Employee of record services

Advertised prices, verified

How employee of record services work

1. You choose the person, the role and the country. You recruit as normal and agree the role, salary and start date. The provider does not select your people; it employs the person you chose, in the location you chose, through an entity it already operates there.
2. The provider issues a compliant local contract. The service drafts an employment contract that satisfies the local labour law, in the local language where required, and signs it as the legal employer. Statutory terms such as notice, leave and probation come from that law, not from your home-country handbook.
3. Payroll, taxes and benefits run every month. The provider pays the employee in local currency, withholds and remits employer and employee taxes, makes social contributions and administers statutory benefits. You receive one invoice: total employment cost plus the service fee.
4. You manage the work, the provider manages the employment. Day-to-day direction stays with you. Terminations, disputes and statutory filings run through the provider because it is the legal employer; carrying that risk correctly is the substance of what the fee buys.

Employee of record versus employer of record

The industry's standard term is employer of record, because the provider is the employer and your hire is the employee. Employee of record is a common variant of the same phrase and vendors answer to both; there is no separate product behind the second name. What matters when comparing services is not the label but the delivery model underneath it: some providers employ through entities they own in each country, others through in-country partners, and the partner model adds a third party to every payslip, dispute and data flow.

The service is also distinct from a PEO, which co-employs staff you already employ through your own local entity, and from contractor management, where no one employs the worker at all. If you have no entity in the hire's location and want them to be an employee with statutory protections and benefits, an employer of record is the instrument that does that.

What the service costs and what sits outside the fee

Advertised pricing is typically a flat amount per employee per month, and the vendors in this index that publish a price cluster in a range you can see in the table above, with a median of $499. The fee is not the whole invoice: on top of it sit the salary, the employer-side statutory contributions of the hire's country, and often a refundable deposit, currency conversion margin or benefits administration charge. A quote that shows only fee plus gross salary is understating the real monthly cost in almost every country.

The fee stops making sense at scale. Once headcount in one country reaches the point where per-employee fees exceed the running cost of a local entity, most buyers migrate, and several providers sell that transition. Until then the service is usually far cheaper than incorporating, registering payroll and retaining counsel in a market you might leave. Policy and contract documents control in every case; nothing on this page is legal or tax advice.

Common questions

Is an employee of record the same as an employer of record?

Yes. Both phrases describe the same service: a provider that legally employs your hire where you have no entity. Employer of record is the standard industry term and the one most vendors use on their pricing pages.

What do employee of record services cost?

Vendors that publish pricing advertise flat per-employee monthly fees, with a median of $499 across the priced vendors in this index. Deposits, currency handling and benefits administration can add to the invoice, so read the vendor's own pricing page, linked beside every figure here.

Who is the legal employer of my hire?

The provider, or a local entity it owns or partners with, holds the employment contract and carries the legal employer duties. You direct the work. That split is the product.

Can the service convert to our own entity later?

Yes, and this is a normal exit. The employee is terminated by the provider and rehired by your new local entity, ideally with continuity of service terms preserved; ask a provider up front how it handles that transfer and what it charges for it.

Coverage by country

• Employer of record vendors covering Singapore
• Employer of record vendors covering Mexico
• Employer of record vendors covering Spain
• Employer of record vendors covering Colombia
• Employer of record vendors covering United Kingdom
• Employer of record vendors covering France
• Employer of record vendors covering Hungary
• Employer of record vendors covering New Zealand