[HN Gopher] Remote-first companies that actively hire ___________________________________________________________________ Remote-first companies that actively hire Author : durmonski Score : 83 points Date : 2021-05-09 16:02 UTC (6 hours ago) (HTM) web link (www.remotecompany.com) (TXT) w3m dump (www.remotecompany.com) | timClicks wrote: | Canonical is another company that has been remote-first since it | was formed in 2004. | boogerlad wrote: | I wonder if any of these companies would be interested in paying | Monero and just avoiding taxes entirely. Taxes are such a huge | headache for both parties. Of course it's illegal, but hard to | trace if done right. I think it would be worth being exposed to a | wider variety of talent. | Throwaway_xmr wrote: | How would you convert monero back to fiat without alerting your | bank?(converting to fiat is also necessary cause you can't pay | your veggie bills in monero). Any deposit to your bank would | easily raise suspicion. Monero to cash is possible but its more | difficult to arrange and chances of honeypot are more. | odiroot wrote: | Businesses, even private cannot just leak money/assets without | explanation. | Sebguer wrote: | Odd not to see DigitalOcean on this list, given at least when I | left (before covid), remote was ~55% of the company and very much | a first-class citizen. They certainly are actively hiring at much | higher rates than most of the companies on this list. | LeonenTheDK wrote: | Can you elaborate a bit on how they facilitated remote workers | being first class citizens? I'll be in a similar position soon | but would like to see some things I and the company could do to | not alienate me and the other remote members. | theli0nheart wrote: | Heap1 is virtual-first and actively hiring (not to mention, | scaling like crazy). I have colleagues in North America, Europe, | Asia, and Australia. We have an excellent engineering culture and | need more hands on deck. :) | | Hit me up (email in profile) if any of the roles listed here2 | look interesting to you. | | 1 https://heap.io/ | | 2 https://grnh.se/d7ce9bfc1us | soneca wrote: | You mention Asia and Australia, but all the remote engineering | roles are _"anywhere in the US"_ | zoover2020 wrote: | +1, I was all sols on the company but then remote roles are | US specific :(. | | Any plans for EU remote roles? | periheli0n wrote: | I wonder how this works tax- and social security-wise. Normally, | the employer must pay social security in the country where the | employee is physically located. Also the employer must adhere to | any employment laws for that country. | | At least that's what HR tells me in my current job, as a reason | why they won't let me go full remote. | | Are they right? How are full-remote companies handling this? | | Edit: Context is EU/UK. | loloquwowndueo wrote: | My company is remote-first and employs people all over the | world. For countries where they don't have an incorporated | entity (the vast majority) employees work as "contractors". The | onus is on them to figure out how to set up to be able to | invoice an overseas company and get paid via wire transfer to | their bank account. But this usually just means "hire an | accountant to figure things out". It is doable. | jakobdabo wrote: | I had this bookmarked, not sure if it's valid or up to date: | "How to Hire Foreign IT Talent Legally for your US Startup" - | https://6nomads.medium.com/how-to-hire-foreign-it-talent-leg... | bberenberg wrote: | We have this issue, and the answer is "it's complicated". We | have some people as FTEs, this is done via a PEO who handles a | lot of the overhead for us. This works within the USA. We also | have some contractors within the US that we work with directly. | We also have staff in other countries, we either pay a US | entity they own, or we pay a company as a vendor in that | country, and that company takes care of paying the individuals. | We also have a few direct international contractors for whom we | ensure we're compliant on the US side of things, but they're | responsible for everything on their side of the equation. | | One thing to understand about fully remote is that it can mean | a lot of things to HR. For example, if they approve 100% | remote, does that mean you're outside of an office? Outside of | a city? Outside of a state? Country? Are you nomadic? | | I can tell you that when I was previously employed by a company | where one of my conditions was I want to be 100% remote in | another state, the agreement was I was hired in State A, and | then my boss didn't enforce butts in seats, and they ignored | that I was in State B from their side of the fence, and I paid | taxes in State B. It was illegal, and I wouldn't recommend | doing this. | periheli0n wrote: | Yep, I figured that it's not the best idea to pretend to be | working in country A while actually living in country B. | Health insurance, social security are the Prime issues. | Besides, the company could get rid of me anytime simply by | stating that I'm in violation of my contract since I'm not in | country A. | ghaff wrote: | And a number of states are getting much more concerned with | collecting any taxes they're owed. Someone was even telling | me that their business travel will be audited on an ongoing | basis to ensure someone isn't working sufficient days in a | different state to require a separate tax filing. | | In practice, I could almost certainly work from laptop in an | adjacent state (on my own dime) for a bit and no one would | care but actively misleading about your address of record is | not advised. | bberenberg wrote: | This is a good point I forgot to mention. We have to be | careful to never let staff from outside of NY enter the | state and do any kind of business here or they can hit | fairly serious tax issues. | ghaff wrote: | That seems extreme? I know NY is especially stringent but | people do attend conferences and the like. I haven't seen | a few days here and there being an issue AFAIK. I think | at one point the metric was 14 days but don't even see | that currently. I'm pretty sure if someone headed to the | Javits for a day had to file a NY tax return that would | be pretty much the end of Javits conferences. | ChrisMarshallNY wrote: | ...and the wiseguys that run things there, er, 'dere, | would not be happy... | | But kidding aside, I feel that the restriction may be an | overreaction. Lawyers and accountants can sometimes | overcompensate when it comes to stuff they don't fully | understand. | | I had a friend that wrote a 99-cent iOS app (I don't | think he made enough to cover hosting and licensing | fees), and his accountant was a bit "over the top." He | insisted that my friend could get into serious tax | jeopardy over the App Store stuff, and insisted that he | pay about a 50% tax. | | Hearing about it was painful. Sounded like the guy needed | "help," but I'm told that otherwise, he was an | outstanding accountant. | Ozzie_osman wrote: | Kind of. There are companies that provide this service (the | ability to pay people in different countries). You can Google | "Employee of Record" (EoR) or "Professional Employer | Organization". A few more modern providers that cater to tech | startups specifically are Deel and Pilot. Basically they let | you pay anyone in any country, and easily draft locally | compliant contracts. Often they'll ask you to set yourself up | as a local entity in the company you want to be paid, so you | might lose some benefits (you'd be more of a contractor than an | employee). | | That said, it's never fully plug-and-play. If you're small | enough you can skirt some of the complications, but every | country has very different laws around mandated time off, | taxes, social security, the ability to classify a worker as a | contractor vs employee, benefits, protections like whether/how | you can lay someone off, etc. | | So it's doable, but it's not seamless. | periheli0n wrote: | Thanks, I'll check those out! | lvice wrote: | I've recently started a remote job with a UK-registered | company, and I am working from Italy. If the company does not | have a local office in the country (which mine doesn't), the | easiest way is just to become a contractor/freelance and send | invoices for b2b services. I had to hire an accountant to | manage taxes, but it's doable. | periheli0n wrote: | Thank you for sharing your experience! Unfortunately this | wouldn't work for me since I need to have a permanent | employment contract in order to be eligible for the sources | of income I usually leverage (research grants). | heipei wrote: | I am a German living in Germany and worked remotely for a US | company for a few years before they set up a German subsidiary. | I was employed by the US corporation (so no employer of | record), had a bi-lingual work contract which included all the | necessary clauses for Germany (minimum vacation time, minimum | termination period, "Probezeit"). My employer paid all social | security contributions but did not automatically withhold | income tax as a German company would have done, so I had to pay | those taxes myself after filing my tax return. | | The employer worked with a big-ish professional services | company who did all the necessary payroll and paperwork for | them. | | Overall it was super smooth and except the taxes nothing was | different than working for a Germany company. But I know that | the ease of hiring really depends on each country, and I know | that the company was only considering opening up remote | positions in countries where there was an ample talent pool, | basically where they could except to hire enough people to be | worth it. | periheli0n wrote: | Hey thanks this is exactly what I would need. So it can be | done - it's just a matter of convincing HR to go the extra | mile. "Just" ;) | redisman wrote: | I worked for a small EU company from the US and what they did | was that we all set up a "consulting" company (sole proprietor | is fine for minimal paperwork) and sent invoices to them. Then | just calculate the rate to cover the normal taxes that you end | up paying fully. It's not that great since the burden to file | business taxes is definitely a ton more work than W-2. | i_have_an_idea wrote: | It's a half-truth. Yes, for you to be an _employee_ , they must | do all of that. | | However, in practice, a remote worker can move anywhere, create | a company (in the country where they live), send invoices and | get paid. The catch is you need to take care of more taxes and | admin work and there are none of the employee protections. | You're essentially providing B2B services. | | So, there are no legal issues for your old employer, as long as | you're comfortable with that. It's mostly that employers would | rather own you, as that gives them certain rights and benefits | vs. just purchasing services from a contracting firm. | periheli0n wrote: | Thanks! In my case it would indeed be difficult to work as a | service-provider, since some of the income streams I generate | require that I have a permanent employment contract with my | employer. | marcosdumay wrote: | > However, in practice, a remote worker can move anywhere, | create a company (in the country where they live), send | invoices and get paid. | | Many countries will forbid that. Employment is characterized | by more than the wording of a contract. | isbvhodnvemrwvn wrote: | Plus you have a number of disadvantages - cost of complying | with commercial laws, likely reduced credit score, no legal | right to time off, your entire wealth might be on the line | etc | doopy1 wrote: | They just hire them as "contractors" but provide sufficient | benefits to make up for it. | matthewowen wrote: | A lot of remote first companies constrain themselves to certain | countries. I don't consider that a contradiction: they're still | remote first, they're still distributed, they just have _some_ | constraint within that. | | Beyond that, it's not uncommon for remote first companies to | "hire" people as independent contractors as workaround to these | problems. | ghaff wrote: | Mitchell Hashimoto has written about this. Think there's at | least a comment on HN somewhere but don't immediately find. | Basically _especially_ spanning countries there are a lot of | considerations and you almost certainly can 't just work | wherever you want--especially as a full-time employee. | jobvandervoort wrote: | If you hire someone in another country, you (employer) must | fully comply with local labor laws, tax requirements, run | payroll and pay any local dues in local currency. | | This is only solved by either setting up a local office and | hire local experts yourself, or working with an employer of | record. | | Source: I'm the CEO of Remote.com and we do this for other | companies across the world, and run all our own entities and | compliance. | periheli0n wrote: | Thanks for the answer and stating your background ;) | | I see how this is true in general, but aren't there special | cases e.g. within the EU, between the EU and the UK, or when | an employee moves country while still being employed, where | simpler solutions may exist? | jobvandervoort wrote: | Generally: no. | | There are cases and/or ways where you can e.g. hire someone | under a local contract without owning a local entity, but | that doesn't scale much beyond that, and you'd still need | to run local payroll somehow, and be locally compliant. | | The one big thing the EU solves is mobility: any EU citizen | can work freely from anywhere else in the EU. That's a | massive hurdle to cross otherwise. | | Beyond that, even between EU countries there are absolutely | massive differences in labor laws, standards, etc. | periheli0n wrote: | Ok. But when working through a EoR, will the employee be | employed by the EoR or the company for which the work is | done? | | And how is the situation when the employees come in from | time to time (commuting across borders) but work the | majority of their time in another country? | jobvandervoort wrote: | The employee would be employed by the EoR on paper. Hence | employer _of record_. But otherwise acts as a normal | employee of the actual employer. | | > And how is the situation when the employees come in | from time to time (commuting across borders) but work the | majority of their time in another country? | | This is a gross simplification, but: You must comply with | where you spend the majority of your time. Spending a few | days/weeks outside of your homebase is normal (see: all | business travel) and doesn't make you immediately liable. | | That said, this gets really complex and murky when you | think about e.g. nomads or people that really split their | time between countries. | ghaff wrote: | For that matter, I'm not sure how well nomadism AFAICT is | really handled within the US. Systems are not really | setup for people to not have permanent addresses with | respect to things that require them (drivers licenses, | passports, W-2s, state taxes, etc.). Pre-pandemic I spent | literally months away from home but I had a clear | permanent address. | periheli0n wrote: | OK, thanks! That's really interesting and helpful. By the | way, I'm sure you are aware, there's a ton of | universities in the UK who right now have exactly this | problem: Lecturers/professors/researchers living | somewhere in the EU and commuting in for a few days per | week during the semester. Their HR departments are | freaking out because of it. They could use some help and | maybe a special deal :wink: :wink: | xyzzy_plugh wrote: | > Basecamp ... a company that offers 100% remote jobs, their | employees are scattered across 32 cities in different time zones. | | I'm guessing this is no longer accurate. | fifiriej wrote: | They are likely hiring though | alephnan wrote: | Context ? | Sebguer wrote: | A third of the company recently quit: | | https://www.theverge.com/2021/5/3/22418208/basecamp-all- | hand... | Etheryte wrote: | While factually correct, I think it helps to highlight that | Basecamp was a company of about 60 people at that point. | Without commenting on the clash that lead to this, it is a | big difference whether 30% of people left at a company of a | few dozen or a company of thousands. | WJW wrote: | Only 30% left and they were about 60 people before that, so it | _might_ still be true. It 's likely that it's only about 22 | cities now though. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2021-05-09 23:00 UTC)