Employing someone outside the country where your company conducts business takes time and effort.
It can be a big headache, and you might be discouraged even considering hiring globally.
Thankfully, Employer of Record (EOR) companies are here to make the world of international employment accessible for every company - no matter how big or small!
But how do you choose the best EOR for your needs?
The EOR companies and its services has popped up like mushrooms in the fall and trying to dissect their offering is entirely different from how you want to spend your time.
So we decided to make it easier for you. with this article.
Firstly, we'll look at what an EOR is all about and how it can benefit your business.
Then, we have compared four major employer of record companies to help you decide which is best for you.
Table of contents:
Key Takeaways
What is an Employer of Record?
An Employer of Record is a third-party company that stands in as the legal employer on your staff's contract.
Working with an EOR allows you to employ talent internationally without setting up a legal entity in that country. For example, you can hire someone from Milan, Italy, without worrying about Italian bureaucracy.
The EOR ensures that your employment contracts comply with local laws, pay your employees' salary on your behalf, see that your employee receives benefits and file taxes.
Even though an EOR is taking care of your contract and legal matters, you still keep a direct relationship with the employees and manage their development in the company.
Besides the main benefit of being able to employ internationally without legally operating in another country, you get many other advantages from working with an EOR.
Those are:
You see potential in a new country but are still determining if it makes sense to set up a legal entity there.
Working with an EOR is a great way to work around that.
You can explore the potential of a new market by hiring people through an EOR and see whether it makes sense to start operating in that country eventually.
With no set country restrictions, a world of talent opens up, and you'll access a pool of job searchers in more than one country.
This way, you can make sure to hire the very best people no matter where they live.
Setting up contracts with people working abroad can be legally complicated and take a long time.
Sometimes it can take too long, and your potential employee chooses another company to work for.
However, with an EOR, hiring talent abroad is very efficient and sometimes takes less than a day.
Working with an EOR can save hours or even days and weeks on complicated HR procedures.
Such as, creating contracts that comply with local legal regulations, filing taxes and organising social security can be highly time-consuming.
The experts at EOR companies take this stress away, and all these procedures go through them.
Employing someone in a country where your company doesn't operate can have many legal risks.
There might be laws you didn't know about that can hurt your company.
EORs are experts in the countries they work in and will give you excellent legal advice to avoid any financial risk to your company.
Your new staff members employed under an EOR will benefit from health benefits, pension, vacation pay and more per the law of the country they are engaged in.
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Once you start researching EORs, you will notice the term PEO pop up.
PEO stands for Professional Employer Organisation.
Sometimes the terms are used synonymously, and the two are very similar, but there are a few key differences:
If you do not operate a legal entity in the country you wish to hire talent, an EOR is a more affordable option. In contrast, a PEO will be cheaper if you already operate a legal entity.
Now that we know what EORs and PEOs are and how you can benefit from them, we will get into which is best for your business!
We will tell you about four different companies and showcase their various services, so you can choose the one that matches your requirements.
Boundless is an EOR founded in 2019. It has since expanded to make its services available in 24 countries.
They are developing in many other countries, but their evaluation of each new country is comprehensive, so they will only work with a country if it complies with their standards.
Their portal is cloud-based, and their website offers a variety of valuable information for employing your talent internationally - even before you decide to hire someone through them.
If you are interested in their services, you will receive a complimentary consultation to discuss your international hiring needs with a professional from Boundless.
You need to employ no minimum number of employees to access their services, whether just one employee or an entire team. However, you can only hire employees, not independent contractors or freelancers.
Boundless work with a percentage rate and charge 8% of the total monthly processed payroll.
The cost includes gross salary, taxes, pension contributions, and other benefit payments or contributions that vary from country to country.
Speak with someone from Boundless or read one of their country guides to learn more about what kind of benefits your employee would receive.
There is currently no option for tiered pricing, no matter how many employees you employ through Boundless.
Furthermore, only monthly payments are supported through their portal. However, they are working to make other payment cycles available.
They do support employee share options and will gladly assist you with that.
And lastly, they are proud of their dedicated customer service team and guarantee a 24-hour turnaround for each query.
After you decide to work with Boundless, you will have access to expert guidance during the set-up and will tailor-make the contracts to your needs.
Suitable for small to medium businesses looking to hire a few employees abroad but also support more prominent companies.
They have excellent knowledge of the select countries they are available in.
✅ Available in 24 countries
✅ Charge 8% of the total payroll
✅ Complimentary consultation and excellent customer support
✅ No minimum amount of employees
✅ Tailor-made contracts for your company
Lano was founded in 2018 and offers EOR services in over 150 countries across the globe and serves over 1500 companies worldwide.
Their online portal is very advanced, easy to use and allows you to integrate programs like Google Drive, Adobe Sign, Microsoft Outlook, Salesforce and many more.
Even before you acquire their services, Lano's website provides in-depth country payroll guides where you can read detailed information about the country where you are interested in employing talent.
Then, book a complimentary demo, where one of Lano's experts walks you through their cloud-based platform and gives you advice tailored to your business.
Unlike Boundless, you can hire employees and contractors/freelancers with Lano.
After a quick and secure onboarding process of 7 days, your new employees will be ready to start working from the country you hired them in.
One of Lano's primary missions is to simplify global payroll.
Their pricing starts from EUR 400 per month for employees and EUR 15 per month for contractors and freelancers, and you can choose between monthly or annual billing.
After an initial consultation, you will receive tailor-made pricing for your company and the number of employees you wish to employ through Lano.
Furthermore, they offer transparent expansion costs, which makes future international growth in your business easier to calculate and account for.
Within their portal, you can access payroll services for multiple entities on a single platform and execute international mass payments in one click.
Suitable for small, medium and large businesses alike. Lano's payroll services are fantastic, and their transparent expansion costs are great for companies wishing to expand quickly and have all their HR tools in one platform.
✅ Available in over 150 countries & offer payroll in 50 currencies
✅ Pricing from EUR 400 (employees) and EUR 15 (contractors/freelancers)
✅ Transparent expansion costs
✅ Complimentary demo
✅ Helpful integrations such as Google Drive, Outlook and more
GoGlobal is both an EOR and a PEO and offers both services.
They were founded in 2018 and offer their services in over 100 countries.
In addition to their EOR and PEO services, they provide international HR counselling, compliance management and consulting services.
GoGlobal also has a dedicated team stationed worldwide to assist employers on-site.
Their pricing is entirely tailored to your company's needs.
After submitting your initial request, one of GoGlobal's experts will contact you and provide detailed pricing for the number of employees you wish to employ at that moment and in the future.
Once you have chosen to work with GoGlobal, you will get a dedicated account manager in charge of your company and employees who will be your point of contact.
GoGlobal's portal is called BlueOcean. You can watch the demo video here.
With this portal, you can manage payroll, access laws and regulations, connect with your account manager and view your employees on an interactive map.
In addition, they focus on making the platform's key features great instead of overloading it with features you don't need.
On their website, you will get access to guides of the countries they serve, containing detailed information.
They even have a dedicated page for employees to learn more about what being employed through GoGlobal means.
It is comprehensive and informative and could be very helpful for future employees.
GoGlobal is excellent for larger businesses wishing to expand quickly across many countries.
✅ Available in over 100 countries
✅ Dedicated Account Manager
✅ EOR and PEO Services
✅ On-site support team
✅ Tailored pricing
Horizons, just like GoGlobal, offers both EOR and PEO services.
They launched in 2018 and are available in over 150 countries.
They have physical offices in twenty countries across four continents.
Even before you start working with Horizons, their website provides valuable information, such as case studies, global employment guides, and informative country guides.
HR specialists built their easy-to-use platform, and it aims to unite all HR services in one place.
You can book a free platform demo directly on the website and arrange a free consultation for your business.
You can employ contractors, freelancers, employees, and enterprises with Horizons.
The pricing for contractors, freelancers and enterprises is tailor-made to your business.
The price for employees starts from EUR 290 per month, with discounts available for NGOs.
They offer tiered pricing for larger enterprises.
They have priced their product so that previously out-priced businesses could gain access to top-tier EOR and PEO services.
Their onboarding process lasts only 48 hours, and you can choose from a range of additional benefits that you would like your employees' contract to contain, like health insurance.
In addition to the usual EOR and PEO services, they offer in-house recruiting, talent acquisition, and global mobility solutions.
They want to support your business throughout your international expansion.
Horizons is a great, affordable choice for small, medium and large businesses.
They have great expertise in Europe, Asia and the Americas and specialise in developing countries.
✅ Available in over 150 countries
✅ Free demo and consultation
✅ Additional recruitment and global mobility services
✅ EOR and PEO services
✅ Onboarding in 48 hours
Of course, many EORs and PEOs out there, and the four we just mentioned are just some of the ones.
Please also consider these great options:
Choosing which employer or record company would fit the needs of your business the most must be done with proper consideration.
Sometimes, you might need some of the services offered by an EOR.
Other times you might need more. Also, it is entirely possible to work with multiple EORs at once.
Their platforms today are intuitive and easy to use, so if needed, that is an option.
Let us know if you have any comments by sending us an email, if you know of any other suitable services we should list, or if you have any feedback about any of the ones I listed above!
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