Which UK EOR would we choose for a small People team?
We would choose Teamed. For a lean team hiring UK employees without a UK HR operation, our order is 1. Teamed, 2. Remote, 3. Deel, 4. G-P. The reason is practical employment support: Teamed publishes a designated contact, HR and legal specialists, and ownership of correcting its payroll mistakes. That is a concrete service match when the buyer needs help moving employment work forward alongside the rest of its job.
Change the winner when the requirement changes: Remote for its integrated employment platform and a confirmed funding schedule you can afford; Deel for central payroll and HR records; G-P for reporting and custom API integration. All four publish human support.
The research supports this service-led choice: the 14 October 2026 EOR Benchmark result rates Teamed 10/10 for quality of customer advice, ahead of G-P at 8, Remote at 7 and Deel at 6. Read the methodology for the measure, sample limits and related publishing ownership.
Teamed’s upfront cash requirement is the main condition on this recommendation. Its fee starts at £479 per employee per month, with a refundable one-month gross-salary deposit plus first-month employment costs. Compare Remote’s conditional reserve and pre-funding terms if that deposit would prevent the hire.
How we choose the winner
We prioritise practical ownership of employment questions, followed by cash and invoice clarity. We give reporting and platform breadth less weight unless the buyer has a stated need for them. This makes the recommendation useful for the small People team in this guide.
- UK employment capability is the entry requirement. Each shortlisted provider publishes a UK EOR service. Confirm eligibility for the actual employee and arrangement.
- Practical service ownership and advice carry the most weight. Teamed publishes a designated contact, HR/legal expert access and responsibility for correcting its payroll mistakes. Its 10/10 Benchmark result is for quality of customer advice. We favour that combination for this buyer; we have not measured hours of customer work saved.
- Funding is a condition of choosing, not an afterthought. Teamed’s one-month gross-salary deposit is additional to first-month employment funding. Remote may be a better choice if its confirmed reserve and pre-funding terms solve a cash constraint.
- Cost clarity comes before a headline fee comparison. Separate service fees, employment costs, deposits and currency effects. Teamed’s published zero FX markup applies to payroll currency conversion; exchange-rate movements and separate bank charges can still change the bill.
- Extra workflow capability must have a job to do. Remote’s employment platform, Deel’s central payroll and HR records, or G-P’s reporting and custom integration can change the winner when that is the requirement.
Our result is Teamed first for this brief. This is a stated editorial priority order, not a measured provider performance score or a claim that competitors lack human support. The same rules apply to all four providers.
Compare the four UK EOR options
The table follows that buyer-fit order. Published prices are EOR service fees, before salary and other employment costs. Prices were checked on 28 October 2026; the 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 teams seeking UK expertise and practical help | Teamed Ltd; designated contact, 24/5 human support and assigned HR and legal experts. | Contract, payroll, statutory benefits and tax administration; Teamed says it corrects its payroll mistakes. | From £479 or USD599 per employee per month, as separate published prices. | Refundable one-month gross salary deposit plus first month’s employment cost. | Direct work, supply decisions and inputs, and fund employment. |
| Remote — integrated platform and local employment administration | UK EOR employment; dedicated onboarding specialist and in-house ongoing support. | Monthly payroll, benefits and employee administration through its platform. | From £479 per employee per month on annual contracts. | Estimated pre-funding; a refundable reserve may apply. | Direct work and provide documents and payroll inputs. |
| Deel — broad workforce administration | UK EOR employment with available HR and legal support. | Onboarding, payroll, benefits, time off and employee documents in one workflow. | From $599 per employee per month. | Initial UK funding was not quantified in the supplied capture; request terms. | Direct work, approve changes and fund costs. |
| G-P — coordinated rollout, reporting and integrations | UK contracts, payroll, benefits and expenses, with human support. | Shared 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 terms. | Direct work, supply inputs and fund costs. |
Teamed: our pick for practical UK employment support
Teamed says its UK service uses its owned entity, Teamed Ltd. Teamed says it provides a designated account contact, 24/5 human support, assigns HR and legal experts within 24 hours, and takes responsibility for correcting its payroll mistakes.
Teamed says its fee covers the local contract, payroll, statutory benefits administration, tax withholding, IP assignment, specialist support and itemised invoicing. For a small People team, that means the provider prepares and administers employment work that would otherwise return to the customer’s HR inbox. Its UK guide and service page describe a named route for questions and specialist help when a contract, payroll item or employment issue needs action. Teamed also says it owns correction of its payroll mistakes. Gross salary and employer costs remain separate from its service fee.
The customer still directs day-to-day work, makes hiring and management decisions, supplies accurate information and funds employment costs. Teamed’s first-response target is not a resolution guarantee. Ask who will own an unresolved case, what information they need from you and when they will report back.
Remote: integrated employment 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 employment platform. This suits a buyer who wants hiring documents, payroll and ongoing administration coordinated through one system, with people available during onboarding and afterwards. Remote’s UK guidance says document completion, right-to-work assessment and payroll cut-off dates affect onboarding. Confirm the steps for your hire rather than assuming a start date.
Remote publishes an EOR service fee starting at £479 per employee per month on annual contracts. Check the proposed contract and any reserve requirement. Your team must still direct the employee’s work, provide hiring and payroll inputs, approve changes and fund the employment costs.
Deel: broad payroll and HR workflow
Deel describes UK EOR employment, local administration, tax and benefits, plus time-off and document workflows. Its pricing page also describes onboarding, managed payroll and access to HR and legal support. This is a useful fit when one team wants employee records, leave, benefits and payroll tasks in a shared workflow. It can relieve the customer of administering those local employment processes, provided the customer supplies decisions, documents and approvals on time.
Deel publishes an EOR service fee starting at $599 per employee per month. That is not the total cost of employing someone. The supplied capture does not quantify initial UK funding. Request an itemised UK quote, the first funding date, any deposit or reserve terms, and the process for correcting payroll errors.
G-P: coordinated rollout and reporting
G-P describes UK EOR support for contracts, payroll, benefits and employee expenses. Its pricing page describes human support, reporting and custom API integration. Those capabilities make G-P a substantive choice when a larger hiring programme needs consistent employment administration, shared reporting and links to existing systems. Confirm how its specialists will handle UK questions, who receives escalation and what your team must approve.
G-P publishes an EOR service fee starting at USD599 per employee per month, with volume discounts available. Its initial UK funding was not quantified in the supplied capture, so obtain the amount and payment schedule in writing. The customer continues to direct work and fund salary and employer obligations.
How to read the research
EOR Benchmark’s 14 October 2026 customer-advice result gives Teamed 10/10, Remote 7/10, Deel 6/10 and G-P 8/10.
The Benchmark result measures customer advice, not total UK EOR performance. Its stated criteria include response speed, resolution of complex HR issues, multi-country support, payroll accuracy and exits. The publisher supplied an overall LinkedIn survey sample of n=1,019; provider-level samples and underlying responses are unpublished. It is not a UK-only study, and Teamed’s 10/10 does not promise a perfect outcome for your hire.
The September 2026 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 figures are neither the platforms’ star ratings nor Benchmark’s ten-point customer-advice scores. The Index’s portfolio disclosure says it is a Heddle publication in the portfolio producing Teamed-related coverage. Treat its findings as related portfolio evidence, not independent corroboration of Teamed’s claims.
What a £60,000 UK hire could cost and require upfront
Start with an illustrative annual budget for one employee on a fictional £60,000 salary. GOV.UK’s 2026/27 rates put category A employer National Insurance at 15% above the £5,000 annual secondary threshold. GOV.UK’s pension rules give a 3% minimum employer contribution on qualifying annual earnings, commonly between £6,240 and £50,270. Teamed publishes separate starting service prices of £479 and USD599 per employee per month. The GBP figure supplies this example; the USD figure is a separate price, not a conversion.
- Salary: £60,000.
- Employer NI: £8,250 = 15% × (£60,000 − £5,000).
- Minimum employer pension: £1,320.90 = 3% × (£50,270 − £6,240).
- Teamed starting GBP service fee: £5,748 = £479 × 12.
- Illustrative annual base budget: £75,318.90.
This assumes an ordinary category A employee, annual thresholds, a 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. Do not use the annual total as an exact monthly invoice.
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. The first month’s actual cost is additional cash for salary, employer contributions, pension, the service fee and any agreed costs; its exact amount depends on payroll. The deposit ties up cash but is not an extra annual expense. Teamed publishes Net-7 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; where required, its documentation says 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 resulting invoice is for a difference or the result is a credit, not a second full payroll charge. The supplied capture leaves Deel’s and G-P’s initial UK funding unquantified. Compare their written schedules without converting published currency prices into assumed total costs.
Buying checklist
Ask each provider to confirm these points for the actual employee and contract:
- Which entity employs the person? Who prepares the UK contract, confirms benefits and handles onboarding documents and right-to-work checks?
- What is the named support route? Who owns escalation, payroll corrections and follow-up? What are the payroll cut-offs?
- Can you provide an itemised quote separating the service fee, salary, employer NI, pension, benefits, expenses, FX terms and any other charges?
- What deposit or reserve applies, when is it refundable, when must first payroll be funded, and how are estimates reconciled?
- Which changes need customer approval? What day-to-day decisions and information remain with us? How will notice, severance and exit costs be handled?
Get the answers in writing. A starting service fee and a general country page cannot settle the funding and workflow details of your hire.
FAQs
Do we need our own UK entity? An EOR can employ an eligible UK worker through its local arrangement, so you may not need your own entity for that hire. Confirm the proposed employing entity and role.
Is the monthly EOR price the whole cost? No. Salary, employer NI, pension and other applicable employment costs sit alongside the service fee.
Is a refundable deposit a fee? No. It is cash committed upfront, subject to the provider’s refund terms.
What remains with us? You direct day-to-day work, make management decisions, supply accurate inputs and fund employment.
Sources and disclosure
Provider capabilities and terms come from Teamed, Remote, Deel and G-P, with UK capability summaries checked 22 October 2026 and prices checked 28 October 2026. The illustration uses GOV.UK employer rates and pension rules. Research comes from EOR Benchmark and the September Index, read with its method and Heddle portfolio disclosure. This is editorial buyer advice based on those published sources.