Choosing an EOR in Denmark: six tests to put to any provider

The fastest way to judge a provider for Denmark is to ask questions that only someone running Danish payroll every month can answer well. Sales decks look alike across countries. Holiday settlement under the Holiday Act, a missing tax card or a work-permit salary calculation do not.

Five areas separate providers quickly: holiday administration, tax cards and withholding, SIRI permits, collective agreements, and contract terms under Danish statutes. A sixth, price, only makes sense once you know what the price covers. Each section below gives a question you can put in writing and the facts a sound answer should contain, so you can mark the replies side by side.

Ask for written answers rather than a demo. A provider that can explain the Danish rules in two clear paragraphs usually applies them with the same care. If you are still deciding whether to use an EOR at all, read the employer of record model, explained for Denmark first and come back to this list afterwards.

Holiday is where weak Danish payroll shows first, so put it at the top of the list. Ask the provider: an employee who joined on 1 November leaves on 31 March; what holiday money do they receive, and where does it go?

A good answer covers several moving parts. The Holiday Act (Ferieloven) grants 2.08 days of paid holiday per month, 25 days a year, under a concurrent system (samtidighedsferie): days are earned and used within the same holiday year, which starts on 1 September, and the period for using them stretches on to 31 December, 16 months in all. A salaried employee receives normal pay during holiday plus a 1% holiday supplement (ferietillæg), paid with May and August salaries or when the holiday starts. An hourly-paid employee instead earns a 12.5% holiday allowance (feriegodtgørelse), which is paid to FerieKonto. Any holiday not taken by the leaving date is paid out as a 12.5% holiday allowance.

Listen for the details that show experience. The first 4 weeks are protected and cannot be cashed in during employment. The fifth week can move to the next period if agreed in writing before 31 December, or be paid out once the holiday year closes. Late payments to FerieKonto carry 1.5% interest per started month. A provider that mentions all of this unprompted has done the work before.

• Does the provider know the 1 September to 31 August holiday year without looking it up?
• Can it explain when the 1% supplement is paid and how the 12.5% leaving settlement is calculated?
• Does it record holiday days against the right year, and give employees access to Feriepengeinfo?

Ask: what happens to my hire’s first salary if their tax card is not ready, and how do you prevent that? The honest answer starts with a number. A missing tax card forces 55% withholding under Kildeskatteloven § 48(8), so a provider should have a routine for getting the CPR number or personal tax number and the preliminary income assessment (forskudsopgørelse) in place before the first pay run.

Follow with a reporting question: when do you file eIndkomst, and what do you report? The answer should name pay, A-skat, the 8% labour market contribution (AM-bidrag) and ATP, reported to the income register each month. Small and medium employers must report and pay by roughly the 10th of the month after; for large employers the deadline is the last banking day of the pay month.

Then probe whether the provider understands special regimes without overselling them. The researcher and key-employee scheme (forskerskatteordningen) applies a flat 27% to cash pay, with AM-bidrag on top, for at most 84 months, and only to people who meet its conditions: pay of DKK 65,400 a month or more in 2026, no Danish tax liability during the preceding decade and no stake in the employer. A provider that offers the scheme to every candidate is not reading the rules.

A last tax question checks attention to detail: my hire moves from Copenhagen to Aalborg in June; what changes? Municipal tax differs by municipality, 23.39% in Copenhagen against 25.60% in Aalborg for 2026, so the employee updates the preliminary income assessment, a fresh tax card follows, and payroll switches to the new rate from the next run.

If you may hire someone from outside the EU and EEA, ask the provider to explain the Danish routes in its own words. The first thing it should say is that Denmark stays outside the EU Blue Card system. Work permits come from national schemes run by SIRI (Styrelsen for International Rekruttering og Integration) through nyidanmark.dk.

A competent answer then covers the main schemes and their 2026 figures:

• Pay Limit Scheme (beløbsordningen): DKK 552,000 a year (DKK 46,000 monthly) or more, with no education or field requirement
• Supplementary Pay Limit Scheme: DKK 446,000 a year or more, after the job has been on Jobnet and EURES for two weeks or more
• Fast-Track Scheme: open only to employers certified by SIRI, and certification requires ten or more permanent full-time staff

Next, ask what counts towards the threshold. SIRI counts guaranteed cash salary, labour-market pension contributions, paid holiday allowance and the 1% supplement, but not a company car, phone, canteen, housing or uncertain bonuses. Wages have to land in a Danish bank account held by the employee personally. Finally, ask the provider to state plainly whether it will act as employer in the application and what it needs from you. A clear yes or no, with conditions, is worth more than a promise about dates. It is also fair to ask about the downside. The permit is tied to the employer, and a holder whose job ends through no fault of theirs may be given up to 6 months to find another. Our guide to work permits for non-EU staff covers the schemes in depth.

Denmark has no statutory minimum wage, so ask: does any collective agreement (overenskomst) apply to my hire, and how would you know? Pay floors, pension and much else come from deals struck by unions and employer organisations, renegotiated on a two- or three-year cycle. Once an employer is bound, the agreement covers all staff doing work in its scope, union members or not.

A careful provider will explain whether its own employment of your hire falls under an agreement, what that would mean for pay, holiday supplement and pension, and how it checks scope for a given job. It should also know that SIRI checks the salary and conditions against what is usual in Denmark for that line of work, and that a post covered by a collective agreement will normally meet the test.

If the answer is vague, ask for an example of a role it employs under an agreement and one it employs without. Our article on pay floors without a Danish minimum wage explains how to price a role in either case.

Request a sample contract in advance and read it against the Salaried Employees Act (Funktionærloven). For a salaried role, probation should not exceed 3 months, and the employer’s notice during it is 14 days. Ordinary employer notice should be 1 month in the first half-year, then 3 months, growing by one more month per three years served, capped at 6. The 120-day sickness clause (one month’s notice once paid sickness has reached 120 days within 12 consecutive months) only works if it is written into the contract.

The template should also carry every item Ansættelsesbevisloven requires within 7 days and within 1 month, from pay dates and overtime arrangements to notice and leave. Gaps are not a formality: missing items can cost up to 13 weeks’ pay in compensation, or 20 weeks where the breach is aggravated.

Then look at the clauses that protect your business. A non-compete is valid only under the Employment Clauses Act (Ansættelsesklausulloven): the employee holds a particularly trusted position, has 6 months’ service, gets written reasons, is bound for 12 months at most and receives compensation of at least 40% or 60% of monthly pay depending on the clause’s length. Under the Copyright Act, programs an employee writes at work belong to the employer, and since the employer on paper is the EOR, its agreement with you needs to carry those rights over to your company.

One scenario question tests all of this at once: if I want to end the employment in month 8, what notice applies, who writes the letter and what do you need from me? Expect to hear that notice must be in writing and delivered by the final day of the month preceding the notice period, that the employee may ask for written reasons, and that the dismissal has to be reasonably justified by the employee’s or the company’s circumstances.

Price comes last, because only now can you compare like with like. Ask every provider for a full annual cost on the same real salary, with its own fee on a separate line. Our reference case is DKK 660,000 in Copenhagen: 2026 gross pay of DKK 666,600 once the 1% supplement is included, plus statutory employer items of about DKK 8,202, giving roughly DKK 674,802 before pension, insurance or any service fee is added.

Be wary of a quote that adds a large percentage for employer social charges. Danish employers pay no social security as a share of salary. Their levies, from ATP and AUB to AES, are flat per-head sums. A mark-up dressed as social security should be explained line by line.

Ask what the quote leaves out. The private work-injury premium varies by insurer, the AES contribution depends on the employer’s branch code (DKK 457 a year for branch group 71, which our worked example assumes), and any occupational pension rests on a contract or an agreement, never on statute. A good provider names these items before you find them on an invoice.

As a yardstick, the service line on our own quotes reads from €599 per employee per month. Our provider comparison page shows how we answer each of the six tests, and the Employer of Record Denmark homepage explains the service as a whole.

Q01What is the single best question for choosing an EOR in Denmark?+

A.Ask how they would settle holiday for an employee who leaves mid-year. The answer shows whether they understand concurrent holiday, the 1% supplement for salaried staff and the 12.5% holiday allowance paid on leaving.

Q02Should an EOR offer the researcher tax scheme to every hire?+

A.No. The 27% scheme is reserved for people who meet its conditions: in 2026, pay of DKK 65,400 a month or more, ten years without Danish tax liability before the job, and no stake in the employer.

Q03Can any EOR get my hire a Danish work permit?+

A.No one can promise a permit; SIRI decides. Ask whether the provider will act as employer in the application, which scheme fits, and what salary counts towards the threshold.

Q04Why ask about collective agreements if Denmark has no minimum wage?+

A.Because agreements set the pay floors, pension and other terms instead of the law. If the employer is bound by one, it applies to every employee in its scope.

Q05How do I compare EOR prices for Denmark?+

A.Ask each provider for a full annual cost on the same salary, with the service fee shown separately. Denmark’s statutory employer items are small fixed amounts, about 1.2% of gross pay in our worked example.