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How to hire remote employees in
No matter where you’re based out of, we can tell you one thing: Russia has different labor laws than your home country (unless your home country is Russia, that is). If you don’t do things right, you’ll be putting your company at the risk of fines—and risk losing the talent you brought onboard. Fortunately, doing things right is pretty easy if you take the right route.
If you want to successfully hire in
Russia
, you have two options:
Laws about hiring contractors are significantly more simple in
Russia
. Onboarding talent takes days, not weeks or months. Both you, the company, and your talent have more flexibility. And in many cases, since you’re remote, the talent you’re hiring is better classified as a contractor, anyway. Of course, it’s not possible in every case, but it’s what we built Thera for.
This is the long route. You can either establish a physical presence with an entity and register as an employer, or you can use an Employer-of-Record (EOR) solution. Odds are, you’ll find using an EOR to be the easier route. Still, using an EOR in
Russia
is expensive—it can often be $500 per month per employee—and sometimes prone to lengthy onboarding times.
Hiring contractors is normally the easier, faster, more flexible choice—but don’t just take it from us. Below are the specific benefits and drawbacks to hiring contractors in
Russia
.
Hiring employees takes months, at the minimum. When you hire with Thera's locally-generated contracts, it’s a matter of days or weeks. This means you can hire the best talent, fast, without losing them to a hellish procession of paperwork.
It costs just $0 to sign up for Thera, then $25 per month to hire your contractors with Thera. If you hired employees manually (or did contracting on your own), you’d likely be on the hook for thousands of dollars each month. Setting up an entity alone can cost tens of thousands of dollars.
Hiring contractors in
Russia
means you’re generally not on the hook for things like health insurance and paid time off. This makes hiring flexible for you, and it gives your talent more options.
Hiring employees is a bigger commitment, and can open you up to increased liabilities and regulations. When you hire contractors overseas, your biggest risk is misclassification—but laws surrounding contractor classification are often significantly more straightforward.
The contractor life isn’t for everyone—some people want the security that being an employee often appears to provide. Though it’s rare, this does happen, and it’s one disadvantage of manage an all-contractor team.
Most countries’ contractor-employer relationship laws stipulate that the employer can’t set fixed working hours, among other things. These laws give contractors more freedom over how and when they do their work than an employee would have. In reality, however, most contractors are willing & able to work on the company’s schedule—it’s a matter of setting expectations beforehand.
If you’re hiring contractors in
Russia
, you can pay them with Thera in a single click. You won’t need to worry about complicated wire transfers, fees, or currency conversions. We’ll take care of it all. Just make a click and your contractor will get paid in their currency of choice. This is a valuable bonus for talent in countries where the local currency is particularly weak—most people appreciate the ability to receive their payment in stronger currencies.
If you’ve read up until this point, you’ll know that it’s easier, cheaper, and more flexible to hire contractors in Russia than employees. Still, there are valid reasons why you might want to hire employees instead. The content below is for you—we’ll cover employer taxes and obligations in Russia
28 calendar days per year, all unused days are carried over.
Employees may be entitled to additional paid leave if they work in harmful and dangerous working conditions, have irregular working hours, work in the far North regions and in some other cases stipulated by the law.
There are 7 public holidays.
Sick leave allowance is paid by the employer for the first 3 days of sickness and by the Social Insurance Fund from the 4th day onwards.
Sick leave allowance varies depending on the overall length of service, but it does not exceed 2,301 RUB per day.
Maternity leave is paid for 140 calendar days and additional paid childcare leave till the child reaches the age of 18 months. The allowance is covered by the Social Security Fund.
Paternity leave falls under parental leave.
The relative or guardian who takes care of the child can take paid parental leave till the child reaches the age of 18 months. The allowance is covered by the Social Security Fund.
Only one parent can take the childcare leave.
Study leave: Employees gaining higher education are entitled to 40 days paid leave during the first two years of study and 50 days paid leave during consequent years of study. The allowance is paid by the Employer.
Labor contracts can be terminated on the following grounds:
All termination settlements are to be finalized during the employee’s last working day.
When terminating due to staff redundancy or a company’s liquidation, severance pay is one month’s salary plus payment of their average month’s earnings for a 2-month period post dismissal when the employee is searching for alternative work.
If the employee fails to find an alternative job after two months, they can obtain a letter from the Employment Fund which entitles them to receive an additional month’s salary.
When termination is a result of the employee’s refusal to transfer to a different available position within the company or due to the loss of the ability to work (additional reasons might also apply), two weeks’ salary is paid.
The probation period is 3 months. It can be extended to 6 months for directors, chief accountants, and their deputies.
Full-time employment is considered 8 hours per day and 40 hours a week.
Hours worked over 40 hours per week are considered as overtime and are paid at a higher rate. Overtime should not exceed 4 hours in 2 successive days and 120 hours per year.
Overtime is paid at a rate 150% of the regular pay rate for the first two hours and at 200% for all subsequent hours worked within a day.
When an irregular working regime is stipulated in the contract, overtime is compensated by additional paid leave and cannot be less than 3 calendar days per year.
Work during weekends and on public holidays is paid at a minimum of 200% of the regular pay rate. However, the employee can agree to be compensated by receiving regular pay plus an additional day off.
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