Hire Employees in Romania

Your own entity is normally an SRL, which is inexpensive and quick to establish. It commits you to Romanian corporate reporting and to registering every contract in REGES-Online before the employee starts work.

An Employer of Record inverts the sequence: the Romanian entity signs the contract, registers it before the start date, withholds the employee’s 35% and files the D112 declaration — while you direct the day-to-day work.

Romania regulates EOR-type arrangements more tightly than most of Europe. Temporary agency work requires a licensed agent, and using an unlicensed structure exposes the client as well as the provider. Verify the licence rather than assuming it.

Romania inverts the usual split: the employer pays 2.25% and the employee pays 35%. The 2018 reform moved almost the entire burden onto the employee side and uprated gross salaries to compensate. The practical consequence is that Romanian gross figures are not comparable with those from any neighbouring market without adjusting, and a foreign employer benchmarking on gross will consistently misprice.

Employer cost is therefore among the lowest in the EU, which makes Romania attractive for engineering and shared-service teams. The constraint is not cost but structure.

Romania regulates EOR-type arrangements more tightly than most of Europe. Temporary agency work requires a licensed agent, and using an unlicensed structure exposes both parties. Verify the licence rather than assuming it, because the exposure sits with the client as well as the provider.

PFA misclassification is the other systemic risk. Engaging someone as an authorised sole trader when the relationship has the hallmarks of employment triggers reclassification with retroactive contributions on the full 35% employee base plus employer charges — and because the employee side is so large, the recalculated liability is far bigger than in markets with a conventional split.

Break-even rule of thumb: EOR fees begin to exceed the running cost of a small Romanian entity somewhere between 15 and 20 employees. Model both before committing — see EOR vs Entity for the full comparison, and plan any later migration so employees keep seniority.

Romania inverts the usual split: the employer pays 2.25% and the employee pays 35%. The 2018 reform moved almost the entire burden onto the employee side and uplifted gross salaries to compensate.

The practical consequence is that Romanian gross figures are not comparable with those from any neighbouring market without adjusting for that shift. A foreign employer benchmarking on gross will consistently misprice, and a candidate comparing a Romanian offer with a Polish one will misread it in the opposite direction.

The employer’s 2.25% is the work insurance contribution and covers unemployment, sickness, accident and wage guarantee. Employer cost is therefore among the lowest in the EU, which is much of why Romania has become a major engineering and shared-service base.

Romania is the cleanest employer position in this dataset, and that is exactly why it gets misquoted. The employer pays one contribution — CAM at 2.25% of gross — and nothing else. CAS at 25%, CASS at 10% and income tax at 10% are the employee’s liabilities, withheld by the employer but not borne by it. Adding them to employer cost inflates a Romanian quote by roughly 45 points. There is no contribution ceiling, so CAM runs on the full gross at every salary level. One live confusion is worth flagging: OUG 156/2024 removed the IT, construction and agri-food exemptions from January 2025, yet several current Romanian guides still describe them as available, and at least one payroll provider states the construction CAS reduction survives to 2028. Those are employee-side questions — the employer pays 2.25% either way — but they change net pay and should be confirmed with ANAF before a net figure is quoted.

Four representative profiles, costed with the 2026 contribution rates above. Salaries are illustrative market midpoints, not GX operating data — use them to see how the on-cost percentage behaves as pay rises, not as a salary benchmark for a specific role. For real market data on your roles, ask for a costing.

Nothing here is capped, so the on-cost percentage is identical at every salary level. A senior hire costs proportionally exactly what a junior one does, which is not true in most comparable markets and makes salary the only variable worth modelling.

Four representative profiles costed on 2026 statutory rates. Salaries are illustrative market midpoints, not GX operating data.

Payroll runs monthly in lei. The D112 declaration covering contributions and income tax is filed by the twenty-fifth of the following month.

Income tax is a flat 10% on employment income, with exemptions that have been narrowed in recent years — the IT sector exemption in particular has been substantially restricted, so guidance describing it as a general benefit is out of date.

The minimum gross salary carries more weight in Romania than in most markets because contributions have a floor tied to it. An employee working part-time at low pay may still attract contributions calculated on the full minimum wage, which makes low-hours arrangements proportionally expensive.

Thresholds and ceilings are uprated periodically, so a figure correct in January may not hold later in the year. Where a row below is flagged, published sources disagreed and the conflict is recorded rather than resolved.

Thresholds move on a local cycle that does not always fall in January, so a figure correct at the start of the year may not hold through it. Where a row below carries a flag, published sources disagreed and the conflict is recorded rather than resolved — there are 2 such rows on this page.

The sections that follow set out contracts and probation, working time, leave, termination and immigration in that order. Where an entitlement comes from a collective agreement rather than statute it is marked as such, because that distinction determines whether it is negotiable.

The Labour Code of 2003, heavily amended since, governs alongside collective agreements at sector and unit level. Romania also regulates temporary agency work and EOR-type arrangements more tightly than most of Europe, which makes verifying a provider’s licence a substantive step rather than a formality.

A written contract in Romanian is mandatory and must be registered in REGES-Online before the employee starts work — not on the first day, and not afterwards. Starting someone before registration is a direct breach with immediate penalties, and it is the single most common failure among foreign employers here.

Probation is a maximum of ninety calendar days for ordinary roles and one hundred and twenty for management positions. It may be used only once with the same employer for the same role.

Fixed-term contracts are limited to thirty-six months in total across successive terms, with a maximum of three consecutive contracts. Exceeding either limit converts the relationship to indefinite.

Eight hours a day and 40 a week, with a maximum of 48 including overtime averaged over four months. Overtime is compensated with paid time off within 60 days where possible, and otherwise paid at a premium of at least 75% of base salary.

Overtime is where payroll disputes usually start. Record hours from day one even where the role is salaried and the expectation is that overtime will not arise — reconstructing records after a complaint is far harder than keeping them.

Overtime is where payroll disputes usually begin, and the burden of proving hours worked generally sits with the employer. Record hours from the first day even for salaried roles where overtime is not expected — reconstructing a record after a complaint is considerably harder than keeping one.

Public holidays sit on top of the annual leave entitlement. Where a holiday falls at a weekend, practice varies — some markets move it, some grant a substitute day and some do neither, so check the position before assuming a day in lieu.

The 17 dates below are the statutory position. Employers in many markets grant more by policy or collective agreement, and sector agreements sometimes add local or patronal days that do not appear in a national list.

Romania observes 17 paid public holidays in 2026. Dates that fall at a weekend and any substitution rules are set out below; entitlement is separate from annual leave.

Maternity: 126 calendar days, at least 42 taken after the birth — 85% of average earnings, paid by the state health insurance fund. Paternity: 10 working days, or 15 with a childcare course — Paid by the employer. Parental leave: Until the child is 2, or 3 where the child is disabled — 85% of average net income, subject to a floor and ceiling, paid by the state. Sick leave: From day 1 — The employer pays the first 5 calendar days; the health insurance fund pays thereafter at 75% or more depending on the condition.

Carer’s leave: 5 working days a year — Introduced by the Work-Life Balance transposition.

Romanian dismissal splits sharply between grounds related to the employee and grounds that are not. Redundancy requires the position to be genuinely abolished, with the abolition effective and not merely nominal — recreating the same role shortly afterwards invalidates the dismissal.

Disciplinary dismissal requires a formal internal investigation before any decision: a written summons stating the allegations, a hearing at which the employee may be assisted, and a reasoned decision issued within statutory time limits. Skipping the investigation makes the dismissal void regardless of the underlying conduct, and Romanian courts apply that strictly.

Notice is a minimum of 20 working days for dismissal and 20 or 45 days for resignation depending on whether the role is a management position. There is no general statutory severance; entitlement arises from the applicable collective agreement or the individual contract.

EU, EEA and Swiss nationals need no permit. A third-country national needs a work permit issued against an annual quota set by government decision, followed by a long-stay visa and a residence permit.

The quota is the binding constraint and it is set annually, so timing matters — applications late in the year may face an exhausted allocation. Allow two to four months end to end.

The employer must demonstrate that the role was advertised and could not be filled locally, with exemptions for highly qualified roles under the EU Blue Card and for intra-corporate transferees.

A cross-border hire may not attract local contributions at all. Under EU Regulations 883/2004 and 987/2009 a worker moving within the EEA is subject to one state’s social security system at a time. A posted worker stays in the home system for up to 24 months under Article 12, and someone working across two or more states follows a single state determined by a 25% activity test under Article 13. Where a valid A1 portable document is held, the host state cannot charge contributions. The certificate is declaratory rather than constitutive — the right legislation applies either way — but without it a host state can assess retroactively with penalties, and enforcement is aggressive in France, Belgium and Austria. Residual local charges are not always nil, so confirm the specific position rather than assuming zero.

REGES-Online registration before the start date is the requirement most often missed, and it is not a filing formality — it is a precondition to lawful employment with immediate penalties attached.

PFA misclassification is the structural risk. Engaging someone as an authorised sole trader where the relationship has the hallmarks of employment triggers reclassification with retroactive contributions on the full 35% employee base plus employer charges. Because the employee side is so large, the recalculated liability is far bigger than in markets with a conventional split.

Practical controls: register before the start date without exception, verify the EOR or agency licence, follow the formal disciplinary investigation before any conduct dismissal, and check whether a collective agreement sets a higher floor than the national minimum.

Work backwards from the start date. For an EU national, one to two weeks is realistic. A non-EU hire needs a work permit against an annual quota followed by a long-stay visa, adding two to four months.

Confirm before making an offer: that the EOR or agency structure is properly licensed, since Romania regulates this more tightly than most of Europe; whether the role falls under a collective agreement setting a higher minimum; and that the candidate understands the gross figure reflects a 35% employee deduction.

The employment contract must be registered in REGES-Online before the employee starts work — not on the first day. Starting someone before registration is a direct breach with immediate penalties, and it is the single most common failure among foreign employers here. The D112 declaration is then due monthly by the 25th.