South America
Colombia

Colombia

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Employer of Record (EOR) in Colombia

What you'll learn

Colombia Introduction

Colombia is a country located in South America and bordered by Venezuela, Brazil, Ecuador, Peru, the Andes mountain range, and the Caribbean Sea. It is a megadiverse country with rainforest, highlands, desert, and grasslands. Since the 2010s, Colombia has tried to diversify its economy by exporting modern pop culture to the world.

Employment Terms

The minimum wage in Colombia is COP 1,000,000 pesos per month, as of 2022. Employees also receive a transportation subsidy of COP 117,172, making the total minimum wage due COP 1,117,172.

The maximum number of working hours is 8 per day and 48 hours per week, and any work done past the standard working hours is paid as overtime (unless the employee earns more than 10x the minimum wage). Overtime is paid at 125% of the regular salary and 175% if worked at night.

Types of Leave

Parental Leave

Pregnant employees in Colombia receive 18 weeks of paid maternity leave, usually starting 1 week before the due date. Fathers receive 2 weeks of paid paternity leave. This leave also applies to adoption. Employers pay for the leave upfront at 100% of the salary, and later receive a refund from the government.

Sick Leave

Employees in Colombia are entitled to sick leave at 2/3 of their regular pay. The employer pays for the first 2 days and the rest is reimbursed by social security.

Paid Leave

There are 18 public holidays in Colombia, and employees who have worked at their company for 1 year are also entitled to 15 days of paid time off each year (accrued at 1.25 days per month). Employees can also qualify for bereavement leave and marriage leave.

Termination Process

Process

Either party unilaterally terminating the employment contract must state in writing at the time of termination the cause or motive that led to the termination, except in some special cases.

The termination process must follow rules and regulations set by employment contract law, salary law, and social security regulations. Employers must offer a “fair” reason for terminating the employee in the eyes of the law or risk penalties and fines.

Notice Period

The notice period for termination in Colombia depends on the terms of the termination. No notice is required for dismissals due to misconduct. If an employee is being dismissed for poor performance, 15 days notice is required and employees can challenge the decision within 25 hours. Notice of 30 days is required for fixed-term contracts.

Severance Pay

The severance amount depends on the cause of the termination, the salary, and the agreement.

For fixed-term contracts, the severance must be the remaining amount of salary due to the employee up to the last date of the contract.

For indefinite contracts, severance depends on the years of service and current salary:

  • If earning less than 10 times the monthly minimum wage, the employee receives 30 days salary for the 1st year of employment and then 20 days salary for every additional year worked.
  • If earning more than 10 times the monthly minimum wage, the employee receives 20 days salary for the 1st year of employment and then 15 days salary for every additional year worked.

Additional Information

Employees in Colombia are entitled by law to receive a bonus of an extra month’s pay every year, split into 2 payments in June and December. Exceptions to the 13th month salary might apply if the employee earns more than COP 13,000,000 per month.

Overview

Language (s):
Spanish
Currency
Colombian Peso (COP)
Capital City:
Bogota
Population:
52 Million
Cost of Living Rank:
131st
VAT (Valued Added Tax):
19%

Employer Taxes

30%-36.2%

(estimated)

★  12% - Pension Fund

★  8.5% - Healthcare Fund

★  0.5%-8.7% - General Labor Risk Pool

★  4% - Family Allowance Fund

★  3% - Institute for Family Welfare

★  2% - National Learning Service

Where you pay less, and get so much more.

Get global HR, compliance and payroll in 3 simple steps:
1

Find your remote talent

You've sourced a full-time employee or contractor located in a country where your company is not incorporated.
2

We’ll find the best price

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

Leave the onboarding & 
admin to us

Sit back and relax as we onboard your new team member and take care of all the local compliances and admin work.
How RemoFirst employs in Colombia
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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 Colombia get paid
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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), Australian Dollars (AUD), or Singapore Dollars (SGD) around the 15th of each month to make sure your employees in Cyprus are paid on time in Euro (EUR). 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
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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
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Whenever the employee or employer has a question about benefits, Visas, or anything else related to international employment in Cyprus, they can speak with our customer support team to get answers from our team of experts.