Paired
at a glance
Founded in London in 2019, Paired is a relationship app that helps couples thrive through conversation starters and quizzes designed to promote communication, intimacy, and growth. Paired is a fully remote company with a global team spanning 7 countries.
Paired partnered with Oyster to hire talent beyond the U.K., and currently has half their team distributed across Europe and North America. Oyster has been integral to Paired’s business growth by enabling them to scale quickly and cost-effectively with seamless compliance support.
- Paired hired 23 people across 6 countries with Oyster
- They’ve streamlined payroll management and reporting
- Paired saves on costs thanks to a seat-based annual plan
The challenge
Backed by therapists and researchers, London-based startup Paired are the makers of a relationship app that deepens communication and closeness between couples through daily quizzes, conversation starters, and expert advice. The app quickly gained users around the world, so after raising their seed round in 2021, Paired knew they needed to grow beyond the U.K.
“Our product has a global audience, and we wanted our team to reflect the same diversity. That’s why we wanted to hire talent globally rather than just in the U.K.,” says Magda Tulacz, Head of Finance at Paired. They also didn’t want to be limited in their search for talent. “Having access to a global talent pool means we can find the very best people for the job, regardless of where they live,” she explains.
But for a small startup, it wasn’t feasible for their internal team to handle the legal and logistical hassles of cross-border employment, from contracts to payroll, statutory benefits, and more. They needed to move fast and didn’t have time to manually research compliance requirements in different countries. For their HR team, this would be not just tedious and time-consuming, but also potentially expose them to unnecessary risk.
What Paired needed as an early-stage startup was a fast, compliant, and scalable solution that would enable them to grow quickly without getting mired in complex bureaucratic processes or the high costs of external consultants.
The solution
After considering various options, Paired chose Oyster as their global employment partner in November 2020. Since Paired was hiring internationally for the first time, they selected Oyster as a reliable and trustworthy guide when it comes to local knowledge and compliance.
“Before working with Oyster, we had never hired anyone outside of the U.K. We chose Oyster because of their focus on compliance, transparency, and ease of use. We wanted a trusted partner who could simplify global hiring.”
With Oyster, Paired is able to seamlessly onboard talent regardless of location, without any legal or operational bottlenecks. “Oyster takes the complexity out of international hiring and streamlines payroll and benefits. We don’t have to worry about logistics or compliance,” says Magda.
Right from the start, Oyster has been a trustworthy, long-term partner providing the knowledge and guidance Paired needs to manage their global workforce. In their day-to-day operations, the Paired team can always count on fast communication and excellent support when they need help with HR admin, benefits, or payroll issues.
“For almost 5 years, Oyster has been a brilliant partner providing great service to support our growth. The Oyster team responds really fast and the support is absolutely fantastic. Our customer success manager is incredibly supportive and responsive. Whatever the request might be, she always goes above and beyond to not only bring us a good solution, but also do so very quickly.”
As the Head of Finance, Magda particularly appreciates that Oyster ensures locally compliant payroll as well as accurate and timely payments for their global team members. “Without Oyster, it would be really difficult for us to set up payroll in countries outside of the U.K.,” she explains. “With Oyster, we can make sure that everyone is paid correctly and compliantly across multiple countries and jurisdictions.”
Beyond processing payroll, Oyster also streamlines payroll management and offers robust reporting capabilities with automated workflows and a centralized dashboard, which makes work easier for Paired’s payroll and finance teams.
“Payroll is centralized and easy to manage since Oyster takes care of the monthly payroll, reporting, and payments. We can easily access consolidated payroll reports, which is crucial for our accounting in the U.K. because it allows us to have a very clear view of monthly costs on an ongoing basis.”
With Oyster as their EOR partner, Paired has been able to scale quickly and compliantly, with half their team now based in Europe and North America. “We currently have 23 team members on Oyster across six different countries, from Spain to Italy, from Denmark to the U.S.,” says Magda. They’ve also saved time and costs by onboarding talent through Oyster rather than managing the process internally.
“Oyster has been an invaluable partner in our growth journey because it’s enabled us to scale really quickly and grow as a business. We’ve been able to expand globally in a cost-effective and time-efficient way.”
Partnering with Oyster has had a significant business impact on Paired. With the ability to recruit globally, Paired has much greater access to talent, which has fueled their growth as a startup since they’re able to fill roles faster and expand with speed and flexibility.
“Hiring globally with Oyster allows us to move quickly and access specialized skills we might not find in one single country alone. We’re able to hire the best person for the job, no matter where they are in the world, without worrying about the logistics. This flexibility is essential for scaling a startup.”
With Oyster handling HR admin, payroll, and benefits, the Paired team is able to work more efficiently. On the payroll and finance side that Magda oversees, Oyster’s automated platform reduces manual work for the in-house team, saving time and effort they can redirect to more strategic work.
“Oyster streamlines payroll and provides accurate and accessible reporting that’s been a huge help for accounting. Reports are easy to generate, which saves us time and reduces manual work.”
Building on several years of successful collaboration, in 2024 Paired started using Oyster Scale, a seat-based annual subscription with discounted pricing. With 15 seats on the Scale plan, Paired has significantly reduced their global employment costs and enabled better resource planning and forecasting.
“With Oyster Scale, we’re able to achieve significant savings by paying the annual fees upfront. This has helped us not only with cost efficiencies, but also cash flow planning for the year ahead. Making a longer-term commitment has also strengthened our relationship with Oyster.”
Looking ahead, Magda expects that Paired will continue to expand confidently into new markets with Oyster. “We’re excited to continue expanding globally with the confidence that Oyster gives us,” she says. “Oyster is constantly evolving and improving, which makes us confident we’re working with a forward-thinking partner.”
Based on Paired’s success with building a global team, Magda is happy to recommend Oyster to other companies that want to scale globally.
“If you want to expand globally, don’t overcomplicate things internally. It’s better to partner with someone that does it right. Oyster makes hiring global talent seamless, compliant, and scalable.”
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