EOR onboarding Colombia: from signed offer to first payroll

Onboarding in Colombia starts with a short data sheet, and every later step depends on it being right. The contract has a legal minimum content, the affiliations need identity numbers and an address, and the pay run needs a salary figure that has been checked against the thresholds that switch costs on and off.

When your candidate says yes, we ask you and them for:

• full name, identity document number (the cédula de ciudadanía for Colombians, a passport and visa for others) and home address
• job title and a plain description of the duties, which becomes the nature of the work clause
• gross monthly salary, and whether any part of pay is variable, a commission or a bonus
• the intended first day and the place of work, including whether the role is fully remote
• the contract type you want and whether a probation period should apply
• the cesantías fund the employee wants to use and, where they already have them, their current health insurer and pension fund

Salary deserves a second look at this stage. A salary at or under 2 SMMLV, that is COP 3,501,810 monthly, brings in the transport allowance and work clothing. From 4 SMMLV the employee pays an extra 1% to the pension solidarity fund. At 10 SMMLV the employer’s health, SENA and ICBF exemption ends. Knowing which band the offer falls into avoids a surprise on the first payslip.

Next comes the contract, drafted under the Labour Code (Código Sustantivo del Trabajo) and signed before the first working day. Most of our hires are on an indefinite-term contract, which Colombian law treats as the normal form. A fixed-term or project contract has to be written, and the 2025 reform, Ley 2466, limits the fixed-term route to four years overall once renewals are counted.

Without a written clause there is simply no probation (período de prueba). Its outer limit is two months, or a fifth of the agreed length on a fixed-term deal running under twelve months, whichever is shorter. While it runs, employer and employee can each walk away with no notice and no indemnity owed, and the worker keeps every employment benefit meanwhile. Probation cannot be reused: a later contract with the same person gets none.

Two notice rules belong in the onboarding conversation too, because they shape the first year. Someone leaving an open-ended job owes the employer a month of notice, 30 calendar days, yet the contract may not attach a penalty to skipping it. Fixed-term contracts roll over for an identical period by default; stopping that takes written notice to the other side 30 or more days ahead of the end date, so a diary entry is needed from the day it is signed.

We also write in the points that tend to cause friction later: who supplies equipment, where the work is done, which payments are agreed as non-salary under CST art. 128, and the confidentiality and intellectual property terms. Under Ley 23 de 1982, copyright’s economic rights in what an employee creates are presumed to move to the employer, as far as its usual business requires, but only where the employment contract is written, which is one more reason the contract has to exist on paper.

This is the stage with a deadline that cannot slide. An ARL policy protects the worker only from the day after enrolment, which makes the eve of the first working day the last moment to enrol them. Leave it to the morning of day one and the employee works that first day without occupational risk cover.

In the same window we register the hire with:

• a health insurer (EPS), funded by 4% from the employee and, above 10 SMMLV or for employers that do not qualify for the exemption, 8.5% from the employer
• a pension fund, either Colpensiones or a private AFP, with 12% of pay coming from us as employer and 4% deducted from the salary
• a regional family fund, the caja de compensación familiar, which the employer alone pays at 4% of pay
• the cesantías fund, which receives the yearly severance savings deposit

How much the ARL charges turns on the job’s risk classification, running from 0.348% in class I up to 8.7% in class V. For an employer joining the system, the starting point is the initial rate of the class, which is 0.522% in class I. The ARL makes the classification, and we pass the result on to you in the cost confirmation.

One practical consequence of the timing is worth knowing. The EPS pays sick leave from the third day only where the worker has at least 4 weeks of contributions immediately before it, so a new joiner’s first month is treated differently. What happens once that threshold is met is set out in our incapacidad and sick pay guide.

If your new hire is not Colombian, immigration and reporting steps run alongside the contract, and the visa usually sets the earliest realistic start date. Visas are issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Cancillería); entry, residence control and the foreigner’s identity card (cédula de extranjería) sit with Migración Colombia.

Most employees come in on the visa M trabajador, which lasts a maximum of three years and covers only the job and employer named in it. The file includes a contract summary signed by the employer’s legal representative, a letter explaining the hire, and four months of the employer’s bank statements showing income that averages 100 SMMLV or more a month. Once the file is complete and paid, Cancillería has 30 calendar days to decide, and the e-visa follows within 10 business days of the fee being paid. Nobody can guarantee the outcome, and we never do.

Family members can apply as beneficiaries of the worker visa. If the visa ends or is cancelled, the holder has 30 calendar days to leave or apply for a new one, and the employer must tell Cancillería when the role changes or comes to an end. Those duties stay with whoever is named as the employer on the application.

Colombia’s visa V nómada digital is no shortcut here, because its holder may not work for a Colombian employer. After arrival, three short deadlines apply:

• the employee applies for the cédula de extranjería within 15 calendar days of arrival or visa issue
• the employer files a SIRE report of the hiring with Migración Colombia, also inside 15 calendar days
• the employer registers the worker in RUTEC with the Ministry of Labour within 120 calendar days of the contract

The full list of requirements is on the Cancillería visa pages, which are the reference for any application.

The first payroll closes the onboarding. Nobody on a monthly salary may wait more than a month between payments, so someone starting mid-month is paid for the days since the start date at the first month end. From that salary we take the worker’s 4% for health and another 4% for pension, any solidarity fund percentage, and income tax under the retención en la fuente rules, which take nothing while the monthly taxable base stays at or under 95 UVT, COP 4,975,530 this year.

The month after, three filings follow. The PILA is settled on a business day that depends on how the employer’s NIT ends, never later than the sixteenth. DIAN receives the tax withheld through a monthly return, also scheduled by NIT, and the nómina electrónica record of that first payment by the tenth day.

Two technical rules explain small differences you may spot between a payslip and the PILA. Regulation rounds the base up to a whole peso and every contribution line up to a round hundred pesos. And if the new hire falls ill early on, contributions do not stop; they are worked out on the sick pay rather than the salary, so the person still appears on the form.

The detail of each line is in our explainer on Colombian payroll and the PILA. Your hire sees a payslip in pesos and can ask us for the PILA record of their contributions at any time.

Onboarding does not end with one payslip, because Colombian employment carries fixed dates that arrive whatever the start month. We put these into the calendar on day one so that you can see the cash effect in advance:

• 30 June: first half of the service bonus (prima de servicios), pro rata for a partial semester
• first 20 days of December: second half of the prima
• January: interest on severance savings at 12% a year, paid straight to the employee
• before 15 February: the cesantías deposit for the previous year, one month’s salary per year of service, pro rata
• 30 April, 31 August and 20 December: work clothes for anyone on up to 2 SMMLV once past three months’ service

If the new hire earns more than 2 SMMLV, the transport allowance and clothing lines simply do not appear; above 10 SMMLV, the exemption on employer health, SENA and ICBF falls away and the PILA shows those three lines from the first month. Either way, the calendar above is the same, so you can budget the June and December peaks from the offer stage rather than discovering them on an invoice.

Annual leave builds up as well. After a year of service the employee is entitled to 15 working days of paid leave, which the employer schedules within the following year with 15 days’ notice. Six of those days, as a minimum, have to be used within each year.

The whole sequence, from data sheet to first February, is the core of what Employer of Record Colombia runs for you. For a wider view of how responsibilities divide, read what an EOR in Colombia covers, and if you are still comparing providers, our guide on shortlisting a Colombian EOR lists the questions to put to each.

Q01What is the latest day for ARL affiliation?+

A.The day before the employee starts. Protection begins only on the day after enrolment, so enrolling on the first morning leaves that whole day unprotected.

Q02Can probation be longer than 2 months for a senior hire?+

A.No. The Labour Code caps probation at 2 months for every contract, and at one fifth of the term for fixed-term contracts under a year. It must also be agreed in writing to exist at all.

Q03Can a foreign hire start on a digital nomad visa while the worker visa is processed?+

A.No. The nomad visa is for remote work for foreign companies, and its holder may not work for a Colombian employer. A foreign hire on a Colombian contract needs a visa that allows that employment.

Q04When does the first prima fall due?+

A.At the next prima date after the start: by 30 June or within the first 20 days of December, calculated in proportion to the days worked in that semester.

Q05Which onboarding filings apply only to foreign employees?+

A.The SIRE report to Migración Colombia within 15 calendar days of hiring and the RUTEC registration with the Ministry of Labour within 120 calendar days of the contract. Separately, the foreign employee must request a cédula de extranjería, with 15 calendar days to do so.