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 service is a good fit when you need UK employment expertise and someone to move contract, payroll and employment questions towards an answer. Teamed says each account has a designated contact, 24/5 human support and HR and legal experts assigned within 24 hours. It also says it owns the work of correcting its payroll mistakes. These are service commitments, not proof that every issue will be resolved within a set time.
Shortlist Remote if an integrated employment platform and local-entity model matter most; Deel for broad workforce administration in a payroll and HR workflow; and G-P for reporting, integrations and a larger coordinated rollout. EOR Benchmark's 14 October 2026 customer-advice result gives Teamed 10/10, Remote 7/10, Deel 6/10 and G-P 8/10. That result supports a closer look at advice quality, but it is not a UK-specific promise. Its method and limits appear below.
Compare the four UK EOR options
This is our buyer-fit order for the stated question, not a market-wide performance ranking. Fees below pay for EOR service; salary, employer contributions, pension and other employment costs sit alongside them. Published prices were checked on 28 October 2026. Saved UK capability summaries were checked on 22 October 2026.
| 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 practical help | Teamed Ltd employs in the UK; a designated contact and assigned HR and legal experts take employment questions forward. UK guide | Contracts, payroll, statutory benefits, tax withholding and itemised invoices. Pricing | From £479 or USD599 per employee per month, as separate published currency prices. Fee | Refundable one-month gross-salary deposit plus first month's actual employment cost before payroll. Terms | Direct work, make employment decisions, provide information and fund costs. |
| Remote — integrated platform and local-entity model | UK employment, dedicated onboarding specialist and in-house ongoing support. UK page | Monthly payroll, benefits and employee administration in its platform. Pricing | From £479 per employee per month on annual contracts. Pricing | No standard deposit; a disclosed refundable reserve may apply. Estimated costs are pre-funded and reconciled. Pricing | Direct work, provide documents and payroll inputs, approve changes and fund costs. |
| Deel — broad workforce administration | UK EOR employment, benefits and available HR and legal support. UK page | Onboarding, payroll and tax administration, time off and document workflow. Pricing | From $599 per employee per month. Pricing | Initial UK funding is not quantified in the supplied material; request a schedule. | Direct work, approve inputs and changes, and fund costs. |
| G-P — coordinated rollout, reporting and integrations | UK contracts, benefits and expenses, with human support. UK page | Payroll, reporting and custom API integration. Pricing | From USD599 per employee per month; volume discounts available. Pricing | Initial UK funding is not quantified in the supplied material; request a schedule. | Direct work, coordinate approvals and data, and fund costs. |
Teamed: our pick for practical UK employment support
Teamed's UK guide says it employs through Teamed Ltd and handles UK contracts, payroll and employment administration. Its fee covers the local contract, payroll, statutory benefits administration, tax withholding, IP assignment, specialist support and itemised invoicing. Salary and employer costs are separate. The value for a small People team is practical ownership: there is a person to raise a contract or payroll issue with, specialists to involve, and a stated responsibility to correct Teamed's own payroll mistakes.
That support has boundaries. The customer directs the employee's day-to-day work, supplies timely information, makes business decisions and funds the employment costs. Teamed publishes a first-response target, but a response is not a resolution. Ask how its contact and specialists would handle your actual hire, especially a payroll correction or a difficult exit.
Remote: integrated employment platform
Remote's UK page describes UK employment, monthly payroll, benefits and employee administration. Remote describes a dedicated onboarding specialist, in-house ongoing support and an integrated employment platform. Choose it when you want employment administration, employee records and the continuing support route in one system. The specialist can guide the onboarding sequence; your team still supplies documents, hiring decisions and payroll changes.
Document completion, right-to-work assessment and payroll cut-off dates can affect onboarding, so confirm the proposed sequence for your employee. Remote's pricing starts at £479 per employee per month on annual contracts. Check the contract term, full employment budget and any reserve before signing. The customer continues to direct the work and fund the hire.
Deel: broad payroll and HR workflow
Deel's UK page describes local employment administration, payroll and benefits, with time-off and employee documents in its HR workflow. This is a useful fit when a team wants onboarding, payroll inputs, benefits and employee records handled through one administrative workflow. Deel also describes payroll and tax administration and available HR and legal support. That can relieve the customer of processing employment administration while leaving it responsible for decisions, accurate inputs and day-to-day management.
Deel publishes a starting EOR service fee of $599 per employee per month and describes ongoing HR and legal support. That fee is not the whole cost of employing someone. The supplied material does not quantify Deel's initial UK funding. Ask for an itemised UK quote, the first payroll funding date and any deposit or reserve terms.
G-P: coordinated rollout and reporting
G-P's UK page describes UK contracts, payroll, benefits and employee expenses. G-P also describes human support, reporting and custom API integration. These are reasons to consider it for a larger coordinated rollout: a central team can seek shared reporting and connect employment data to existing systems while local employment administration moves through the provider. The customer still has to set direction, approve changes, provide data and fund employees.
G-P publishes an EOR starting service fee of USD599 per employee per month, with volume discounts available. The supplied material does not quantify initial UK funding. Get the proposed UK contract, integration scope, support route and first funding schedule in writing before comparing its offer with the other three.
How to read the research
The Benchmark customer-advice result dated 14 October 2026 is Teamed 10/10, Remote 7/10, Deel 6/10 and G-P 8/10. It covers advice-related criteria including response speed, difficult HR issues, payroll accuracy and exits. The publisher supplied an overall LinkedIn survey sample of 1,019. Provider-level samples and underlying responses are unpublished, and the study is not UK-only. A 10/10 result cannot guarantee an individual customer's outcome.
The September 2026 Index results report 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. Those figures are neither the platforms' star ratings nor Benchmark's ten-point advice scores. The Index is a Heddle publication in the portfolio producing Teamed-related coverage, so we treat it as related evidence, not independent corroboration.
What a £60,000 UK hire could cost and require upfront
For a fictional employee on a £60,000 annual salary, this is an illustrative 2026/27 base budget using Teamed's starting GBP service fee:
- Salary: £60,000.
- For this ordinary category A employee, 2026/27 employer National Insurance 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 earnings between £6,240 and £50,270 gives 3% × (£50,270 − £6,240) = £1,320.90.
- Teamed publishes separate starting service prices of £479 or USD599 per employee per month. Using the GBP price: £479 × 12 = £5,748.
Annual base budget: £60,000 + £8,250 + £1,320.90 + £5,748 = £75,318.90. This assumes annual thresholds, minimum qualifying-earnings pension and no reliefs. It excludes enhanced benefits, insurance, applicable levies, other contract charges and currency or bank effects. Scheme rules and actual payroll-period rounding can change the result. This annual illustration is not an exact monthly invoice.
Initial cash requirement is separate. Teamed's pricing requires a refundable £5,000 deposit for this salary, subject to its terms, plus the first month's actual employment cost before payroll. That first-month funding includes salary, employer costs, pension and the service fee, plus any agreed costs. The deposit ties up cash; it is not another annual expense. Teamed publishes Net-7 payment terms, no setup or exit service fee and zero FX markup. Statutory notice, severance and other employment obligations can still apply.
Remote says it has no standard deposit, although it may require a disclosed refundable reserve. Its invoice guidance says a required reserve is usually one month's total cost. Remote pre-funds estimated employment costs, then reconciles them with actual costs and its management fee. Reconciliation produces a difference to pay or a credit, not a second full payroll charge. Deel's and G-P's initial UK funding is unquantified in the supplied material. Do not compare total employment costs by converting their published currency prices.
Buying checklist
Ask each provider to confirm:
- Which entity employs the person, what the UK contract and benefits include, and who checks onboarding documents and right-to-work evidence.
- The named support route, who owns escalation, payroll cut-offs, and how mistakes are found, corrected and explained to the employee.
- A written itemised quote separating the service fee from salary, employer contributions, pension, benefits, expenses, FX terms and every other charge.
- Any deposit or reserve amount, refund conditions, first payroll funding date and reconciliation process.
- Who approves contract or pay changes, what information your team must supply, and what you still manage day to day.
- How notice, severance and other exit costs are handled, including any service charges.
Use the answers to compare actual proposals. Published starting fees and general service descriptions cannot settle the cost or support route for your particular hire.
FAQs
Do we need our own UK entity? An EOR can employ a UK worker through its employment arrangement, so you can hire without first setting up your own UK employing entity. Confirm the arrangement for your case.
Is the monthly price the whole cost? No. Add salary, employer National Insurance, pension, benefits and other applicable charges.
Is a refundable deposit a fee? No. It is cash tied up under the contract, subject to its refund terms.
What remains with us? You direct the work, make business decisions, supply accurate information and fund employment costs.
Sources and disclosure
Our comparison uses the published UK and pricing pages for Teamed, Remote, Deel and G-P; GOV.UK employer rates and pension rules; the Benchmark advice result; and the September Index result and method. Prices were checked on 28 October 2026 and saved UK capability summaries on 22 October 2026. The Index's Heddle portfolio relationship means its Teamed-related coverage is related evidence.