EOR Pricing Models
You built the business case around $599 per employee per month. The board approved it. Six months later the real figure is closer to $900 a head, and nobody in Finance can say where the other $300 went.
It went to FX markups that never show as a line item, employer contributions that change with the country, benefits administration buried in a quarterly invoice, and a deposit that tied up $150,000 of capital before anyone was onboarded.
The headline number and the real number are different things, and procurement mistakes live in the gap between them. The same cost layers turn up in every EOR contract, though, and each one can be priced before signature.
Check current provider details
What are the main EOR pricing models?
A flat fee per employee, a percentage of gross salary, or a hybrid of the two. Across the 13 EOR providers we reviewed, the flat fee is what almost all of them sell, and the model you land on decides whether your cost per head holds still or climbs every time somebody gets a raise.
Flat fee per employee per month
The provider charges the same amount every month for each employee, whatever that employee earns. It is the dominant model among the providers we cover.
Published rates run from $199 per employee per month at the low end (Remofirst), through $599-$699 in the middle (Remote, Deel, Atlas, Papaya Global), to $800-$1,000+ at the top (G-P).
Flat fees suit employers hiring senior or well-paid staff. A $15,000/month engineering lead carries the same platform fee as a $4,000/month junior analyst, and the fee stays put when salaries, bonuses and overtime move.
The same arithmetic works against junior-heavy teams in low-cost markets. Pay $599/month to employ someone earning $2,000/month and the platform fee alone is 30% of gross salary.
Percentage of gross salary
The provider takes a fixed share of each employee’s gross pay, typically 10-25%. It is uncommon among the major providers and shows up mostly in regional EOR services and in enterprise contracts where the percentage gets negotiated down at volume.
On a $3,000/month salary, a 15% fee is $450, roughly level with a flat fee. On a $10,000/month salary the same 15% is $1,500, about three times the flat-fee equivalent.
Commissions and overtime then move the figure again on every pay run, which is the part Finance dislikes.
Hybrid pricing
A smaller group charges a base platform fee plus a reduced salary percentage, so part of the bill is forecastable and part still scales with pay.
Rippling runs a variant of this. Every employee, domestic and international, also carries an $8/user/month HRIS base fee for the core HR system, so for a company with 200 US employees and 10 EOR employees that layer adds $1,680/month before a single EOR charge.
Model a hybrid properly before comparing it with anything. The base fee is the forecastable part. The variable component brings back the scaling problem that percentage pricing has.
WhichPayroll view
Flat-fee pricing has won this market, and Finance is why. It is the only model where you can forecast a year of EOR spend without first forecasting salaries.
If a provider quotes a percentage, ask what the flat-fee equivalent would be. Whether they offer one is worth knowing early, because it shows how much of the price is actually negotiable.
Why does your EOR pricing model affect total employment cost?
Because it decides which costs arrive as one predictable line and which arrive separately, and how the bill behaves when salaries and headcount rise. Four consequences are worth pricing before signature.
Budget predictability. Flat fees let Finance multiply headcount by rate and know the year’s platform cost. Percentage models move on every pay run, because bonuses and overtime move gross pay.
Cost scaling with seniority. Percentage models charge you for promoting people. A team averaging $6,000/month gross today might average $8,000/month in 18 months, and the fee rises with it.
Hidden cost exposure. The headline fee is typically 40-60% of your true cost.
The rest comes from employer contributions, benefits administration, FX spreads and currency conversion costs, setup fees, termination fees and EOR deposit requirements. The pricing model decides which of those sit inside the headline and which get billed on their own.
That 40-60% is a rough guide, and our own worked example further down falls outside it: on a 25-person team the platform fee comes to 24% of year-one cost. Use the band as a prompt to do the arithmetic, never as a substitute for it.
Negotiation leverage. A published rate gives a buyer a number to argue against. When a provider will not quote until after a sales call, the first figure on the table is the one they chose to open with.
What separates transparent EOR pricing from opaque pricing?
Transparency here means you can build the total cost yourself, from public documents, without a sales call. We checked it across 13 EOR providers and the spread is wide enough to change which one you pick.
Signs of strong pricing transparency
The strong ones publish a per-employee rate with what it includes, document their FX methodology, state setup and termination fees before contract, disclose deposit requirements upfront, and give country-level employer contribution estimates during the sales process.
Remote, Deel and Multiplier publish their headline EOR rates. Remofirst publishes the lowest entry price we found, at $199/month. They sit alongside the rest in our best employer of record services guide.
Signs of opaque pricing
At the other end no number appears at all before a sales call.
From there the pattern repeats: percentages quoted in negotiation that never appeared on the website, FX markup folded into the conversion rate with no published methodology, and setup and termination fees that first surface on an invoice.
Red flags in EOR pricing
Watch for employer contributions bundled in a way that hides the provider’s margin, and for a “from” price that only holds in the cheapest jurisdictions.
A separate charge for compliance monitoring deserves a direct question, because compliance is the service an EOR exists to provide.
Pricing transparency spectrum
Published rate vs true cost visibility across providers
Highest transparency: Remofirst ($199/mo published), Remote ($699/mo published, FX methodology documented), Deel ($599/mo published). Mid transparency: Multiplier ($459/mo published on an annual contract, $499 month to month), Atlas ($599/mo published), Pebl (formerly Velocity Global) ($399/mo published, though the conditions attached to it are not).
Lower transparency: G-P (pricing by request, $800-$1,000+ reported), Oyster ($699 published, supplementary deposit clauses in terms).
A published rate is the start of the answer. Getting to a true cost also needs the FX methodology, the deposit requirement and the termination charges.
How does EOR pricing compare across providers?
Published rates run from $199 to $1,000+ per employee per month. The table sets out the structures we found across the major providers as of April 2026; the actual price moves with country, headcount and negotiation.
| Provider | Monthly EOR fee | Pricing model | Setup fee | Deposit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Remofirst | From $199 | Flat fee | Not disclosed | 1 month gross |
| Multiplier | From $459 | Flat fee | Not disclosed | ~1 month gross (refundable) |
| Rippling | From $499 + $8/user base | Hybrid | None reported | None |
| WorkMotion | From EUR 499 (~$568) | Flat fee (tiered) | Not disclosed | 2x total employment cost |
| Remote | $699 | Flat fee | None | None |
| Deel | From $599 | Flat fee | None | 1-1.5x monthly cost |
| Atlas | From $599 | Flat fee | Not disclosed | 1-2 months gross |
| Pebl | $399 (terms not published) | Flat fee | Not disclosed | None reported |
| Papaya Global | From $599 | Flat fee | Not disclosed | None reported |
| Oyster | $699 | Flat fee (tiered) | Not disclosed | Min 1 month gross + supplementary |
| G-P | $800-$1,000+ | Varies by contract | Not disclosed | 1-2 months gross |
Source: Provider pricing pages, third-party comparison data, and WhichPayroll analysis, April 2026. Prices quoted in euros are converted at the euro reference rate we pin, EUR 1 = USD 1.1383 at 1 July 2026. Actual pricing may vary by country and headcount.
The spread reflects real differences in what a fee buys. A $199/month provider that bills benefits and termination separately can cost more in total than a $599/month provider that does not.
How do you calculate the true cost of an EOR?
Take the platform fee, then add five layers to it. The steps below are the framework we use, and the worked example at the end shows what they come to on a real-shaped team.
Step 1: Platform fee
Your monthly per-employee charge, times headcount, times 12. A 25-person team at $599/month is $179,700 a year.
Step 2: Employer contributions
Statutory costs the employer owes on top of salary. The country sets the size, and the spread is wide: France adds 40-45% of gross salary, the UK approximately 15-20%, and the United States roughly 10-15%.
Step 3: Benefits costs
Health insurance, pension above the statutory minimum, meal vouchers, transport allowances, and whatever else is mandated or expected locally.
Some providers fold basic health cover into the platform fee and some bill it on its own, a difference of $100-$400 per employee per month depending on country and level of cover.
Step 4: FX conversion cost
If you fund payroll in USD and your people are paid locally, the provider converts at a rate carrying a margin above mid-market, mid-market being the rate before anyone adds a spread.
Our analysis of FX spreads across EOR providers found 0.5% to 5% above mid-market. On $150,000 of monthly payroll a 2% spread is $3,000 a month, or $36,000 a year, hidden inside the exchange rate where no invoice line shows it.
Step 5: Onboarding and offboarding fees
One-time charges per person. Onboarding runs $0 to $2,000 depending on jurisdiction and provider, and offboarding $150 to $400 per termination.
Onboard 25 employees and churn 5 a year and the range is $5,000-$52,000 annually, decided almost entirely by which provider you signed.
Step 6: Deposit opportunity cost
Money held in a deposit is money you cannot use. At 5%, a $150,000 deposit costs $7,500 a year before you count anything else.
True cost worked example
25-person team, $6,000 average gross, mixed countries (UK, Germany, US, Brazil, India)
Platform fee ($599/mo): $179,700/year. Employer contributions (average 25% of gross): $450,000/year. Benefits ($200/mo avg): $60,000/year.
FX spread (2% on $1.8M payroll): $36,000/year. Onboarding (25 x $500): $12,500 one-time. Offboarding (5 x $300): $1,500/year.
Deposit opportunity cost ($150K at 5%): $7,500/year.
Year-one true cost: approximately $747,200. The platform fee is 24% of that. The other 76% is employer contributions, benefits, FX and fees, and none of it appears in the sales deck.
How to choose the right EOR pricing model for your team
A flat fee, in every case we would advise on. The four rules below say what that buys in each situation, and what is left to negotiate once the model is settled.
If you are hiring senior or high-salary roles: a $15,000/month employee costs $599 in platform fees on a flat model and $2,250 on a 15% percentage model. That is $19,812 per year per employee, or nearly $200,000 a year at 10 senior hires.
If budget certainty matters to your board or investors: take a flat fee with a published rate. You can model the year with one multiplication, and you do not have to forecast salary changes, bonus cycles or overtime patterns to do it.
If you are hiring junior roles in low-cost markets: percentage pricing may come out cheaper per employee, and the variance comes with it. If predictability is worth more to you than $50-$100 per employee per month, stay on the flat fee.
If you are scaling past 25 employees: ask what discount applies at your headcount before you sign. We have seen 10-30% at volume thresholds, and providers rarely raise the subject themselves.
Before you sign anything: compare at least three providers on the same employee profile and the same country mix. The questions in the next section are what to put to each of them.
What should you ask providers about EOR pricing?
Seven questions. Ask them in writing, and keep the answers, because a spoken assurance is worth nothing when the first invoice arrives.
1. Is your platform fee all-inclusive, or does it exclude benefits administration, compliance monitoring, or country surcharges?
Headline fees vary widely in what they cover. Remote and Deel include compliance and standard onboarding in the platform fee, while others charge separately for compliance updates, immigration support or benefit plan administration. Get the list of inclusions and exclusions before comparing any two rates.
2. What is your FX conversion methodology, and can I see the spread above mid-market?
Ask for the methodology in writing and for the spread as a number. Nothing on the invoice will show it, so the answer has to come from them.
3. Do you require a deposit, and when is it returned after contract termination?
Deposit requirements run from zero (Remote, Deel) to two times monthly total employment cost (WorkMotion). A deposit that ties up $200,000 of capital costs you whether or not it is refundable, so ask for the amount, the conditions that extend the hold, and the exact refund timeline on exit.
Our WorkMotion vs Remote comparison shows what that deposit gap does to the total cost of one hire, and WorkMotion vs Deel sets the same gap against the rest of their pricing and coverage.
4. At what headcount threshold do volume discounts apply, and what is the exact discount structure?
Ask for the headcount threshold and the exact tier structure in writing, before the commercial terms are drafted.
5. Are there per-event fees for onboarding, offboarding, or amendments?
Confirm every per-event charge before modelling annual cost. Step 5 above has the ranges we found.
6. How do you handle employer contributions in my target countries, and are they billed at statutory rates or with a margin?
Ask for country-specific employer contribution estimates at your actual salary levels, then check them against the statutory rates yourself.
7. What does your invoice actually show, and can I see a sample before signing?
The invoice should break out the platform fee, gross salary, employer contributions line by line, and per-employee charges. Ask to see a real one before signature. A provider who will not show the format is asking for trust in a total that cannot be checked.
Check current provider details
Frequently asked questions about EOR pricing models
Do EOR providers charge setup or termination fees?
Some do. Onboarding runs from $0 (Remote, Deel) to $2,000 per employee in complex jurisdictions, and termination fees from $150 to $400.
Not every provider raises them during sales. Ask about onboarding, offboarding and any per-event charges by name before you sign.
Tools for this topic
- Employer Cost & Burden Calculator: model the true employer cost under each pricing model
- EOR vs Entity Break-Even Modeler: find where EOR pricing stops making financial sense
Methodology and disclosure
This assessment covered EOR pricing structures by reviewing published pricing pages, provider documentation, contract terms, third-party comparison sources, and industry pricing data across 13 EOR providers. Pricing data reflects published rates as of April 2026.
WhichPayroll may earn affiliate commissions from some providers featured on this page. That does not affect our editorial assessments or our pricing analysis.