HR outsourcing in Egypt for foreign employers
Somebody has to be the registered employer of your Egyptian hires, run their payroll, and file their statutory contributions correctly and on time. This is how that function gets handled when it is not you, what it covers, and what it costs.
This is the function, not the search
Companies usually come to Egypt through recruitment first: someone needs a role filled. HR outsourcing is the function underneath that decision, the part that continues after someone is hired and keeps running every month afterward. Contracts have to be drafted correctly. Payroll has to run on time, in the right currency, with the right withholdings. Social insurance has to be registered and filed monthly. None of that is optional, and getting it wrong is a compliance problem, not an administrative inconvenience.
This is a distinct decision from who sources your candidates. You can use Atlas for both, which is how most clients run it, or you can use another recruiter and have Atlas handle only the employment and payroll side for hires you have already identified. Either is workable.
What this is not is a formal, licensed employer-of-record product sold as a standalone category the way a large multi-country HR platform sells it. It is the same underlying function, direct employer relationship and full compliance carry, scoped to Egypt specifically rather than a global platform.
The employer cost structure this produces, base salary plus statutory contributions plus our fee, is the same structure behind every hire we place. We break it down in full, with a worked example, in the real cost of building a team in Egypt.
How the function actually runs
Six steps, and we carry all six. The parts companies usually underestimate are the third and the fourth.
We become the registered employer
Atlas holds the employment contract for each hire and carries the compliance risk under Egyptian labour law. You do not register a local entity to start, and you do not become the party responsible if a contract, a filing or a termination is handled incorrectly.
Contracts drafted to Egyptian law, in your language
Every employment contract is drafted to meet Egyptian labour law requirements and reviewed in plain English with you before anyone signs. Termination clauses, probation terms and notice periods are set out clearly rather than buried in boilerplate.
Payroll run monthly, invisible to you beyond one invoice
Salaries, statutory withholdings and social insurance contributions are processed on Egyptian timelines, in Egyptian pounds, by people who do this daily. You see one consolidated invoice, itemised, not a set of local tasks to manage.
Statutory filings handled without your involvement
Social insurance registration, monthly contribution filings and income tax withholding are filed on schedule. If a rate or a cap changes, which happens on a published annual schedule, that is our responsibility to track, not yours.
Benefits and leave administered to local norms
Annual leave, public holidays, sick leave and any benefits beyond the statutory minimum are administered against Egyptian norms, so your team is compliant and competitively positioned in the local market without you having to research either.
One point of contact when something changes
A raise, a role change, a resignation, a dispute: each of these has a correct administrative process under Egyptian law. You tell us what changed and we handle the paperwork, rather than you working out the process yourself each time.
What is covered
Four functions, itemised separately in your monthly invoice rather than folded into one number.
- Employment contracts and onboarding
- Drafted to Egyptian law, reviewed with you in plain language, and processed alongside the statutory registrations a new hire triggers.
- Payroll processing
- Monthly salary runs, payslips and disbursement, reconciled and itemised into one invoice rather than left for you to piece together.
- Social insurance and tax administration
- Registration, monthly contribution filings and income tax withholding, tracked against caps and rates that are scheduled to change annually.
- Benefits, leave and offboarding
- Annual leave and public holiday tracking, benefits beyond the statutory minimum where you want them, and a compliant offboarding process when someone leaves.
What it costs, itemised
We will not publish a flat per-employee fee, because scope varies by headcount and by how much of the function you already run yourselves. What we can publish is the structure, which is the part quotes usually hide.
- Base salary
- Set by the role and the seniority of each hire, not by a blended headcount rate. This is your number, passed through, not marked up.
- Statutory employer contributions, about 22 percent
- Employer social insurance runs at 18.75 percent of insurable salary (PwC Worldwide Tax Summaries), with employer health insurance adding a further 3.25 percent (Fragomen, 2025). Both apply to a capped insurable wage, EGP 14,500 a month as of 2025, not the full salary, with the cap scheduled to rise roughly 15 percent annually through 2027.
- Our HR management fee
- Quoted separately and in writing, covering contracts, payroll administration, statutory filings, and benefits and leave management. Scales with headcount rather than being bundled into a recruitment fee.
Egyptian personal income tax is progressive up to a top marginal rate of 27.5 percent (Andersen Egypt, 2026), withheld from the employee's pay rather than added to your cost, but it is part of why gross salary and take-home pay are different conversations worth understanding if you discuss compensation directly with a candidate. The full build up, with a worked example, is in the real cost of building a team in Egypt.
Questions we get before the first call
If yours is not here, ask it directly. We answer these in writing before anyone signs anything.
Related reading
The real cost of building a team in Egypt
Base salary, statutory on costs, the insurable wage cap, and a worked example you can check.
Hiring in Egypt without a local entity
The two ways to build in Egypt, and what a proper engagement should include, whichever you pick.
The Egyptian talent pool most companies never reach
Who this employment structure is built to attract and retain, not just administer.
Tell us who you have hired, or who you are about to
That is enough for us to come back with an itemised quote and an honest view on what the transition looks like if these are existing hires rather than new ones.
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