Italy · Employer of Record · Payroll Services · PEO
You have found the person you want to hire in Italy — now you need a compliant way to employ them. JN Recruitment is the expansion partner that connects international companies with vetted Employer of Record and payroll partners in Italy — plus the employment lawyers, tax advisors, consulenti del lavoro and accountants an Italian expansion actually needs — and delivers the boutique recruitment that finds the candidate in the first place.
for an EOR to file the UNILAV and issue a compliant Italian employment contract
employer social contributions on an Italian gross salary — plus the TFR severance accrual
no S.r.l. required — with an Employer of Record, the partner is the legal employer in Italy
our recommendation is free — the best specialist from our vetted Italian network, matched to your case
Payroll partner Italy
Italy is Europe’s second-largest manufacturing nation — and a market where employment terms are written by collective bargaining before you ever draft a contract. Nearly every industrial role sits under a national collective agreement (CCNL) that fixes pay grades, probation, notice and the thirteenth — sometimes fourteenth — salary payment; the hire must be notified to the authorities before work starts (comunicazione obbligatoria, UNILAV); INPS and INAIL positions must exist before the first payslip; and the TFR severance entitlement accrues from day one. None of it is optional, and companies that have already found their candidate lose weeks here — or improvise with a partita IVA contract that the authorities later reclassify as employment.
There are two clean routes. If you have (or will build) an Italian entity, a payroll service provider in Italy — in practice a consulente del lavoro, the licensed payroll and labour-compliance profession — runs the monthly buste paga, filings and registrations for you. If you have no entity and don’t want one yet, an Employer of Record (EOR) employs your hire legally in Italy while you direct the day-to-day work — what many US companies would call a PEO. The market for both is crowded and opaque; staff leasing (somministrazione di lavoro) requires a ministry-authorised agency, service depth and pricing vary enormously, and the CCNL binds an EOR exactly as it binds a local employer. Sooner or later an Italian expansion also needs an employment lawyer, a tax advisor (commercialista) and an accountant. We vet all of it for you.
JN Recruitment is a boutique recruitment firm headquartered in Mannheim, with offices in Poland and Cyprus — and the expansion partner international companies use for the Italian market. Years of placing people in Italy have built us a network of the best employment lawyers, tax advisors, consulenti del lavoro, accountants and vetted EOR providers in the country. We recommend exactly the specialists your case needs — free of charge, at the partner’s standard rates — and stay your single point of contact. What we deliver ourselves is the headhunting: the sales recruitment agency for Italy that international machinery, industrial-technology and recycling companies already use to enter the market.
What we arrange
Whatever stage your Italy plans are at — first hire without an entity, or a full team on an existing S.r.l. — this is what our vetted Italian network delivers: EOR providers, consulenti del lavoro, employment lawyers, tax advisors and accountants, matched and introduced by us:
The partner becomes the legal employer of your hire in Italy — employment contract under the right CCNL, UNILAV notification, INPS and INAIL positions, payroll including tredicesima and TFR accrual — while you manage the work day-to-day. Live within days, no S.r.l. required. The standard route for a first hire in Italy.
For companies with an Italian entity: a consulente del lavoro — Italy’s licensed payroll profession — runs the monthly buste paga, UniEmens declarations to INPS, INAIL filings, withholding tax remittances, the tredicesima and quattordicesima runs and year-end CU certificates — no in-house Italian payroll expertise needed.
Searching for a “PEO Italy”? The US-style PEO doesn’t exist 1:1 under Italian law — staff leasing (somministrazione di lavoro) is reserved for ministry-authorised agencies (Agenzie per il Lavoro), and the compliant equivalents are EOR employment or outsourced payroll on your own entity. We translate what you actually need into the right Italian construct.
Specialised employment lawyers for watertight Italian contracts, CCNL classification and quadro-versus-dirigente questions, tax advisors (commercialisti) for registrations and filings, accountants for the books — the advisory bench every Italian expansion eventually needs, already vetted and briefed.
Onboarding paperwork, mandatory workplace-safety training, absence tracking and statutory notifications — plus audits of Italian freelance setups: authorities reclassify false partita IVA arrangements into employment, and partners convert contractors into compliant setups before that happens.
The part we deliver ourselves: executive search for technical sales and leadership roles in Italy. If you don’t have the candidate yet, we find them — then plug employment and payroll in behind the signed offer.
Market knowledge
Italian employment is governed by collective agreements down to the notice period — and it prices in costs other markets don’t have. The essentials we brief every company on before an Italian hire:
Italy has no statutory minimum wage — instead, national collective agreements (CCNL Metalmeccanico, Commercio and hundreds more) set the minimum pay grades, probation, notice periods and extra salary payments for virtually every role. The CCNL binds an EOR exactly as it binds a local employer, so choosing and applying the right agreement — and the right level, quadro versus dirigente — is part of the offer, not an afterthought.
Italian gross salaries always include a thirteenth payment (tredicesima) in December, and several CCNL sectors — commerce among them — add a fourteenth (quattordicesima) in summer. Payroll runs thirteen or fourteen cycles a year, and budgets and EOR quotes should always work from annual gross so offers stay comparable across Europe.
The trattamento di fine rapporto is an Italian particularity: roughly one month’s salary per year of service (about 6.91% of annual pay) accrues as a severance entitlement, revalued annually and paid out when the employment ends — whoever ends it. It is a real employer cost on top of social contributions, and a serious EOR quote shows it as a separate line.
The comunicazione obbligatoria (UNILAV) must reach the authorities by the day before the start date, INPS and INAIL positions must exist, mandatory safety training applies, and monthly UniEmens declarations follow. A first-time employer in Italy clears this checklist before payroll can even run — it is the single biggest time sink an EOR or payroll partner removes.
Employer cost benchmarks
Payroll quotes in Italy are built on social contributions plus the TFR accrual. The 2026 picture — the source of the “roughly 30% on top, plus TFR” rule every employer budget should use:
| Contribution | Employer pays | Employee pays |
|---|---|---|
| Social security (INPS — pension, unemployment, sickness et al.) | ≈28–32% by sector & size | ≈9.19% |
| Severance accrual (TFR — trattamento di fine rapporto) | ≈6.91% | — |
| Accident insurance (INAIL, by risk class) | ≈0.5–3% | — |
| 13th/14th salary payments (tredicesima / quattordicesima) | +1–2 monthly salaries | — |
| Executive funds for dirigenti (e.g. Previndai, Fasi) | several % extra | smaller shares |
Orientation figures for 2026, rounded: INPS rates vary by sector, company size and CCNL, INAIL by risk class, and dirigente packages carry their own CCNL with additional funds. The 13th/14th payments are part of annual gross rather than a contribution — shown here because first-time employers routinely forget to budget them. Rule of thumb: a €70,000 gross salary costs the employer roughly €95,000–100,000 all-in including TFR. Your payroll or EOR partner’s quote is the binding number.
Yes. An Employer of Record (EOR) employs your candidate in Italy on your behalf: the EOR holds the Italian employment contract under the applicable CCNL, files the UNILAV notification, runs payroll and social contributions, and you direct the day-to-day work. No S.r.l., no Italian bank account, no registrations on your side. It is the standard route for a first hire in Italy — with one Italian particularity: staff leasing is reserved for ministry-authorised agencies, so the provider’s structure and authorisation matter, and we check both before any introduction.
The EOR is the legal employer under Italian law. It issues a compliant contract under the right CCNL and level, notifies the hire via UNILAV before the start date, opens the INPS and INAIL positions, runs the monthly busta paga including the tredicesima (and quattordicesima where the CCNL requires it), withholds income tax, pays employer contributions, accrues the TFR, arranges mandatory safety training and administers holidays and sick leave. You remain in charge of the work itself — targets, tasks, tools, day-to-day management — and reimburse the EOR for gross salary, employer costs and a service fee.
Typical Italian EOR pricing is a flat €400–700 per employee per month, or a percentage of gross salary — on top of the salary itself, roughly 30% employer contributions and the ≈6.91% TFR accrual. Compare that with the alternative: forming and running an S.r.l. means notary and registration costs, a commercialista, annual filings and a local payroll setup — rarely worth it below three to five employees. We match you with a partner whose pricing fits your head-count and flag the all-in monthly number before you commit.
Budget roughly 28–32% employer social contributions to INPS — the exact rate depends on sector, company size and CCNL — plus INAIL accident insurance by risk class and the TFR severance accrual of about 6.91% of annual pay. Remember that annual gross already spans thirteen or fourteen payments. As a rule of thumb, a €70,000 gross salary costs the employer roughly €95,000–100,000 all-in per year including TFR, before any bonus, car or EOR fee — and a dirigente costs meaningfully more through the executive CCNL’s dedicated funds.
In the US, a PEO co-employs your staff while you keep your own entity; an EOR employs them fully so you don’t need one. Italian law has no 1:1 equivalent of the US PEO model — supplying workers to another company is somministrazione di lavoro, reserved for Agenzie per il Lavoro authorised by the Ministry of Labour, and the compliant constructs for an expansion are EOR employment or outsourced payroll on your own S.r.l. Providers use all these labels loosely, which is precisely why we check what a partner actually delivers before we introduce them.
Yes — within the constructs Italian law provides. Where the arrangement amounts to supplying labour, the provider must be a ministry-authorised staffing agency (Agenzia per il Lavoro); unauthorised labour supply (somministrazione irregolare) exposes both companies to sanctions and gives the worker a claim to employment with the user company. Whatever the structure, the CCNL, UNILAV notification, INPS/INAIL positions and TFR apply in full. Provider structure and authorisation are the first things we verify in our partner vetting — and a question you should ask any EOR you talk to.
Yes. If your S.r.l. or branch already exists, an Italian payroll partner — in practice a consulente del lavoro — takes over the monthly cycle: buste paga, UniEmens declarations to INPS, INAIL filings, withholding-tax remittances, the tredicesima and quattordicesima runs, TFR administration and year-end CU certificates. Typical pricing runs per payslip per month. The same partners handle the employer registrations if your entity has never employed anyone in Italy before.
Via EOR: the Italian employment contract and UNILAV notification are typically ready within three to seven working days once the candidate’s documents are complete — the fastest compliant route into the Italian market. Building your own entity first takes weeks to months including registrations. In practice the binding constraint is usually the candidate’s notice period: CCNL rules mean one to three months for quadri and often more for dirigenti — which, as recruiters, is the part we actively manage for you.
Only if they are genuinely self-employed. Italy polices false self-employment (false partite IVA) with legal presumptions of employment where the classic indicators are present — one client providing most of the income, fixed hours, integration into your organisation. Reclassification means back-dated INPS contributions, sanctions and a deemed employment contract under the applicable CCNL, TFR included. If the working reality is employment, EOR employment costs little more and removes the risk; our partners also audit and convert existing contractor setups.
No — and that is deliberate. JN Recruitment is a boutique recruitment firm and your expansion partner for Italy: over years of placing candidates here we have built a vetted network of the best employment lawyers, tax advisors (commercialisti), consulenti del lavoro, accountants and EOR providers — and we recommend exactly the specialists your case needs. You contract directly with the partner at their standard rates; the recommendation costs you nothing, and we stay your single point of contact. What we deliver ourselves is the search: if the candidate doesn’t exist yet, our Italian headhunting finds them.
Across Europe
The same specialised technical sales search opens every market on the continent — pick the country you are expanding into.
Hiring in several markets at once?
Hiring at leadership level? Our executive search practice:
Candidate found — and now need a compliant way to employ them?
Talk to us — no strings attached. We get back to you within 24 hours.
Our mission is simple: placements that open new markets.
30-minute intro call
Two quick steps — tell us what you need and how to reach you. Within one business day you get an intro call and, where it fits, a direct introduction to the right specialists from our vetted network.
Your contact person Jonas Strambach Director & Senior Recruiter, JN Recruitment +49 1525 2077583 [email protected] Thank you — we’ll get back to you within one business day to schedule your intro call.
An honest read on your vacancy & market — in your first call.
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Before you go
Every month a key sales seat stays empty pushes your expansion plans back — and leaves serious revenue on the table. We fill technical sales positions within weeks, so you hit your expansion targets on schedule.
Jonas Strambach Director & Senior Recruiter, JN Recruitment Free vacancy check · reply within 24 hours
