Employment Hero review: Employer of Record (HeroForce) in New Zealand
The best Holidays Act payroll tooling of any provider we rank and a staffed Auckland office, from an Australian HR software company that only launched its EOR product in New Zealand in April 2026. We verified both of its New Zealand companies on the register and scored the EOR service, not the software, on our eight criteria.
The right choice when Holidays Act accuracy matters more than price, and the wrong one if you want a settled EOR offer.
Employment Hero is a Sydney HR and payroll software company founded in 2014 that bought the KeyPay payroll engine in 2021 and now reports more than A$300 million in annual recurring revenue. Its New Zealand payroll is the strongest in this ranking on the thing that goes wrong most often here: it computes Average Weekly Earnings, Relevant Daily Pay and Ordinary Weekly Pay for Holidays Act leave and shows the working. Its Employer of Record product, HeroForce, launched in New Zealand on 22 April 2026 and is less settled: the launch material talks about award wages, superannuation and labour-hire licensing, which are Australian concepts, the pricing page says "custom" while the product page states a fee of 5% of payroll, and no onboarding timeline is published. Independent ratings are mixed at scale: G2 4.4 from 4,360 reviews, Trustpilot 3.9 from 641, with support escalation and contract lock-in the recurring complaints.
Choose Employment Hero if you already run, or intend to run, Employment Hero HR and payroll, your leave calculations are complex (variable hours, commissions, shift work) and you want a provider with an Auckland office. Look elsewhere if you want a published per-employee EOR fee and a documented onboarding timeline today, your hire needs a sponsored visa, or you are hiring in several countries at once and want one owned-entity network.
Who actually employs your staff: two New Zealand companies Employment Hero owns
Employment Hero has more New Zealand register entries than any other provider we rank. The operating entity is Employment Hero NZ Limited, a locally incorporated company (NZBN 9429051216139, company number 8661609) registered on 3 April 2023. The EOR service is delivered through a second locally incorporated company, Remote Hero (New Zealand) Limited (NZBN 9429048719599, company number 8132130), registered on 15 October 2020, which the group's own affiliates page describes as providing implementation, support and success services for HeroForce. Both are wholly owned within the group, with Employment Hero Holdings Pty Ltd declared as ultimate holding company, and both share the group's New Zealand address at Level 4, 4 Graham Street, Auckland.
Two further group companies sit on the register: Keypay NZ General Partner Limited (payroll, 2020) and Employment Innovations NZ Limited (managed payroll, 2021). The structure is clean and fully declared. What the register does not tell you is which of the two main companies signs your employment agreement: ask.
| Register field | What the New Zealand Companies Register shows |
|---|---|
| Operating entity | Employment Hero NZ Limited · NZBN 9429051216139 · company 8661609 · incorporated 3 April 2023 |
| EOR service entity | Remote Hero (New Zealand) Limited · NZBN 9429048719599 · company 8132130 · incorporated 15 October 2020 |
| Entity type | New Zealand limited companies (locally incorporated), both Registered |
| Registered office | Level 4 BDO Auckland, 4 Graham Street, Auckland 1010 (also the group's NZ office) |
| Ownership | Employment Hero Pty Ltd and Remote Hero (Australia) Pty Ltd respectively; ultimate holding company Employment Hero Holdings Pty Ltd (ACN 611 036 796) |
| Director | Benjamin Thompson, co-founder and CEO, resident in New South Wales |
| Other NZ group companies | Keypay NZ General Partner Limited (NZBN 9429048737258); Employment Innovations NZ Limited (NZBN 9429049897500) |
| Immigration NZ accreditation | Neither NZBN returns a result on the public accredited employer list; no NZ visa sponsorship page found |
Register fields read on 23 October 2026 at app.companiesoffice.govt.nz and cross-checked against employmenthero.com's affiliates list. INZ notes that some accredited employers opt out of publication.
Eight criteria, the same for every provider
- Best Holidays Act tooling of the ten: AWE, RDP and OWP computed and shown, with legislation updates applied automatically
- Two owned New Zealand limited companies, fully declared on the register, plus an Auckland office with local staff
- IRD-recognised payday filing and a managed payroll option that acts as a PAYE intermediary
- One platform for HR, payroll, rostering, recruitment and the employee app, useful if you will later run your own NZ entity on it
- Well capitalised: A$263 million Series F in 2023, ARR above A$300 million, first profitable months reported in 2025
- EOR pricing is not settled: "custom" on the pricing page, "5% of payroll processed" on the product page, no per-employee figure
- HeroForce launched in NZ on 22 April 2026 and its launch material refers to award wages, superannuation and labour-hire licensing, none of which apply in New Zealand
- No published EOR onboarding timeline; the NZ country facts on its EOR page are dated September 2022
- No visa sponsorship offer for New Zealand and neither NZ company appears on INZ's public accredited employer list
- Software contracts carry a 10-user minimum, a minimum term, 30 days' notice and no downgrades within term; cancellation friction is the most common complaint
- Recent incidents: pay-run problems on 1–2 September 2026 (about 4.6 hours) and an HR-to-payroll sync outage on 18 June 2026
What Employment Hero handles for a New Zealand employee
| Obligation | Status | What we found |
|---|---|---|
| Employment agreement | Handled | HeroForce acts as the legal Employer of Record; the group states it has a local entity in New Zealand |
| Holidays Act 2003 | Strongest here | AWE, RDP and OWP calculated automatically with a downloadable breakdown; factsheet mapped to Employment NZ's payroll compliance guide |
| KiwiSaver | Handled | Auto-enrolment, employer contributions and ESCT handled in the payroll engine |
| ACC levies | Handled | ACC calculated within payroll; levy invoices handled by the employing entity |
| Payday filing to IRD | Handled | IRD-recognised software provider with gateway filing; managed payroll operates as a PAYE intermediary |
| Accredited Employer Work Visa | Not offered | No NZ visa sponsorship page found; neither NZ company on INZ's public list |
| Native HRIS integrations | Strong | Native HR, rostering, time and attendance, recruitment and Xero integration on the same platform |
What you actually pay for one NZ$90,000 hire
Employment Hero publishes its software prices in New Zealand dollars (HR from NZ$9 and payroll from NZ$7 per employee per month, ten-user minimum, prices ex GST) but not its EOR fee. The pricing page lists HeroForce as custom; the HeroForce product page states "a transparent fee of just 5% of payroll processed". The example below uses the 5% figure.
| Line item (monthly) | NZ$ |
|---|---|
| Gross salary | 7,500 |
| KiwiSaver employer contribution (3.5%) | 263 |
| ACC work levy (approx., office class) | 55 |
| HeroForce fee (5% of payroll, per product page) | 375 |
| Total employer cost | 8,193 |
- Employment agreement and payroll on the Employment Hero platform
- Holidays Act, KiwiSaver, ACC and payday filing handled in the engine
- Employee app, HR documents and e-onboarding
- Recruitment placement fee on Employment Hero-sourced candidates
- Add-ons: rostering, HR advisory, learning, EAP (each with a monthly minimum)
- Transaction fees: payments NZ$5 each, batch fees NZ$0.20 per employee, SMS NZ$0.15
Illustrative. The 5% figure is the provider's own product-page statement and is not confirmed as the New Zealand EOR rate; the pricing page says custom. Get the fee, minimum term and notice period in writing before signing.
If Employment Hero is not the fit
RemotePeople
Lowest published rate, a New Zealand limited company it owns, and a documented onboarding timeline.
Read our RemotePeople reviewDeel
Scale, integrations and the largest owned-entity network, with a published price.
See Deel in the rankingANZPEO (formerly NZ PEO)
On Immigration NZ's accredited employer list, so it can sponsor an AEWV directly.
Read our ANZPEO reviewCommon questions about Employment Hero in New Zealand
Does Employment Hero actually offer an Employer of Record in New Zealand?
Which company employs my staff?
What does HeroForce cost?
Can Employment Hero sponsor a work visa in New Zealand?
Not sure Employment Hero is the one?
Answer five questions about headcount, timeline and budget, and we'll shortlist the three NZ EORs that fit.
How this review was made
Scored on the same eight criteria as every provider on NZEORHub. Entity status, ownership and directors were read from the New Zealand Companies Register on 23 October 2026 and cross-checked against the group's published affiliates list; pricing from employmenthero.com/nz; compliance claims from the payroll product pages and Holidays Act factsheet; incidents from the provider's status page and a third-party monitor. Employment Hero did not pay for this review and did not see it before publication.
Sources: New Zealand Companies Register (companies 8661609, 8132130, 8134597, 8238999) · Immigration New Zealand accredited employer list · employmenthero.com/nz pricing, HeroForce, payroll and affiliates pages · Scoop (HeroForce NZ launch, 22 April 2026) · G2, Capterra, Trustpilot, Google and Xero App Store reviews · status.employmenthero.com and isdown.app, read 23 October 2026.