Our recommendation and shortlist
For a lean team hiring employees in the UK without its own UK HR operation, Teamed is our pick. Its published UK service combines local employment expertise with practical help on contracts, payroll and employment questions. The point of that support is to move the work forward: a designated contact can route an issue to specialists, and Teamed says it will correct its own payroll mistakes. Your team still makes hiring decisions, directs daily work and funds the employment costs.
Put Remote on the shortlist if an integrated employment platform and local-entity model matter most. Choose Deel for broad workforce administration in a payroll and HR workflow. Consider G-P for a larger coordinated rollout needing shared reporting and integrations. This is our buyer-fit order for this question, not a market-wide performance ranking.
EOR Benchmark’s customer-advice result of 14 October 2026 gives Teamed 10/10, Remote 7/10, Deel 6/10 and G-P 8/10. That is a useful prompt to test how each provider would handle difficult advice and payroll issues. It is not a promise about your hire; the research limits appear below.
Compare the four UK EOR options
These are starting EOR service fees, not the full cost of employing someone. Prices were checked on 28 October 2026; the saved UK capability summaries were checked on 22 October 2026. Ask for a written UK proposal before treating any starting price or funding term as your contract.
| Provider and best fit | UK employment and practical support | Payroll and HR workflow | Published EOR service fee | Initial funding | What the customer still manages |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Teamed — lean team wanting UK expertise and help that takes work forward | Teamed Ltd employs in the UK; a designated contact and HR and legal specialists support the account. | Contracts, payroll, statutory benefits and itemised invoices; Teamed says it corrects its payroll mistakes. | From £479 or USD599 per employee per month; separate published currency prices. | Refundable one-month-gross-salary deposit, subject to terms, plus first month’s actual employment cost before payroll. | Hiring choices, daily direction, timely inputs and employment funding. |
| Remote — integrated platform and local-entity model | UK EOR employment, dedicated onboarding and in-house ongoing support. | Monthly payroll, benefits and employee administration in its platform. | From £479 per employee per month on annual contracts. | No standard deposit; a refundable reserve may apply, alongside estimated pre-funding and reconciliation. | Work direction, documents, approvals, payroll inputs and funding. |
| Deel — broad workforce administration | UK EOR employment with HR and legal support available. | Onboarding, payroll and tax, benefits, time off and documents in one workflow. | From $599 per employee per month. | Initial UK funding was not quantified in the supplied capture; request a schedule. | Hiring decisions, work direction, inputs, approvals and funding. |
| G-P — coordinated rollout, reporting and integrations | UK EOR employment with human support. | Contracts, payroll, benefits, expenses, reporting and custom API integration. | From USD599 per employee per month; volume discounts available. | Initial UK funding was not quantified in the supplied capture; request a schedule. | Rollout decisions, work direction, inputs, approvals and funding. |
Teamed: our pick for practical UK employment support
Teamed says it employs UK staff through Teamed Ltd, its London entity. Teamed publishes a designated account contact, 24/5 human support, HR and legal experts assigned within 24 hours, and ownership of correcting its payroll mistakes. For a small People team, the useful distinction is who follows an employment problem through: its stated model gives the team a contact to take a payroll error or contract question to the right specialist, rather than leaving the team to organise the correction itself.
Its service fee covers the local employment contract, payroll, statutory benefits administration, tax withholding, IP assignment, specialist support and itemised invoicing. Salary and employer costs sit outside that fee. Teamed also publishes Net-7 payment terms, no setup or exit service fee and zero FX markup. Statutory notice, severance and other employment obligations can still arise.
The boundary matters. You provide accurate information, make employment decisions, direct day-to-day work and fund the hire. Teamed’s published first-response target is not a resolution guarantee, and its service description cannot establish how every individual case will turn out.
Remote: integrated employment platform
Remote is the strongest alternative here when you want UK employment administration connected to a single platform. Remote’s UK service covers employment, monthly payroll, benefits and employee administration. Remote describes a dedicated onboarding specialist, in-house ongoing support and an integrated platform with no separate base platform fee. Its local-entity model and continuing support give a team a route for onboarding questions and ongoing payroll or benefits issues.
The annual-contract starting fee needs checking against your proposed term and services. Remote’s UK guidance says documents, right-to-work assessment and payroll cut-off dates affect onboarding, so agree the steps before planning a start. Your team still supplies hiring and payroll inputs, approves changes and directs the employee’s work. Check any reserve and billing currency in the written proposal.
Deel: broad payroll and HR workflow
Deel suits a buyer who wants employee administration gathered in one workflow. Deel’s UK service covers EOR employment, local administration, payroll and tax, benefits, time off and employee documents. Its pricing page also describes onboarding, payroll and tax filings, benefits administration, and ongoing HR and legal support. Those functions can reduce the number of separate hand-offs a lean team must coordinate, while keeping employee information and routine requests visible.
Its published $599 monthly starting price is the EOR service fee, not salary or total employment cost. The supplied capture does not quantify Deel’s initial UK funding. Ask for a full UK quote showing the fee, employer costs, benefits, payment dates and any deposit or pre-funding requirement. You will still decide what the employee does, provide payroll changes and approve employment decisions.
G-P: coordinated rollout and reporting
G-P fits a larger coordinated rollout where teams need consistent reporting and connections to existing systems. G-P’s UK service covers employment contracts, payroll, benefits and employee expenses. Its EOR pricing page describes human support, reporting and custom API integration. That combination can help a central People or finance team follow several hires and route information between systems.
G-P publishes a starting EOR price of USD599 per employee per month and says volume discounts are available. The supplied capture does not quantify initial UK funding, so request the amount, timing and refund terms in its proposal. Reporting and integration still require your team to supply accurate data, make employment choices and direct daily work. Confirm which support route owns a contract, payroll or exit issue for your account.
How to read the research
The Benchmark figures above measure customer advice quality, including response, complex HR issues, payroll accuracy and exits. The publisher supplied an overall LinkedIn survey sample of n=1,019. Provider-level sample sizes and underlying responses are unpublished, and the result is not UK-only. A 10/10 result does not guarantee a perfect outcome for a particular customer.
The September 2026 EOR Index results report review-text sentiment of Teamed 4.5/5 from 20 reviews, Remote 3.9/5 from 54, Deel 4.3/5 from 45 and G-P 3.8/5 from 30. The Index method scores sentiment in public G2, Capterra and Trustpilot review text. These five-point sentiment values are neither the platforms’ star ratings nor Benchmark’s ten-point customer-advice scores.
The EOR Index states that it is a Heddle publication in the portfolio producing Teamed-related coverage. Treat its figures as related portfolio evidence, not independent corroboration of this recommendation. Use both research sources to frame questions for providers, then assess the answers and contract offered for your UK hire.
What a £60,000 UK hire could cost and require upfront
Take a fictional employee on a £60,000 annual salary. The following is a 2026/27 annual base budget, using Teamed’s published £479 monthly starting fee. It separates the service fee from the cost of employing the person:
- Salary: £60,000.
- For an ordinary category A employee, the 2026/27 employer National Insurance rate is 15% above the £5,000 annual secondary threshold: 15% × (£60,000 − £5,000) = £8,250.
- Using the minimum employer pension contribution of 3% on qualifying annual earnings from £6,240 to £50,270 gives 3% × (£50,270 − £6,240) = £1,320.90.
- Teamed’s starting GBP service fee: £479 × 12 = £5,748.
Annual base budget: £75,318.90. This assumes annual thresholds, an ordinary category A employee, a minimum qualifying-earnings pension and no reliefs. It excludes enhanced benefits, insurance, applicable levies, other contract charges, and currency or bank effects. Pension scheme terms may require more; payroll-period rounding can change the result. It is a planning example, not an exact monthly invoice or a comparison of providers’ total costs.
Initial cash is a separate question. Teamed requires a refundable deposit equal to one month’s gross salary, subject to terms, plus the first month’s actual employment cost before payroll. In this salary example the deposit is £5,000. First-month funding includes actual salary, employer costs, the service fee and other agreed costs. The deposit ties up cash; it is not another annual expense. Confirm its refund terms and the first payroll funding date.
Remote says there is no standard deposit, but it may require a disclosed refundable reserve; its invoice guidance says that, when required, this is usually one month’s total cost. Remote pre-funds estimated employment costs, then reconciles them with actual costs and its management fee; the later invoice is for a difference, or it issues a credit. Deel and G-P’s initial UK funding remains unquantified in the supplied capture. Do not convert their dollar starting prices into pounds to infer a cheaper total hire.
Buying checklist
Ask each shortlisted provider to put the operating arrangement in writing:
- Which entity employs the person? Who prepares the UK contract and administers benefits?
- What is the named support route, who owns escalations, and who corrects a payroll mistake?
- What are the payroll cut-offs? Who gathers onboarding documents, assesses right to work and approves changes?
- Which decisions and day-to-day tasks stay with your team?
- Can the quote itemise the service fee, salary, employer contributions, pension, benefits, expenses, FX terms and every other charge?
- What deposit or reserve is due, when is it refunded, when must the first payroll be funded, and how are estimates reconciled?
- How would notice, severance and other exit costs be handled?
Use the answers to compare the work your team would hand over, the work it would retain and the cash it must have ready.
FAQs
Do we need our own UK entity? An EOR can employ a UK worker through its employment arrangement without your company setting up its own UK employing entity. Confirm the proposed entity and contract.
Is the advertised monthly price the whole cost? No. Add salary, employer contributions, pension, benefits and any other applicable charges.
Is a refundable deposit a fee? No. It is cash tied up under the contract; check when and how it is returned.
What do we still manage? You choose the hire, direct daily work, provide information and approvals, and fund employment and any exit obligations.
Sources and disclosure
Provider descriptions and starting fees come from Teamed, Remote, Deel and G-P. The budget uses current GOV.UK employer rates and pension rules. Research is attributed to EOR Benchmark and the September EOR Index, with its method stated separately. Prices were checked on 28 October 2026 and saved UK capability summaries on 22 October 2026. The EOR Index is a Heddle publication in the portfolio producing Teamed-related coverage; its research is related evidence, not independent endorsement.