Employer of Record (EOR) refers to a third-party organization that legally employs your staff on your behalf. This service becomes particularly valuable when expanding your team to a new country like Belarus. EOR services essentially bridge the gap between your company and the employment landscape in a new location. They simplify international expansion by eliminating the need for you to establish a local legal entity, saving time and money, minimizing risk by ensuring compliance with local regulations and streamlining HR administration so you can focus on core business activities and team management.

While the core function of an EOR is to act as the legal employer and handle tasks like payroll, taxes, and compliance, their services can extend beyond that to provide additional support for your international team. Here’s a breakdown of some additional services an EOR like Spex might offer:

• Onboarding & offboarding
• Assistance with setting up and managing employee benefits packages.
• HR support, guidance on local labor laws, employee relations management, and conflict resolution.
• Recruitment assistance.
• Global mobility solutions such as assistance with visa applications, relocation services, and cultural training for your employees.

Here’s a breakdown of the key benefits of EOR services, focusing on the advantages they offer for businesses expanding their IT team to Belarus:

• EOR services allow you to start hiring top IT talent in Belarus almost immediately, minimizing upfront costs and accelerating your expansion timeline.
• EOR partner handles payroll processing, tax filings, work permit management, and adherence to local labor laws. 
• EOR services free you from the complexities of local HR administration, allowing you to manage day-to-day operations, project assignments, and performance reviews for your Belarusian staff.
• Experienced HR and legal professionals ensure your company operates compliantly, minimizing legal risks and giving you peace of mind when managing your IT team in Belarus.
• You gain access to the exceptional IT talent pool in Belarus without the limitations of needing a local entity. 
• EOR services offer a flexible solution for businesses of all sizes. As your IT team in Belarus grows, you can easily scale your EOR services to meet your evolving needs without the complexities of managing a local entity.

EORs like Spex simplify hiring remote employees in Belarus by:

• Being your legal employer: We handle contracts, work permits, and social security, eliminating your need for a local entity.
• Managing payroll & taxes: We ensure accurate and timely payments, complying with Belarusian regulations.
• Minimizing risk & ensuring compliance: We navigate labor laws, protecting you and your employees.
• Reducing your burden: Focus on your team, not paperwork. We handle HR tasks like payroll and taxes.

This lets you build a strong remote team in Belarus with reduced complexities and increased peace of mind.

Global EOR services offer a wide range of benefits that can be advantageous for many industries. Here are some that stand to gain the most:

• Technology: The tech industry is known for its global workforce and fast-paced nature. EORs can help tech companies quickly hire top talent anywhere in the world without the complexities of setting up local entities.
• E-commerce: Similar to tech, e-commerce companies often require geographically diverse teams. EORs streamline remote hiring for customer service, marketing, and logistics roles across borders.
• Finance & Professional Services: Financial institutions and professional service providers like consulting firms can leverage EORs to access a global pool of skilled accountants, analysts, and other specialists.
• Media & Marketing: Reaching new audiences often requires in-region marketing expertise. EORs can help media and marketing agencies hire local talent for targeted campaigns and content creation.
• Sales: Building strong sales teams in new markets is crucial for growth. EORs simplify hiring local sales representatives who understand the market nuances and can connect with potential customers effectively.

EORs act as a shield for your business, minimizing liability and ensuring compliance in Belarus through several key actions:

• They handle employee classification correctly, eliminating the risk of misclassification penalties and lawsuits.
• EORs stay on top of evolving regulations, ensuring all payroll taxes, social security contributions, and work permits are handled accurately and on time. This minimizes the risk of audits and hefty fines.
• By acting as the legal employer, the EOR assumes primary responsibility for compliance. This significantly reduces your company’s legal risk associated with employing staff in Belarus.

Both EOR (Employer of Record) and PEO (Professional Employer Organization) handle HR tasks for businesses, but with a key distinction: their role as the legal employer.

EOR acts as the legal employer for your staff in a new country (like Belarus). They handle payroll, taxes, contracts, and compliance, eliminating the need for you to establish a local entity. This is ideal for companies expanding internationally and wanting a fast, low-risk entry into a new market.

PEO functions as a co-employer alongside your company. You retain legal responsibility for your employees, while the PEO handles payroll, taxes, and some HR functions. This can be beneficial for established businesses within a country who want to outsource HR tasks and access benefits packages.

In the context of payroll, EOR (Employer of Record) refers to a service where a third-party company acts as the legal employer for your staff, handling all payroll-related tasks for your employees in a specific location, like Belarus. Here’s how it works:

• You Hire, They Manage: You identify and recruit talent, while the EOR handles everything from payroll processing to tax filings for your employees.
• Compliance Champion: The EOR ensures accurate and timely salary calculations, deductions, and tax filings, adhering to all Belarusian payroll regulations. This minimizes the risk of penalties for your business.
• Local Expertise: The EOR leverages their knowledge of local payroll laws and tax regulations to ensure all aspects of payroll are handled correctly.

Our team has developed frameworks and obtained all necessary clarifications from regulators to provide such services to our clients. You can be fully assured that our partnership will be entirely legal and legitimate.

In addition to signing an MSA (master service agreement) with our clients, we also sign an insurance agreement in which the client commits to making an insurance deposit equivalent to one month’s salary of the employee, including all taxes and banking fees. This deposit is used by us in cases of employee termination for final settlement, payment of vacation pay, or covering sick leave payments. Since we invoice our clients once a month, there is often no opportunity to receive money from clients on short notice, which is why the insurance deposit is utilized.

This is a common practice in the IT sector in Belarus. Employment contracts rarely specify salaries only in Belarusian rubles. Most employees prefer to see their salaries linked to euros or US dollars. This preference arises due to the strong volatility of the Belarusian ruble. In agreement with the client, we specify the employee’s salary amount in euros or US dollars in employment contracts and calculate it according to the exchange rate of the National Bank of the Republic of Belarus (NBRB) on the last day of the month for which the salary is paid.

It’s worth noting that, according to Belarusian legislation, we are obliged to calculate the salary based on the NBRB rate, but we sell foreign currency at a private bank, where the rate is lower than the NBRB rate (it should be reminded that the employee will receive the salary according to the NBRB rate, and in practice, we receive less in Belarusian rubles to our account). Therefore, currency differences arise, which the client must also cover (in practice, for a salary of $4,000 USD, the currency difference amounts to no more than $50 USD).

Additionally, there is an option to use a special banking solution that allows for automatic conversion of the allocated Belarusian rubles to the employee’s euro or US dollar account at the NBRB exchange rate, which is a more convenient solution for the employee and reduces losses due to exchange rate differences.

As mentioned earlier, we can organize medical insurance and various compensation and bonuses for the client’s employees. Often, medical insurance in the Republic of Belarus does not offer the same extensive coverage as in Europe or the United States, so the practice of providing “Health money” is common, where we pay the employee an equivalent amount of their annual insurance coverage as a premium. We can also organize coworking space rental or rent a separate office for the client’s employees. Our team can handle many internal processes of the client’s company for their employees under EOR conditions. These may include branded “welcome packs,” greetings for themed holidays, and team-building activities. HR/recruiting outsourcing can also be arranged, integrated into the client’s company, and responsible for all HR processes within the client’s team.