 2022 und mittlerweile sind wir rund 50 Frauen, die für Autonomía arbeiten.

Our values

Mutual help

We help each other to promote our well-being.

Equality

As cooperative members, we all have the same rights and obligations.

Honesty

Our cooperative is based on honesty and transparency, both internally and towards our customers.

Environmentally friendly

Autonomía attaches great importance to ecologically sustainable cleaning and strives to produce as few CO2 emissions as possible.

How we organize ourselves

Organization: Autonomía consists of the members of the cooperative (members) and the administration. The cooperative members elect the administration, which is responsible for the strategic management of the cooperative. The operational management (customer care, personnel and financial accounting, marketing and communication) is carried out by the Center for Care Cooperatives as part of a social franchise relationship.

Our working conditions

All Autonomía cleaners benefit from good social security, as this is guaranteed by the cooperative: AHV, pension fund contributions, child allowances, daily sickness benefit insurance, accident and non-occupational accident insurance.
All cleaners who work through Autonomía are employed by the
cooperative and therefore have the benefits of employment, such as the right to unemployment insurance.
We cooperative members work independently and have a say in how we want to carry out our work.
We have a say in our working hours and therefore have greater flexibility in terms of time, which has a positive impact on our work-life balance.
As members of the cooperative, we elect the administration, which in turn is responsible for strategic management. Each of us has the same say and we all receive the same salary.
We benefit from free further training in cleaning techniques, IT skills, communication and German language skills.
Through our co-determination as cooperative members, we feel part of the cooperative. This promotes team building and a valuable exchange of knowledge and experience.
We cooperative members share responsibility for the cooperative without being personally liable.

Like every cooperative, Autonomía is based on the following seven principles:

Voluntary and open membership
Democratic member control
Economic participation of the members
Autonomy and independence
Training and further education
Cooperation between the members of the cooperative and other cooperatives
Care for the community