What are the benefits of using a Contractor of Record?

A Contractor of Record (COR) is a service that enables tech companies to engage skilled software developers as independent contractors without establishing a legal entity abroad.

COR’s main benefits include:

• Reduced legal and financial risk tied to contractor misclassification
• Lower expenses since contractors are responsible for their own taxes and social security contributions (SCC)
• Access to a global tech workforce so you can scale your dev team quickly
• Fast onboarding so you can start working with your developers in days
• Compliance and admin off your shoulders, as B2B contracts, invoicing, compliance, and admin are handled

With Contractor of Record services, you can stay focused on building innovative tech products instead of managing international contractors.

What are the Contractor of Record provider’s responsibilities?

Since the COR service provider acts as an intermediary between the tech company and contractors, they cover the operational and legal parts to make this cooperation smooth. This includes everything from managing contracts and ensuring legal compliance with local laws to classifying workers, as well as onboarding and offboarding, managing records and payouts for talents.

Some CORs, like Alcor, also offer additional services, including full-cycle tech recruitment, hardware procurements, and coworking space leasing, all without pre-payment or hidden charges.

What is the difference between Contractor of Record and Employer of Record?

1. Legal setup. Employer of Record (EOR) providers act as the legal employer of your software developers, taking on all the responsibilities and liabilities. For this, they use their own legal entities abroad. The Contractor of Record company doesn’t hire programmers directly. Instead, it enables to engage them as independent contractors in a compliant and risk-free way.
2. Length of cooperation. Global EOR is used for full-time, long-term employment of developers. This is ideal for tech companies that want to build a dedicated remote team in lower-cost locations like LATAM or Eastern Europe. COR, on the other hand, is more flexible—ideal for project-based work or quick team scaling. Still, with the right EVP and retention strategy from a local partner like Alcor, you can build long-lasting relationships even on a contractor model. The average tenure of our hires is 2.5 years.
3. Cost. EOR services tend to be more expensive. Not only do you pay for a wider range of admin and compliance support, but you’re also on the hook for higher employment taxes and social security contributions. Meanwhile, CORs are more budget-friendly due to the scope of services they offer. Plus, you can skip the additional employment costs, significantly reducing your spending on taxes and SSC.

What is the difference between Contractor of Record and Agent of Record?

Agents of Record act on behalf of their clients when dealing with insurance or employee benefits through third parties.

Unlike the Contractors of Record provider, AOR doesn’t hire developers or handle admin functions. Instead, they focus on insurance negotiations, managing policy changes, and receiving commission from insurers. An AOR can be a good addition to your existing Contractor of Record solution if you want to manage insurance provision and benefits for your contractors.

However, if you prefer not to juggle multiple providers and would rather keep everything in one place, you can simply partner with Alcor. Our tech R&D solution supports both FTE and B2B cooperation models and includes benefits and insurance management through our EOR services.

What is Alcor, and why is it a better long-term alternative to outsourcing or generic EOR/COR platforms?

Alcor builds software R&D centers and hires remote development teams for US and European tech product companies. Since 2017, we’ve been helping our clients scale in Latin America and Eastern Europe, adding 10 to 100 developers each year.

• hiring in top tech talent markets,
• benefiting from tax incentives for tech, and
• managing all the necessary contracts for tech (NDAs, IP rights protection agreements, etc.).

Alcor lets clients easily track and manage payroll, benefits, and more via its cloud platform, AlcorOS. However, unlike other global payment platforms, our clients don’t just get robotic support; they work with a dedicated human Customer Operations manager.

Our solution is 50% more affordable than hiring in the US or tech outsourcing, and we offer custom pricing and volume discounts for even greater savings – no setup or hidden fees.

Does Alcor’s COR handle compliance, payment processing, and benefits?

Yes! Alcor’s COR services are part of a larger turnkey R&D center solution, designed with tech business needs in mind. While COR typically covers contractor compliance and payments, we take it a step further.

Through our tech-focused EOR and COR services, we manage:

• FTE, B2B, IP, and NDA agreements,
• onboarding & offboarding,
• labor law and tax compliance,
• payroll processing & withholding,
• bonus and benefits for developers
• worker misclassification risks.

All of this under transparent pricing with no prepayment or hidden fees.

On top of that, we also handle full-cycle tech recruitment and operational support, such as:

• hardware procurement,
• office/coworking leasing,
• insurance provision,
• employer branding,
• HR services,
• remote/office/hybrid strategy support,
• sysadmyn support,
• business/travel visa support,
• stock options & IP agreements – you name it.

What locations does Alcor’s COR cover?

You can engage top-10% software developers through Alcor’s COR service in the following countries:

• Latin America: Mexico, Colombia, Argentina, and Chile
• Eastern Europe: Poland, Romania, Ukraine, and Bulgaria.

Need 5+ developers of Silicon Valley caliber? We can hire them as contractors in just a month. To ensure you get the best talent on the market, we prepare a location strategy and consultation from the start.

Payment processing, compliance, and other admin is on us.

What if I want to get Alcor’s EOR service, what’s included in it?

First of all, you don’t have to spend 3.5+ months on setting up your own legal entity and other infrastructure like a bank account, a local team, etc., in a new tech market. We’ll hire talent on your behalf right away.

Secondly, our EOR service covers everything: payroll, compliance, benefits, onboarding, offboarding, and other services. We commit to onboarding talent in 10 business days and provide free offboarding.

Last but not least, you’ll hire talent in top talent markets for tech – across Latin America and Eastern Europe – with 3.5+ million IT specialists and fast-growing tech industries.

But our solution is not just another HR payments platform – with us, you get EOR, plus tech recruitment from scratch with full operational coverage in one place.

How does Alcor handle compliance, risk, and data protection?

Alcor acts as a legal shield, ensuring 100% compliance with labor laws in the countries of our operations and IP protection. We protect clients from risks related to worker misclassification, social security, and tax obligations while providing GDPR and CCPA solutions.

We also provide a background check service for our clients upon request. Moreover, Alcor has a mature policy set consisting of a publicly available Privacy Policy, Cookie Policy, Terms of Use, Security Policy, and Code of Ethics.

Does Alcor provide a full-cycle tech recruitment service?

Yes. With the help of our 40 in-house tech recruiters and researchers, we hire Silicon Valley-caliber talent from scratch. You can get 5 developers in the first month, 30 in 3 months, and 100 in a year.

You get the first CVs of pre-vetted candidates in 5 business days, while one vacancy is typically closed in 2-6 weeks. These are your people from day one who become part of your in-house team and culture, with no buyout process and fees if you later insource.

What is the quality of Alcor’s candidates?

To present you with the best candidates, we use an internal database of 253k software engineers and external resources.

• 80% of the CVs we send to clients are approved;
• 8 CVs are needed to secure an accepted offer;
• and 15% of vacancies are closed with the first CV.

If a client wants to further improve the quality of the candidate pipeline, we offer an Engineering Manager screening service. As a result, 98.6% of the developers that we hire for clients successfully pass probation.

How long do software developers that Alcor hires stay with clients?

90% of the talent we hire for clients stays with them long-term, while the average tenure of developers is 2.5 years. If you’re dissatisfied with our hire or vice versa, we offer a 3-month free replacement warranty.

What’s more, you can increase the retention rate among your R&D team with the talent retention strategy developed for you by our HR professionals.

Is Alcor’s pricing transparent?

We don’t have setup fees, tricky rate cards, or expensive pricing wrappers. Also, our model doesn’t presuppose regular cost increases with no visible returns. Instead, we have custom pricing for each client, set and revise individual compensations, and give contractual volume discounts.

Who manages the team day to day?

You do. We act as the official employer of record (EOR) for compliance and payroll, while decision-making, roadmap, and performance management remain on your side.

What documentation and visibility do we get?

You get full transparency – employment contracts, SLAs, and supporting documentation are shared with you from the start.

How is IP handled, and who can access our code?

IP remains 100% yours, protected by compliant IP rights agreements from day one. Alcor does not access your source code, product docs, or other sensitive materials.

Who bears compliance and other employment-related risks?

Alcor bears 100% of employment and compliance risk in each country by acting as your legal shield for labor, tax, and regulatory matters.

Who are the clients of Alcor?

Our clients include tech product companies from the US and EU – People.ai, BigCommerce, Grammarly, Sift, Ledger, Pindrop, Chartbeat, BIScience, ChargeAfter, Tubular Labs, and Teladoc – from domains like AI/ML, ecommerce, cybersecurity/fraud prevention, crypto/fintech, media & marketing analytics, and digital health.

Does Alcor have any industry awards, or is it featured in ratings?

Alcor has earned top rankings in the IT & business services, HR outsourcing, and legal outsourcing categories on Clutch, become the #1 HR Services Agency on SuperbCompanies, and won The Legal 500 EMEA Awards. We are also featured on Clutch, TrustPilot, G2, and GoodFirms.

What is the team behind Alcor?

We’re a 100+ in-house team with deep bench strength – 40 tech recruiters and 60 back-office specialists across 8 key locations, with 93% CSAT and a 93% Net Promoter Score. Leadership is hands-on and accessible: Founder & CEO – Dmytro Ovcharenko; COO – Viktoriia Keliar; Director of Technical Recruiting – Kassandra Ruiz; Head of Customer Operations – Oksana Petrus; Head of Legal – Oleh Danylchenko.

Supporting leaders include Head of People & Culture – Hanna Koval; Senior Legal Adviser (LATAM) – Gilda Orozco; Country Manager, Mexico – Javier Preciado; plus regional recruiting leads in Poland, Romania, and LATAM for on-the-ground execution.

How does Alcor make cross-region collaboration work – overlap windows, English proficiency, and executive availability?

We run teams across the USA, Latin America, and CEE – covering GMT-7, GMT-6, GMT-5, GMT-4, GMT, GMT+1, GMT+2, and more. That footprint lets us engineer reliable overlap windows: typically 5-8 hours within the Americas or Western Europe, and 2-5 hours between US time zones and CEE with modest schedule shifts.

English proficiency runs from intermediate to native, with customer-facing roles staffed at advanced/native levels. To improve leadership accessibility, we align recurring exec-level touchpoints within overlap windows and keep async updates flowing so decisions don’t wait on the clock.