How to hire remote employees in

Slovakia

Slovakia is one of many European countries filled with great remote talent. If you’ve found someone you want to hire in Slovakia—or if you’re just curious—you’re in the right place. We’ll teach you about the legal obligations and risks of hiring in Slovakia: As well as the easiest way to hire the remote talent you find.

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Employment requirements

Country snapshot

CURRENCY

Euro (EUR)

EMPLOYER TAXES

30.45%

PAYROLL FREQUENCY

Monthly

OFFICIAL LANGUAGE

Slovak

Why hire independent contractors in Slovakia

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 Slovakia.

It’s the fastest way to hire globally

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’s a lot cheaper

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.

It’s more flexible for you & your team

HHiring contractors in Slovakia 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.

Can be less risky than hiring employees

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.

Some people want to be employees

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.

You might not have as much control over your talent

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.

What to know before you hire in Slovakia

So you want to hire in Slovakia. That’s great. But you should know that hiring in Slovakia is different from hiring in your home country. There’s a whole laundry list of labor laws to catch up on, lawyers to contract, compliance issues to navigate… And it can get complex. So we’ll break it down in simple terms.

If you want to successfully hire in Slovakia, you have two options:

Hire talent as contractors

Laws about hiring contractors are significantly more simple in Slovakia. 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.

Hire talent as employees

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 Slovakia is expensive—it can often be $500 per month per employee—and sometimes prone to lengthy onboarding times.

Hire contractors in a couple clicks with Thera

How can I pay people in Slovakia

If you’re hiring contractors in Slovakia, 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 want to hire employees in Slovakia

If you’ve read up until this point, you’ll know that it’s easier, cheaper, and more flexible to hire contractors in Slovakia 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 Slovakia

Taxes in Slovakia

Employer tax

Health Insurance

Sickness Insurance

Pensions

Unemployment Insurance

Guarantee Insurance

Accident Insurance

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Individual tax

Up to 37,163.36 EUR: 19%
37,163.37 EUR and above: 25%

Leave

Paid Time Off (PTO)

Employees that worked for less than 60 days are entitled to 1/12 of the yearly entitlement per 21 working days.
Employees that worked more than 60 days entitled to prorated 4 weeks of vacation per year.

Public Holidays

There are 15 public holidays in Slovakia.

Sick Days

The first 10 days are paid by the employer.

Days 1-3 are paid at a rate of 25% of daily salary.
Days 4-10 are paid at a rate of 55% of daily salary.

Maternity Leave

Mothers are entitled to 34 weeks of maternity leave.

Mothers of twins are entitled to 43 weeks of maternity leave.

Single mothers are entitled to 37 weeks of maternity leave.

The leave is paid by the Social security agency at a rate of 75% of daily salary up to a maximum of 66,6083.

Paternity Leave

Fathers are entitled to 28 weeks of paternity leave, starting 6 weeks after the mother gives birth, but only if the mother is not receiving maternity benefits. Single fathers are entitled to 31 weeks of paternity leave. The leave is paid by the Social security agency.

Parental Leave

Parental leave can be used by a parent or guardian until the child reaches the age of 3 years old or until the child reached the age of 6 years old in case of a child having a long term adverse health condition.

The amount of the parental allowance is 270 EUR per month or 370 EUR per month (if the parent previously received a maternity benefit in the EU/EEA states). It is paid by the Central Office of Labour Social Affairs and family

Other Leave

None.

Termination

Termination Process

The employment contract in Slovakia can be terminated in writing by both parties as follows:

mutual agreement
immediate termination – in extreme circumstances the employer must terminate the employment within two months since becoming aware of the grounds for the immediate termination, and at the latest within one year of the day on which those grounds arose.
termination in the probationary period by either side can terminate the employment during the probationary period without providing any reason for termination by a written notice that must be given and delivered to the other party at least 3 days before the day of stipulated termination.

Notice Period

The general length of the notice period for a Slovak labor contract is:

is 1 month (unless longer notice period is stipulated by the Labour Code)
if the employee was employed for at least 1 year but less than 5 years – 2 months
if the employee was employed for at least 5 years – 3 months

When employees resign they need to give the following notice:

1 month – if the employee had worked 1 year or less

2 months – if the employee had worked 2 years or more.

Severance Pay

Severance pay depends on the length of employment and type of termination. When employment is terminated with notice, the minimum amount of severance pay is one to four times the employee’s average monthly earnings, depending on the years of service (2 to 20 years).

Probation Period

The probation period is limited to 3 months for operational roles or 6 months for management roles.

Employee requirements in Slovakia

Working Hours

A standard workweek is 40 hours, at 8 hours per day.

Overtime

Overtime pay for hours over 40 a week is 125% of regular salary.
Pay for working on Saturday is 150% of regular salary.
Pay for working on Sunday is 200% of regular salary.
Pay for working at night is 140% of regular salary.

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