Three ways to engage an engineer in China, and they are not competing versions of the same thing — they buy different things. Here is what each gives you, what it costs, and the cases where we would tell you to use one of the other two.
| Direct contract | Employer of record | Via a UK intermediary | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Who pays into China | You | The EOR | The intermediary |
| You need an entity there | No | No | No |
| Relationship in China | Contractor | Employee of the EOR | Contractor |
| Statutory benefits | No | Yes | No |
| Who directs the work | You | You | You |
| Your admin burden | High | Low | Low |
| Typical cost shape | Rate only | Salary + % or fee/head | One inclusive rate |
| Ending it | Contract notice | Local employment law | Contract notice |
You contract with and pay the engineer yourself. It is the cheapest line item and the most work, and the work is the kind that recurs every month: cross-border payment mechanics, currency, and the documentation each bank wants. It also leaves you closest to the question of whether a long-running, directed contractor relationship is really employment — decided on facts rather than on what the contract is called. Paying an engineer in China goes through the mechanics.
Use it when: the engagement is short, small and self-contained, and you have someone who will own the administration without resenting it.
An EOR employs the person locally on your behalf. It is the most complete answer and the only one of the three that produces genuine employment: local contract, statutory contributions, benefits, and the protections that go with them.
You pay for that completeness, usually as a percentage of salary or a fixed monthly fee per head on top. The other cost is flexibility — because it is employment, ending it follows Chinese employment law rather than a notice clause, and that is a feature if you are hiring for years and a friction if you are not sure yet.
Use it when: you want a long-term team member on employment terms, the person cares about benefits and security, or your own policy requires that anyone working on your product is somebody's employee rather than a contractor.
We will say so if that is your situation. It is not what we do, and an EOR is the right instrument for it.
This is our model. You contract with ProdReady Recruitment, a UK limited company; we contract with and pay the engineer; the engineer works to your team. You get one invoice in sterling or dollars from a UK supplier, and no part of the cross-border problem reaches your finance function.
What you are buying is specifically the removal of friction, plus the sourcing. What you are not buying is a managed service — we are not between you and the engineer on delivery, and we do not want to be. They join your standups and work your backlog.
Use it when: you want a specific engineer working on your product quickly, on contractor terms, without opening an entity or learning a payment regime.
Choosing a model settles who pays whom. It settles less than people expect about the rest:
Whichever route you choose, these are the ones that reveal how a provider actually operates:
The third and fourth are the ones worth pressing. They are about what happens when something goes wrong, and a provider who has thought about that will answer immediately.
This is one of 6 guides supporting our main page on hiring remote Chinese AI engineers, which covers rates, the engagement model and how a placement actually starts.
Tell us what you are building and the constraints you are working under. If we are not the right route for it, we will say so rather than sell you one.
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