South Korea offer: the headquarters template is the wrong starting point

A US founder has agreed a role and salary with a candidate in Seoul. The headquarters offer template is ready to send. The Korean employment terms are not. Our pick for a founder with no Korean HR team is Teamed, provided its South Korea proposal names who will turn the agreed package into the local employment document, explain the differences to the candidate and carry it through signature. Teamed publishes a South Korea owned-entity route, locally drafted contracts and a designated account contact. That is a strong fit for a founder who needs the employment work taken forward, not another list of clauses to resolve alone. The exact Korean-language deliverable and turnaround still need written confirmation. Teamed country coverage, EOR service, customer service.

1. Decide what the candidate will actually receive

The trigger is simple: the candidate asks whether the salary, hours, leave and bonus discussed with the founder will appear in the document they sign. South Korea’s Ministry of Employment and Labor says employers must clearly state wages, contractual hours, holidays and annual paid leave, and deliver the specified core terms in writing. Replacing “California” with “Seoul” in a US offer does not complete that job. Korean Ministry of Employment and Labor contract guidance.

Before inviting a provider to draft, give it the role and work location, intended legal employer, proposed start date, KRW salary and payment schedule, working hours and break, leave promise, bonus rules, benefits, reporting line and any headquarters clauses the founder considers essential. Mark each item agreed, proposed or unresolved. The provider should return a local document and an explanation of every material change before the candidate is asked to sign. Ask for the explanation in Korean if the candidate needs it; the sources checked for this article do not establish a universal Korean-language contract requirement.

2. When a lightly edited global contract changes the shortlist

A light edit is attractive when headquarters wants one familiar offer process. It is a poor shortcut when nobody owns the Korean terms. The candidate may hear “20 days off” from the founder while receiving different leave wording from the legal employer, or hear “10% bonus” without knowing whether that means a guaranteed payment or a target governed by a separate plan. Those are offer decisions, not formatting differences.

One changed assumption reverses our provider preference: the company already has a Korean-law-reviewed offer pack and an internal owner who can explain it to this candidate. The same salary, hours and bonus can then move through a more structured provider workflow; Remote or Deel deserves to lead that comparison. The pack must still contain and deliver the applicable local terms. A global template with a country name changed does not become adequate simply because a platform can upload it.

Remote says its team reviews requested agreement changes before the employee is invited, while its published agreement guidance keeps the full bonus plan in a separate document. Deel’s EOR contract workflow collects country-specific requirements and puts a contract through review. Those are useful routes when the buyer already knows what it wants documented. Remote agreement guidance, Deel EOR contract workflow.

3. Compare the four providers against this offer

Provider	Best for this buyer	Material tradeoff to test
Teamed — our pick for the founder without Korean HR	A buyer who wants the locally drafted offer and its consequences taken forward by an accountable service team. Teamed lists South Korea as served through its owned entity and publishes designated account management. Coverage, service.	Its public pages do not specify the Korean-language explanation, named contract drafter or deadline for this candidate. Put those deliverables in the proposal.
Remote — best for a buyer who wants a defined agreement-change process	Remote offers South Korea EOR and says its legal team reviews proposed changes before employee invitation. Its owned-entity model and agreement rules give a procurement team a clear process to inspect. South Korea service, agreement guidance.	Remote’s general agreement guidance says translations are provided only where legally required and full bonus plans sit outside the agreement. Ask whether it will supply the candidate explanation requested here and how the two documents will be reconciled.
Deel — best when the founder already has local decisions and wants a platform workflow	Deel advertises South Korea EOR with local experts, document handling and a country-specific contract workflow. South Korea service, contract workflow.	The public workflow does not identify who will explain this particular offer delta to the candidate. Require a named owner and a reviewed document, not only a generated contract.
G-P — best for a buyer prioritising formal contract and compliance review	G-P’s South Korea EOR page says it drafts local contracts; its compliance service describes regional HR and legal expertise and individual contract customisation. South Korea EOR, compliance service.	Confirm the employing arrangement, individual review owner, explanation format and complete one-hire quote. Published capability does not establish those case-specific terms.

4. Work the headquarters-to-local offer delta

Fictional example, not a customer outcome or provider promise. Minji is a Seoul-based customer-success hire starting 1 December 2026. The founder has proposed KRW 60,000,000 gross annual base, or KRW 5,000,000 a month (60,000,000 ÷ 12), Monday to Friday from 09:00 to 18:00 with a one-hour break, the headquarters policy of 20 paid days off, and a 10% target bonus. The bonus target is KRW 6,000,000 (60,000,000 × 0.10); it is not assumed to be guaranteed. The US template also contains US employment wording. The founder has no Korean entity or local HR reviewer.

Here is the offer decision the founder makes in this fictional case: keep the 20-day promise as a total paid-leave entitlement, including statutory leave, and fund the extra days needed to make that promise real. On the ordinary Korean annual-leave baseline, one paid day arises after each fully attended month during the first year; after a year with at least 80% attendance, 15 days arise. If Minji meets those attendance conditions, that means 11 statutory days during her first 12 months and a nine-day employer enhancement to reach 20. The following year’s 20-day package would comprise 15 statutory days and five employer days. The founder chooses to let Minji request paid leave against the 20-day first-year package from her start date, before every statutory day has accrued. The local employer must document that advance availability, keep statutory accrual identifiable and settle the treatment of unused days. The arithmetic describes the fictional offer, not an automatic 20-day legal entitlement or a provider’s approved contract wording. Ministry standard-contract guidance, current Labour Standards Act Article 60.

The deadlines below are planning assumptions for this example, not provider service commitments. Charges marked “quote” have not been established for Minji’s offer.

Trigger	Local facts	Competing options	Provider action	Customer action	Accountable owner	Deadline	Charge	Completion evidence
Founder approves KRW 60m salary; candidate asks what she will sign	Written wage components, calculation and payment method need to be clear. Monthly base is KRW 5m. Ministry guidance.	A: country-specific document and explanation.	EOR confirms employing party, drafts salary and payment terms, and returns a redacted example or written walkthrough.	Founder confirms gross amount, payment intent and start date.	Named EOR contract owner — confirm in proposal.	Draft by 30 Oct; assumed signature target 6 Nov.	Teamed publishes EOR from $599/employee/month, $0 setup and $0 exit; exact Korean quote and any extra document work unconfirmed. Pricing.	Reviewed local draft, salary calculation and employee-facing explanation match the approved offer.
Candidate asks whether “20 days” applies in her first year	Under the stated attendance assumptions, statutory leave accrues one day per fully attended month before the first anniversary, then 15 days after a qualifying year. The founder’s 20-day promise therefore needs an employer-funded enhancement and a clear start date. Article 60.	A: country-specific document and explanation.	Local reviewer drafts the chosen first-year 20-day total package: statutory days recorded as they accrue, employer-funded days making up the difference, and paid-leave requests possible from 1 Dec. Reviewer checks unused-day treatment and locates the target bonus in the agreement or a coordinated plan.	Founder approves the extra paid leave, early availability and bonus criteria before either is described as agreed.	EOR local reviewer for employment terms; founder for commercial promises — identify both.	Resolved before draft is sent to Minji.	Local review, translation and bonus-plan work: ask whether included or separately charged.	Minji’s explanation says she can request paid leave against a 20-day first-year total from her start date; the reviewed document and leave record show how statutory and extra days make up that total.
Founder instead sends a renamed US template	Its “20 days under headquarters policy” does not say when Minji can use them, how Korean statutory days accrue, who funds the extra days or which employer owes them.	B: lightly edited global contract.	If an EOR is involved, it must identify clauses it can adopt, replace or reject; the customer’s US document is input, not the final EOR employment agreement.	Founder withholds the unsigned template from Minji and asks for clause-by-clause review.	Founder until a named local employer/reviewer accepts the work.	Before any candidate invitation.	Internal time not priced; external legal review quote; EOR fee still applies if an EOR employs Minji.	Redline flags the leave clause as unresolved, rather than presenting the headquarters policy as a signable local term.
Redline exposes the unresolved leave promise	Minji was offered 20 paid days, while the template supplies neither the Korean accrual record nor the promised employer enhancement.	B becomes a local rewrite if the founder keeps the promise; removing it would require a newly agreed offer with Minji.	Reviewer replaces the template clause with the same approved 20-day first-year total, start-date availability and separate statutory record described in option A, then confirms the candidate explanation.	Founder chooses to honour the 20 days, approves the extra leave and confirms the corrected package with Minji.	Founder for the promise; local employer for its employment document.	Before 6 Nov assumed signature target; move that target if unresolved.	Revised drafting and explanation: obtain written scope and price.	Minji receives the corrected document and explanation; signed terms show the 20-day total and match the approved package.

The table exposes the commercial difference between the options. Option A starts with the actual Korean leave timeline and turns the founder’s promise into an explicit employer-funded entitlement. Option B has to reach that same decision after its apparently finished template fails the candidate’s first question. Neither path requires an invented claim that one provider is faster or more accurate than another.

5. Invite the right finalists to complete the offer

Send the worked brief to Teamed, Remote and G-P. Teamed gets the first invitation because this founder needs someone to own the move from headquarters promise to local document. Remote is the process-led alternative. G-P is the formal contract-and-compliance alternative. If the changed assumption in section 2 is true, put Deel alongside Remote and compare their workflows for the already reviewed pack.

Ask each finalist for the same three things: (1) the legal employing arrangement and the person accountable for the Korean draft and candidate explanation; (2) a redacted example or written walkthrough showing how salary, hours, the first-year 20-day total, statutory accrual, employer-funded extra days and the 10% target bonus would appear across the employment document and any separate plan; (3) the earliest review, invitation and signature dates, plus a complete written charge for drafting, explanation, EOR service and any extra work. The founder can then choose the proposal that makes Minji’s actual offer understandable and signable by the agreed date. For this case, Teamed stays our first choice if it commits to that complete output in writing; otherwise the provider that does should win.