Hiring Employees in Thailand: What Employers Must Do (2026 Guide).

What hiring employees in Thailand asks of you

Hiring employees in Thailand creates obligations in three layers: a one-time registration with the Social Security Office, a monthly payroll cycle with two separate government deadlines, and record-keeping duties that outlast the employment itself. None of them are complicated on their own. What catches new employers out is that the clock on the first one starts the day your first employee does.

The employment contract itself is the easy part. Thai labour law recognises fixed-period and indefinite-period contracts, and it treats a probationary contract as an indefinite-period contract, which matters later when notice and severance come into play. Agree the salary, the working days, and the start date in writing, and the real work begins after signing.

This guide covers what the law requires of you as the employer of Thai staff, with a short section at the end on what changes when the hire is a foreigner. The month-to-month engagement mechanics, what a firm actually does for you and when, live on the linked service pages.

Register with the Social Security Office first

Registration is the deadline most first-time employers miss. Under the Social Security Act, an employee aged 15 to 60 is an insured person, and Section 34 requires the employer to file an employer registration form and an insured person registration form with the Social Security Office within 30 days from the date the employees become insured persons. In plain terms: your company registers once, each employee is registered as they join, and the 30-day window opens on the first day of work.

The Act also keeps the file current. Changes to the registered details have to be notified by the 15th of the month following the change, and when an employee leaves, that is a change. If an employer fails to register, the Act lets the Office enter the details itself based on the evidence, so silence does not make the obligation go away.

Registration, monthly filings, and the forms behind them are the core of what a firm handles under social security submissions, which is usually folded into a payroll engagement rather than bought separately.

The monthly payroll cycle has two legs

Every month you pay salaries, two remittances follow, and they go to different offices under different rules.

The first leg is income tax. The Revenue Department's guidance on personal income tax puts the duty on the payer: for employment income, the employer withholds tax at source, files the return, and submits the withheld amount to the District Revenue Office. The amount withheld follows the progressive personal income tax scale for each employee's expected annual income, and it is credited against the employee's own annual return, which is due by the last day of March following the tax year. The Revenue Department's English pages do not publish the monthly remittance deadline, and a firm confirms the current filing calendar. What the monthly engagement looks like in practice is covered under payroll tax filing.

The second leg is social security. The employer deducts the employee's contribution from wages and remits it together with the employer's own share to the Social Security Office by the 15th of the following month, filed on the SSO 1-10 forms. The Social Security Office's contributions page sets the wage base for the calculation at a minimum of 1,650 baht and a maximum of 15,000 baht per month, and charges a surcharge of 2 percent per month on late remittance. The contribution percentage itself is set by ministerial regulation rather than stated in the Act, so confirm the rate in force with your accountant or payroll firm rather than a blog post.

Calculating salaries, deductions, and both remittances on a reliable monthly rhythm is exactly the job of payroll processing. For one or two employees some owners run it themselves; the deadlines do not shrink with headcount, which is why most stop doing so as the team grows.

Payslips, records, and work rules

Thai law is specific about what an employer documents, and the duties scale with headcount. The Ministry of Labour publishes an English translation of the Labour Protection Act, and its record-keeping chapter is worth reading once in full.

An employer with ten or more employees must keep an employee register in Thai, created within 15 days of each hire, and written work rules in Thai covering working time, holidays, leave, discipline, grievances, and termination. Employers of ten or more must also keep documents recording wages, overtime, and holiday pay, signed by the employee as evidence of payment; a bank transfer record counts as that evidence for salaries paid into an account. Both the register and the payment documents must be kept for at least two years, and longer if a complaint or lawsuit is running.

Below ten employees the formal register and work rules are not yet required, but the payment evidence discipline is worth adopting from day one. Labour disputes are decided on documents, and the employer is the party expected to produce them. Payslip production and statutory record-keeping are standard parts of a payroll services engagement.

Severance is a statutory floor, not a negotiation

When you terminate an employee, the Labour Protection Act's severance provisions set minimum payments that scale with continuous service:

These apply when the employer ends the employment, and retirement is treated as a termination for this purpose. The Act lists narrow exceptions where no severance is due, including dishonest performance of duties, an intentional criminal offence against the employer, wilful damage, and gross negligence causing serious damage. The exceptions are read strictly, so do not assume a difficult dismissal fits one; for a contested termination, a lawyer can assess the position before you act.

Notice is a separate obligation. For a contract without a fixed period, either side terminates by written notice given at or before a wage payment date, taking effect at the following one, and the employer may instead pay wages up to that date and end the employment immediately.

Hiring foreign staff changes the sequence

A foreign hire runs on the same payroll rails once employment starts: withholding, social security, records, and severance all apply. What changes is the start. A foreigner needs a work permit before working, and the sponsoring company must meet conditions of its own before the permit can be issued. Those company-side requirements, and the order in which visa and permit are obtained, are covered in the guide to getting a work permit through your company. Read it before agreeing a start date with a foreign candidate, because the permit timeline, not the contract, decides when work can legally begin.

When to bring in a firm

Most small employers hand payroll to a firm not because the arithmetic is hard but because the calendar is unforgiving: two monthly deadlines, a surcharge that accrues monthly, and records that must hold up years later. A monthly engagement with an accounting firm that includes payroll typically covers the withholding calculation, both remittances, payslips, and the social security file, and it scales as you hire.

The decision point is usually the first hire, not the tenth. Registration has a 30-day fuse, and the first payroll month sets the pattern every later month follows. Getting that pattern right once is cheaper than repairing it later.

This guide is general information about employer obligations in Thailand, not accounting, tax, or legal advice. Rules, rates, and forms change, and how they apply depends on your company and your employees. For a specific situation, speak with a qualified accountant or lawyer.