Every country has its own set of labour laws and employment requirements. You may understand the laws where you live, but when you travel to another country, it's a completely different ball game.

If you do not follow these laws, your company may face hefty fines or even a business ban.

Here are some facts about hiring in Pakistan:

• Payroll
• Employees are paid fortnightly or monthly in Pakistani rupees, the local currency (PKR).
• The weekly minimum wage is 17,500 PKR, or about $90 USD.
• Bonuses or 13th-month payments are not required by law.
• The standard work week is 48 hours, 9 hours per day.

Tax rates in Pakistan

Salary-based tax brackets begin at 5% and progress to a fixed rate plus an excess. It becomes quite intricate!

Employers must contribute an additional 5% of salary to an employee's pension.

Leave

• Every employee is entitled to 14 calendar days of fully paid annual leave, which must be taken all at once.
• Pakistan also has 17 government-designated public holidays.
• Employees are entitled to 24 days of paid sick leave, with 16 days at full pay and eight days at half pay.
• Female employees are entitled to three months of paid maternity leave, while fathers are entitled to one month.
• Employees who are terminated receive severance pay equal to 30 days' wages for each year of service completed.

How much does it cost to form a team in Pakistan?

Establishing a business in Pakistan

On paper, the costs of registering a foreign company in Pakistan are not prohibitively expensive. The fee for forming your own legal entity is only about $20, plus a few other small fees for name and address registration.

Isn't it simple? But don't forget that you'll also need to hire legal consultants to ensure that everything is done correctly. Then, when your new employees begin, you'll need to cover the man-hours required to onboard and file the necessary paperwork.

There's also the cost of banking, the office space you're registering with, and so on, so those on-paper costs will soon be outweighed. You could also collaborate with a professional employer organisation (PEO).

Pakistani PEO services

Our monthly fees start at $19, allowing you to hire and pay international employees without having to register your company in Pakistan.

We also provide Employer of Record services, which include HR duties, onboarding, payroll, benefit packages, and ensuring compliance with local Pakistani laws. This starts at $199 per month, which is a very low cost of doing business when compared to the alternative!