Oceania

New Zealand

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Employer of Record (EOR) in New Zealand

What you'll learn

  • Country Introduction
  • Employment Terms
  • Minimum Wage and Working Hours
  • Statutory Leave Laws
  • Termination Process
  • Additional Information
New Zealand Introduction

New Zealand is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, part of the Oceania region. It consists of 2 main islands and 700+ smaller islands. New Zealand is a developed country that ranks highly in quality of life, education, protection of civil liberties, government transparency, and economic freedom. The country’s unique natural beauty and quality of life make it the perfect place for remote workers.

Employment Terms

The minimum wage in New Zealand is NZD 21.20 per hour,  and a standard workweek is around 40 hours per week at 8 hours per day. Overtime work is regulated by the employment contract and is mutually agreed upon by the employee and employer.

Types of Leave

Parental Leave

Maternity leave is known as primary carer leave in New Zealand, and applies to pregnant employees, their spouse or partner, and employees who are going to have the primary responsibility to care for a child under 6 years old permanently.

Employees who are pregnant are entitled to 26 weeks of primary care leave that is paid between NZD 177 to NZD 586 per week by the government.

Sick Leave

Employees are entitled to 10 days of sick leave after 6 months of working with the same employer. The sick can be taken to care for the employee themself, their partner, or a dependent.

Paid Leave

New Zealand has 11 public holidays, and employees are entitled to at least 4 weeks of paid time off each year. Employees can also qualify for other types of leave, such as civic duty, armed forces, and stress leave.

Termination Process

Process

Terminations in New Zealand must be fair and reasonable, the details of which are usually laid out in the employment contract.

Notice Period

The length of the notice period is usually also listed in the employment agreement, around 4 weeks.

Severance Pay

Severance pay must be given according to what is stipulated in the employment agreement.

Additional Information

N/A

OVERVIEW
Language(s):
English, Māori
Currency:
New Zealand Dollar (NZD)
Capital City:
Wellington
Population:
5.1 Million
Cost of Living Rank:
16th
VAT (Valued Added Tax):
15%
Employer TaxES
4%
(estimated)

★  3% - Pension Fund

★  1% - ACC Levy

Get Started in 3 Steps

1

Remote candidate

You've sourced a full-time employee or contractor located in a country where your company is not incorporated.

2

Cost Calculation

Pass us the details of your candidate and we will let you know exactly what it costs to employ your candidate in that country.

3

Onboarding & Admin

Sit back and relax as we onboard your new team member and take care of all the local compliances and admin work.

Same-day onboarding
Best Pricing
Available in 180+ countries
How Remofirst employs in New Zealand

It can be prohibitively expensive to establish an entity in every country you want to hire talent in, so Remofirst will hire and pay your employee on your behalf while you manage their daily duties. Remofirst will handle formal HR procedures and employment contracts that adhere to local laws, so that you can simply approve invoices via our platform. When you work with an Employer of Record (EOR) you can compliantly hire the best employees around the world.

How employees in New Zealand get paid
Your employee's hours, time off, holidays, bonuses, and commissions are automatically calculated into payroll. Remofirst will invoice you in either US Dollars (USD), Euros (EUR), British Pounds (GBP), Canadian Dollars (CAD), or Singapore Dollars (SGD) around the 15th of each month to make sure your employees in New Zealand are paid on time in New Zealand Dollar (NZD). To make it even easier, you can summarize your entire global team's salaries to aggregate them into one payment (instead of many individual payments).
Full-time Employees vs Global Contractors

Unlike full-time employees, contractors work on projects with multiple companies at a given time and are technically self-employed. Full-time employees are solely focused on their employer and usually receive benefits (such as health insurance, equity or stock options, and time off) as an additional form of compensation. While it can be cheaper to work with international contractors instead of paying benefits to a full-time employee, you run the risk of misclassification. It's recommended to work with an EOR for contractor onboarding and payments, so you can know that your international contractors are paid compliantly and on time.

Dependable support for employees
Whenever the employee or employer has a question about benefits, Visas, or anything else related to international employment in New Zealand, they can use our platform's chat function to get answers from our team of experts. Every client of Remofirst also receives a dedicated account manager that will serve as a point of contact for global HR support.