Pay your contractors in India — without the per-seat fees
One agreement, one invoice, one transfer. We contract and pay your Indian contractors from our Hong Kong entity — full documents on every payout, fee from 2.5% of volume. No $300/seat. No idle charges.
- 0% GST & zero TDS for your contractors — foreign-origin payouts (FIRA) keep their export status clean
- Full paper trail on every payment — offer, invoice, closing certificate with IP assignment
- You save materially vs a $599 EOR seat — and your contractor takes home more
Paying Indian contractors shouldn't cost you a platform tax
Bank wires quietly take 3–5% between your account and theirs, split across FX spread and correspondent fees you never see itemised. Per-seat platforms charge $300 or more per person per month — and keep charging in the months a contractor didn't invoice you at all. Paying through a local Indian entity looks tidier until you notice what it does on the other side: the payment becomes domestic supply, so your contractor loses the zero-rated export status and picks up 18% GST plus 10% TDS withheld at source. And contracting each person directly leaves the one exposure none of the above solves — misclassification risk sitting squarely with you.
We built the construction that removes all four.
Outcomes that matter
Not features — the things that change on your side of the table in the first month.
One transfer → many payouts
Fund a single invoice; we disburse to every contractor on your roster. No chasing individual wires, no follow-ups from people asking where their money is.
A fee that scales down, not up
2.5–5.5% of payout volume, tiered by what you actually pay out. No per-seat fees, no charges for idle contractors, no minimums.
No direct legal link to your contractors
ReStaff signs and pays each person as prime contractor. Classification exposure sits on our construction, not on your contract.
Documents your finance team can trust
Offer, invoice and closing certificate with IP assignment on every payout — plus a bank-channel receipt (FIRA, earlier FIRC) on the contractor's side.
Contractors keep more
Foreign-origin payouts plus India's presumptive regime (44ADA/44AD): zero income tax up to ~$2,200/mo and 0% GST on exported services.
Same shield, different meter
A flat-fee Contractor of Record and this construction solve the same legal problem. What differs is how the bill is metered — and what that does to the person receiving the money. Modelled on a contractor taking home $1,800/mo.
| $1,800/mo contractor in India | Flat-fee CoR | ReStaff |
|---|---|---|
| Shield fee | $299–325 flat | $45–99 (2.5–5.5% of volume) |
| Fee when the contractor is idle | charged in full | none — you pay on payouts |
| Documents per payout | varies by provider | offer + invoice + closing certificate with IP assignment |
| Contractor's GST on your payments | depends on the paying entity | 0% — export under LUT, FIRA per payout |
| Contractor's income tax | identical construction | identical (44ADA: zero up to ~$2,200/mo) |
Who it's for
Startups & scaleups
Paying their first 1–50 contractors in India, without spinning up an entity or committing to seat fees before the team shape settles.
Agencies & studios
Recurring Indian talent on variable monthly volumes — where per-seat pricing punishes exactly the flexibility the model depends on.
Product teams
Buying burst capacity in dev, QA, design and content, with the document trail finance needs to book it as a clean expense.
How it works
From first conversation to first payout, typically inside a week.
- Sign one MSA — with ReStaff Ltd (Hong Kong). KYB takes about a day.
- Contractors self-onboard — 15–30 minutes each; we verify identity and payout details before anything moves.
- Fund one invoice — a single monthly invoice from us, paid by ordinary bank transfer.
- We contract & pay each person — as prime contractor, at a fixed quoted FX rate, with foreign-origin documentation (FIRA, earlier FIRC) on every payout. Payouts land in as fast as 15 minutes.
- Download the paper trail — offers, invoices and closing certificates with IP assignment, exportable for your books.
Why the offshore construction matters
This is the part that isn't cosmetic. Where the money comes from changes what your contractor keeps.
Foreign-origin payouts = clean export status
Once a contractor crosses ₹20L a year of turnover (~$1,850–1,900/mo), GST registration becomes mandatory. Exported services stay at 0% under a Letter of Undertaking — but only with provably foreign receipts, and the proof is the bank-channel document. Every ReStaff payout ships with a FIRA (earlier FIRC). Payments routed through an Indian entity are domestic supply instead: 18% GST plus 10% TDS at source.
Zero withholding at source
A foreign payer with no Indian presence has no obligation to withhold Indian tax, so nothing is deducted before the money arrives. Your contractor settles their own liability through advance tax once a year — instead of watching 10% sit with the tax department for months.
44ADA and 44AD in one paragraph
India's presumptive regime lets qualifying professionals declare 50% of receipts as deemed income — IT and professional services qualify — and business-type services declare 6% of digital receipts. Combined with the ₹12L rebate under the new regime, income tax comes to zero up to roughly $2,200/mo, and still only about 3% at $2,500/mo. The ceiling is ₹75L of annual receipts. The three articles below work the arithmetic through line by line.
General information, not tax or legal advice. Tax outcomes assume no other tax planning by the Indian contractor.
Don't take our word for it — check the math
EOR vs contractors in India under 44ADA
At a $1,500/mo take-home, the employer's cost through an EOR seat runs about 162% of what the person actually receives — before anyone has negotiated a rate.
Read the full math →Flat-fee CoR vs the ReStaff construction
Identical legal shield, opposite meters: a flat $299–325 per seat against 2.5–5.5% of volume — on an $1,800 payout that is $45–99 instead of $325.
Read the full math →Your own Indian entity vs contractors
Fixed overhead only amortises with headcount: at five seats the entity still lands near 126% of take-home, and it is weeks to months before the first person is paid.
Read the full math →Questions we get asked
Is this a Contractor of Record?
Yes, structurally: ReStaff signs and pays each contractor as prime contractor, so there is no direct contract between you and the person. The difference is the meter — priced as a percentage of payouts instead of a flat seat fee.
Which entity pays my contractors?
ReStaff Ltd, Hong Kong, Reg. No. 3 150 548 — verifiable on the public companies registry in a couple of minutes. Payouts arrive as foreign-origin receipts with a FIRA (earlier FIRC), which is exactly what keeps the contractor's 0% GST export status intact.
Is 44ADA a loophole?
No. It is a deliberate simplification regime written into the Income Tax Act with published limits — ₹75L of annual receipts for professionals with at least 95% digital receipts. Millions of Indian professionals file under it every year; it exists precisely so that independent professionals don't have to maintain full books.
What about misclassification?
The construction removes the direct contract between you and the person, and moves first-line exposure onto us. But substance still matters, and no paperwork fixes a role that is employment in everything but name. Contractor-shaped roles — scope, deliverables, real independence in method — belong here. Disguised employment doesn't, and we'll tell you so.
We're on an EOR or a flat-fee CoR now. How painful is switching?
There is no mass conversion to run. Each new hire and each contract renewal is a fresh decision, so most clients start with the next person they add and let the mix shift naturally. Mixed setups — some people employed, some on the contractor construction — are entirely normal and nobody has to move on day one.
What does it cost?
A single percentage of monthly payout volume, 2.5–5.5% depending on volume. It covers the payment itself, FX at a fixed quoted rate, and the full document set on every payout. No per-seat fees, no idle charges, no minimums.
Do we issue a 1099 or a 1042-S?
Neither, in the usual case. Form 1099-NEC covers US persons, and your contractor in India is not one. Form 1042-S applies to US-source income, and services performed entirely outside the United States are generally foreign-source — so there is typically nothing to report and nothing to withhold. What you should collect is a W-8BEN from the individual (or a W-8BEN-E from their company) and keep it on file.
Under the ReStaff construction your counterparty is ReStaff Ltd in Hong Kong rather than the individual, which simplifies this further. General information, not tax advice — confirm with your own accountant.
Is there VAT or reverse charge on our side?
If you are in the UK or the EU, buying services from a supplier outside your country normally puts the VAT obligation on you under the reverse-charge mechanism: you self-account for it and, if you are fully taxable, recover it in the same return, so the net cash effect is usually nil.
Your Indian contractor should not be charging you Indian GST on an exported service — under an LUT with foreign-origin receipts that export is zero-rated. If an invoice arrives with 18% GST on it, that is a signal the payment route is domestic rather than foreign. General information, not tax advice.
See your exact numbers
EOR vs CoR vs your own entity vs the contractor construction — modeled on FY 2026-27 math.