Global payroll services are definitely in vogue. Global employment has just exploded in popularity with the rise of globalization and the internet. The pandemic has even surprisingly bolstered global hiring by many folds. Nowadays, you don’t have to be a large multinational corporate to become a “multinational employer“. Businesses of all types and sizes, from tech giants to sole-traders running their online store, are in need of global payroll solutions – whether through a subsidiary or a franchise abroad, an agency, a contractor, or without a legal entity abroad, they need to figure out a way to make international payroll payments, while remaining compliant with local laws and regulations.
As such, they need to find a safe, cheap, prompt and easy to integrate international payroll service that is global enough to on-board customers globally, without limitations, and able to allow your business to hire internationally ANYWHERE in the world, and make global payroll payments while saving on time, costs and overheads.
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Who Needs a Global Payroll Solution and Why
Companies are searching for the best global payroll options because payrolls are often clunky. The actual payment process could be long and tiresome, as well as expensive and labor-intensive. Employing abroad is even more so. There are enough well-developed, technological, and friendly payroll payment solutions available, integrated with global hire and global hr solutions, that this international payroll process shouldn’t be painful anymore.
Companies and businesses all the way from small businesses to multinational corporations can use a global payroll software for:
- Automating global payrolls to reduce workload and hassle
- Saving money on international payroll payments
- Streamlining international hiring software/processes and payrolls
- Hiring overseas without requiring a local entity abroad
- Aligning payrolls to local tax requirements and other legal requirements
- Getting access to premium global payroll software that will synchronize automatically with the company’s accounting software (and/or other relevant SaaS services).
… and there’s a clear winner, too, providing viable solutions to 90%+ of all businesses inquiring about global payrolls.
Our #1 Choice – Best International Payroll Provider & Features
Top features from our winner, namely Papaya Global, include:
- Hire from anywhere with local points of contacts in each country.
- Multiple employment and payroll processing model.
- All employment data captured in a centralized database.
- Import expenses and bonuses from spreadsheets.
- Export all payrolls and expenses directly.
- Accuracy and compliance automated engines (compare output with input) – error report compiled.
- Global payment remittance features without a local bank account (paid to employees and local authorities).
- Standard reporting as well customized slice and dice reporting.
- Employee on-boarding and self-service portal, contract, pay slips, report vacations and sick days, employee engagement, all accessible to the employee.
- ➡️ View a Papaya Global Review
- ➡️ Make a Papaya Global Application
Top 5 Global Payroll Solutions Today [Rated]
The best international payment solutions by rating, September 2023 ➡️
- The #1 Most Comprehensive Hiring Abroad Solution in The Market - Global Payrolls and EOR/PEO Solutions Across The Globe
- Very Technology-Oriented With Integration to Almost Anything HR/Accounting Like SAP, Priority, Microsoft Dynamic, Google SSO Monday, Expensify, BambooHR, Okta, Workday and More
- The Entire Hiring Process is Streamlined and Improved Works With Large Name Customers like Microsoft, Toyota, Johnson & Johnson, Intel, and Wix
- A Company With a Mission - To Increase Employment in Emerging Markets (And This is Where It's Focused)
- From $399 Per Employee Per Month up to $699 Per Employee Per Month (But Most Locations Cost $699, So More Expensive Than Papaya Global for Most
- Full Remote Employee Management Through Advanced Tech with A Great Employee Portal
Moneycorp: Best for PAYMENT Solutions & Corporate FX
- Experts in International Payments, Since 1979 - Specialise in Corporate Foreign Exchange Services (Guidance, Hedging, Mass Payments). Very High Level of Credibility.
- Does not offer a full HR suite i.e. You Can Use OFX for Payroll Payments and Not for Hiring. No EOR Solutions - Does offer API integration to Netsuite, Quickbooks and Xero and can process mass payments via bulk payment file or integrate the system into an ERP (mode of execution is client-led)
- Widest Selection of FX Hedging Tools to Fix Rates for Future International Payroll Payments
Rippling: Best for Domestic Payroll Transfers (Now Offering Global Payrolls Too)
- Integrated Hiring Solution for Domestic Payrolls - Talent, Benefits, Learning Management, Attendance, Work Analytics, and of course, Payrolls - Under One Roof
- For Global Payrolls, You have Native HR Software Enabling You to Pay in a Single Pay-Run Across Multiple Countries, Currencies and Legal Jurisdictions, and Control the Product End to End
- Locally Adjusted Hiring and Onboarding Flows that Change Depending on Country
- Easy to hire employees and contractors abroad - excellent technology and integrations, smooth app (even integrates with Wise Money Transfers to make international payroll payments via email address only)
- $49 per contractor per month or $599+ per month for Employer of Record service (same price range as Papaya Global, higher minimum slightly)
- Mediocre or worse reviews on Product Hunt
(read our best global PEO guide, if you want to learn more about that aspect)
Myriad of Solutions to Pay Payrolls Globally, But Hard to Navigate
Propelled by great technology, heavy funding, and significant global presence in a multitude of locations, there are international payroll service providers and dedicated companies which are currently on the market, can turn an international payroll processing into an easy plug-and-play solution for the entire recruiting and employee management process (including local taxes, local laws and local benefits). All while saving significantly on payment costs and simplifying the associated processes (as international foreign exchange payments can be both costly, and highly complicated to execute, with banks).
The current challenge that many companies are facing is how to find the best international payroll service provider to fit their precise needs, and there are vast differences between the available solutions currently on the market.
For example, a small business looking for a global payroll service in Spain which does not have a global entity, will more commonly use an all-inclusive solution such as the one offered by Papaya Global, while a larger corporation which already has everything set up in terms of local presence, local contracts, local legal compliance, and local tax, might opt for a solution that is exclusive to making the international payroll payments with a company like moneycorp. In not so many words, while Papaya is an example of international payroll outsourcing companies, moneycorp is a bank-alternative on how to pay employees abroad.
In Video:
This global payroll service comparison will demonstrate how the two above scenarios and solutions are completely distinct and how the two payroll providers fall into completely different categories (Papaya Global and Deel are HR solutions that enable global payroll processing as a part of a holistic HR process, while Moneycorp is foreign exchange and payments companies that don’t partake in the recruiting and hiring, whereas Rippling is providing only domestic payroll payments in the U.S). Hence we will categorize each service on our best 5 global payroll service comparison list into either “strictly for payments and business foreign exchange” or “global hr and payroll”. We will also cover the availability of such services, what are the minimum requirements to use, and pricing.
Can You Hire Anywhere? 🌎 Are There Minimal Requirements? 💰
All of the above selection rated as the best global payroll solutions truly have an international approach to business. Companies like Moneycorp, OFX, and WorldFirst can onboard business customers from most western countries (not including South Africa, while Moneycorp can’t onboard Australia/NZ and WorldFirst can’t onboard USA) and have at least 40 different currencies available for payments. Please keep in mind that with these providers, you are not confined to make salary payments to employees abroad – you could pay and receive money from anyone as long as it’s compliant with Anti Money Laundering regulation.
Papaya Global tops the chart of globalization by being available worldwide (with the exception of blacklisted countries of course), and supporting global hiring in any country and any currency – a very impressive feat, similar only perhaps to Payoneer‘s reach.
In terms of minimum turnover or minimal number of employees there are no limitations with either provider! with that being said smaller businesses which are looking for f a more holistic solution in the form of a legal entity abroad through a PEO can be off-put by Papaya’s rates at $650 per employee per month (for EOR service only – global payroll payments are just $20 per payment).
Is “Fintech” International Payroll Management Effective?
Online testimonials of companies which have switched over to a “techy” type of international payroll management systems such as the ones we are comparing and reviewing on this page, demonstrate a very high degree of satisfaction. When these companies started using international payroll, PEO or EOR services (international payroll outsourcing companies), they stopped looking at international hiring as a nuisance or an overhead.
For some, the struggle was making the actual mass payroll payments in a variety of currencies to a variety of global bank accounts. Bank’s online systems are archaic and in the U.S and UK there are even banks who do not enable international payments through these systems. Others who don’t support solutions like mass payments or paying to multiple accounts in multiple countries in one-go. Then, there’s the struggle of feeding overseas employee data back into the bank’s global payment system – often not supported or defected and requires some sophisticated maneuvers to make it to work.
Top global payroll providers, or EOR providers, has expertise in areas like local compliance, data security, global benefits, global equity allocation, global immigration and of course global HR and global payroll. With that many options and diversity, the solution you’re getting is almost tailored – “tell us who you want to hire abroad, and we’ll show you the way to do it”.
A small sample of the functionalities offered by the most advanced solutions in the market includes: attendance tracking, employee benefits and leaves, a self-serving portal for employees, tax management, W-2 preparations, and of course the payment itself by a direct bank deposit in the local country and currency, all in one place. The technological boom of the 2010s and 2020s is probably the first time that VCs and highly funded startups have been paying attention to people in HR and accounting and opted to build advanced and all-inclusive multi-country payroll software as well as other innovative HR solutions.
Read more about the Best Global PEO and EOR Solutions on this dedicated guide.
Hedging Foreign Exchange for Overseas Payrolls
One key element any small business or corporation must keep in mind is that if revenues are accumulated in one currency, but international payroll management are done in another currency (or several other currencies), that business is exposed to foreign exchange risks. Currencies do not move in tandem with each other, and the “earnings currency” of a certain company lose value in comparison to its “spending currency” (or currencies), it poses a serious threat to that company’s bottom line.
For example, if a certain business has staff in the U.S but receives Turkish Lira because most of its sales are in Turkey, that business would seriously lose from currency movements – 1 dollar is worth TWICE as much Liras as it was worth 12 months ago, and that means the cost of salaries in the U.S would be twice as much as they were in October of 2021 (and three times as much as it was in 2019).
Another example which is less drastic, would be for a British business employing and paying international payrolls in India. In October of 2021, the INR to GBP rate was about 102, and it is currently (June 26) below 96. The rate went down almost 6% in this period and paying payrolls in India has become 6% more expensive for that business.
Fix Your International Payroll’s Exchange Rate for Years to Come?
There are certain types of contracts sold by currency brokerages like the aforementioned Moneycorp which enable SMEs and corporations to hedge against currency movements. The most common contract, which is also the most straightforward, is a Currency Forward which simply fixes the current rate for future transactions (up to a period of 3 years with Moneycorp, and up to 2 years with most other business foreign exchange services). There are other FX hedging solutions, though, such as a variety of options available with your broker. Please note that international payroll processing companies like Papaya Global or Deel don’t sell such contracts.
Paying Global Payrolls
Reading through this guide and our selection of the top-rated global payroll services, you have probably realized by now that when people, whether small business owners or company executives, search for global payroll, they have one of two very distinct intentions. It’s either about making the payment itself and foreign exchange to a bank account abroad, or about discovering a full-suite solution that will enable you to recruit, hire and employ abroad, without having to have a local entity.
We cover both angles so you can choose the one that fits you more – even if you have not fully made up your mind, you need not worry. It’s still worth taking the next step – signing up with any of the global payroll outsourcing providers listed in this guide is FREE.