- What global payroll platform do you actually recommend?
- Deel for sub-200-employee mid-market motions; Papaya Global for enterprise payroll consolidation across 15+ entities. The structural reason: mid-market companies running entities in 2-5 countries need fast time-to-value, published pricing, and bundled hiring + payroll workflow — Deel covers all three. Enterprise companies running 15+ entities with complex inter-company billing and BI reporting need depth that Deel doesn't ship at the same level — Papaya's wedge is that depth. Honest split point: 200-300 employees with 5-10 entities is the gray zone. Below that, Deel almost always wins on speed and cost. Above that, Papaya's reporting + inter-company billing depth starts to matter.
- What's the difference between EOR and Global Payroll?
- EOR (Employer of Record) means the vendor IS the legal employer in that country — Deel/Remote/Oyster hires the worker through their local entity, you direct the work and pay them via the EOR. You don't need to set up your own foreign entity. Global Payroll means YOU own the foreign entity, and the platform handles in-country tax filing, payroll processing, and statutory compliance for entities you own. Most distributed startups start with EOR (faster, no entity setup needed) and only move to Global Payroll for countries where the headcount justifies the entity-setup cost (typically 5-10+ employees in a single country). Some companies run hybrid: EOR for low-headcount countries, Global Payroll on entities you own for high-headcount countries.
- When do I need Global Payroll for entities I own?
- Three patterns: (1) headcount in a single country exceeds 5-10 full-time employees and the EOR markup ($599/mo × N employees) would justify the entity-setup cost ($15K-$50K legal + ongoing accounting); (2) tax efficiency or grant-program eligibility requires you to be the legal employer (R&D tax credits in some countries, accelerator programs); (3) regulated industry compliance requires you to be the direct employer rather than going through an EOR's local entity. Below those thresholds, EOR is structurally cheaper. Above them, Global Payroll on owned entities pays back within 12-24 months.
- How does Global Payroll pricing actually work?
- Most platforms quote per-employee per-country, ranging $20-$50/employee/mo for mainstream geos at SMB / mid-market scale. The fee covers in-country payroll processing, tax filing, payslip generation, and statutory reporting. The full TCO also includes: per-employee fee × headcount + employer mandatory contributions (which the platform processes but passes through) + occasional implementation fees (typically $0 for SMB, $15K-$50K for mid-market multi-entity rollouts, $30K-$150K for enterprise rollouts). When comparing platforms, normalize by 'all-in cost per employee per country' rather than headline rate alone — Papaya's $20/employee/mo with $80K implementation isn't actually cheaper than Deel's $29/employee/mo with light-touch onboarding for sub-100-employee setups.
- Can I run Global Payroll on multiple platforms?
- Yes, and many enterprise companies do — typically because they inherited platforms via acquisitions or because different regions chose different vendors years ago. The operational cost is real: multiple sources of truth on payroll data, manual reconciliation in finance close, and ongoing vendor management overhead. Most companies that run multi-platform setups are actively trying to consolidate to one platform within 12-24 months. The exception: very large enterprises (1000+ employees, 20+ countries) sometimes run a deliberate split — Workday for US + native countries, Papaya/Deel for everything else — because the consolidation friction outweighs the data-fragmentation cost.
- How do I migrate Global Payroll between platforms?
- Multi-entity migrations are operationally significant. Plan 4-8 weeks per entity for SMB / mid-market migrations, 8-16 weeks per entity for complex regulated-industry setups. The key gates: aligning on a cutover date that doesn't fall during a critical payroll cycle (avoid year-end, fiscal-quarter close), running the new platform in parallel for 1-2 cycles before fully cutting over, validating tax filings continuity, and reconciling employee benefits enrollment. Don't migrate all entities at once — pick one country as a pilot, validate the migration playbook, then roll out sequentially. Most enterprise migrations land 6-18 months end-to-end.