Skip to main content

Frequently Asked Questions

Work Schedule – Days & Hours

    Staff work schedule is to align with your business needs.                            

    You choose 5 consecutiveworkdays for your offshore employee, 

      2 consecutive days are considered rest days, they can be any 2 consecutive days. 

            Examples:

            -    Workdays: Mon-Fri, Rest days Sat-Sun

            -    WORKDAYS: Wed-Sun, REST DAYS Mon-Tue

    Shift is 9 hours, 8 hours paid, 1 hour unpaid break (so a 40 hour week) 

            –    you choose the start time.                            


Pricing Model

    Transparent & Straightforward pricing model

            -    Employee Costs – this includes staff Salary, Allowances, Mandated Benefits, 

                  Health & Life Insurance – all costs in PHP and converted to your choice of currency 

                  (we always use the average of the previous months FX rate, 

                  so this can change slightly from month to month)

            -    Outforce Service Fee – covers HR, Payroll, Labor Compliance, Insurances, Retention Program, 

                  IT Equipment & Support, and Facilities (if required)

            -    Security Deposit – monthly charge in place to cover the liability of staff redundancy, 

                  if staff choose to resign or are terminated, the Security Deposit accruals are refunded 

                  in full when they exit the company.

Employee Costs (No Mark-up) + Outforce Service Fee
+
 Security Deposit
=
 Total Invoice

 • Salary
• Allowances
• Benefits
• Insurances
• HR Management
• Payroll Administration
• Labor Compliance
• Insurnaces
• Retention Program
• IT Equipment & Support
• Facilities (if required)
• Covers Redundancy Liability
• Fully Refundable if not required 
 • Monthly Recurring
• No Hidden Charges

Adjustments to Employee Costs

•    These charges are passed on to you at cost (no mark-up).

•    Staff time in and out via web-bundy login on our cloud-based payroll and leave tracking system.

•    This means there may be adjustments to Employee Costs based on;

            -    Attendance – staff pay deductions due to tardiness, undertime, absences (Leave without Pay)

                                            All credits are passed on to your invoice.

            -    Loadings – staff are entitled to additional % of their hourly rate for work completed on Public Holidays, 

                  Rest Days, Overtime, Night Shift. Note, all work completed during this time must be requested 

                  and approved by you, the client. Additional charges are passed on to your invoice.

-    Regular Holidays (+100%)

-    Special Holidays (+30%)

-    Rest Days (+30%)

-    Overtime (+25%)

-    Night Shift (+10%) – between the hours of 10pm-6am Philippines time.


Public Holidays

•    Your assigned Outforce Account Manager is the primary point of contact for both your offshore staff, 

     and your onshore team. The Account Manager is responsible for timekeeping and leave management 

     within our HRIS, and they will notify you prior to the upcoming PH public holidays.

Public Holiday Schedule (Onshore vs Philippines)

   Do staff take Philippine Holidays off? 

     Onshore vs Philippines Public Holiday schedule for your staff is completely your call, 

     we have clients that follow the Philippine holidays off, and others that follow the Onshore country holiday schedule.

Following PH Calendar (Staff take PH Holidays Off)

   Staff receive normal pay for those holidays with no additional loadings.

    Note: If staff are to have PH Holidays Off, and work during Onshore Holidays that do not align with PH Holidays, 

    be sure you are ok with PH staff working if Onshore holiday means all Onshore staff are off for the day.

Following ONSHORE Calendar (Staff take ONSHORE Holidays Off)

    For Onshore Holidays that do not align with PH Holidays, staff are on “no work, no pay”, /

      unless they choose to use a PTO (see explanation of PTO below) leave credit to ensure they receive pay 

      for that day (only possible after 6-month probationary period)

                -    In instances where the staff is still in probation and they are not required to attend work on a holiday, 

                      then it’s at your discretion if you wish to allow them to use an accrued PTO credit to ensure they 

                      are paid that day.

                -    If they report for work on a PH holiday, they receive normal pay for the day plus Loadings.

                            •    Regular Holiday (+100%)

                            •    Special Holiday (+30%)

                                

The following table outlines the schedule for PH Holidays 2023 & 2024.

 Month Phillipines Holiday Date Weekday Type of Holiday Loading
January New Year's Day 1st January 2023 Sunday Regular 100%
 Additional Non Working Day2nd January 2023 Monday Special  30%
 February EDSA People Power Revolution Anniversary 25th February 2023 SaturdaySpecial 30% 
April Maundy Thursday 6th April 2023Thursday  Regular100% 
 Good Friday7th April 2023  Friday Regular100% 
 Black Saturday 8th April 2023 Saturday Special 30%
 Araw ng Kagitingan 10th April 2023Monday  Regular 100%
 Eid al-Fitr ***22nd April 2023 Saturday  Regular100% 
MayLabor Day1 st May 2023Monday Regular  100%
JuneIndependence Day 12th June 2023Monday Regular  100%
Eid al-Adha ***  28th June 2023Wednesday  Regular 100%
 August Ninoy Aquino Day 21st August 2023MondaySpecial 30% 
National Heroes Day  28th August 2023 Monday Regular 100%
 NovemberAll Saints' Day  1st November 2023Wednesday  Special 30%
All Souls' Day  2nd November 2023 ThursdaySpecial  30%
Bonifacio Day  27th November 2023 Monday Regular 100%
 December Feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary 8th December 2023 Friday Special 30%
 Christmas Day 25th December 2023MondayRegular  100%
 Rizal Day 30th December 2023Saturday Regular  100%
 New Year's Eve 31st December 2023 SundaySpecial  30%

*** approximate date, actual dates announced closer to the day and in accordance with the Islamic & Lunar calendar.



 Month Phillipines Holiday Date Weekday Type of Holiday Loading
January New Year's Day 1st January 2024 Monday Regular 100%
FebruaryChinese New Year10th February 2024 Saturday Special  30%
 March Maundy Thursday
 25th March 2024 ThursdayRegular 100% 
 Good Friday
29th March 2024Friday  Regular100% 
 Black Saturday
30th March 2024  Saturday Special30% 
 April Araw ng Kagitingan
6th April 2024Tuesday Regular 100%
Eid al-Fitr *** 10th April 2024Wednesday  Regular 100%
MayLabor Day1st May 2024Wednesday  Regular100% 
JuneIndependence Day
12th June 2024Wednesday Regular  100%
Eid al-Adha *** 
17th June 2024Monday Regular  100%
August Ninoy Aquino Day
21st August 2024Wednesday  Special 30%
National Heroes Day 
26th August 2024MondayRegular 100% 
NovemberAll Saints' Day 
1st November 2024 Friday Special 30%
All Souls' Day 
2nd November 2024Saturday  Special 30%
Bonifacio Day 
30th November 2024 SaturdayRegular  100%
DecemberFeast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary
8th December 2024 Sunday Special30%
Christmas Eve  24th December 2024 Tuesday Special 30%
 Christmas Day 25th December 2024WednesdayRegular  100%
 Rizal Day 30th December 2024Monday Regular  100%
 New Year's Eve 31st December 2024 TuesdaySpecial  30%

PTO (Paid Time Off)

     Employees are entitled to a total of twenty (20) PTO leave credits per calendar year.

     Leave credits are earned monthly upon hiring at 1.67 per month.

    PTO credits shall only be available upon regularization (once 6 month probation has successfully been completed).

    PTO credits can be used for any purpose (sick, vacation, birthday etc).

    PTO credits accumulated in the current year must be exhausted until 31 March of the following year. 

      Up to five (5) unused PTO credits are converted to cash and paid to the employee in April of the following year. 

      Any excess accumulated PTO of more than 5 earned from the previous year will be forfeited if unused. 

      The conversion of PTO credits to cash is an Employee Cost and passed on to you in the relevant invoice.


Staff Performance & Evaluations

    Staff performance evaluations are at intervals during your staff’s tenure and will be prompted 
      by your Outforce Account Manager. It is crucial we have your feedback on how your staff are tracking. 
      This information is critical should we ever have to implement a Performance Improvement Plan (PIP) 
      or answer labor cases filed to the Philippines Department of Labor by exited employees.


Recruitment

    We can hire resources for any sector where the job function of the staff can be performed remotely.

    Our recruitment team is the biggest department within Outforce, it’s well and truly part of our sales process, 

      if we can’t recruit the talent needed, there is no deal, so it’s critical.

    We have tech recruiters who specialize in building out our client partner tech, telco and IT teams 

      – for telcos we’ve built teams of porting specialists, project engineers, network operations, developers, 

      billing specialists, customer support, sales support.

    Due to the high number of tech roles and telco client partners, we have a great referral ecosystem 

      we can lean on when sourcing candidates, we incentivise staff to refer suitable talent.

    We have a very deep CV pool we have developed through our ATS over the years we’ve been recruiting.

    We post job ads on all the major job boards in the Philippines, paid listings on Job Street, 

      foundit (previously Monster), Mynimo, LinkedIn, Facebook Groups


Employee Engagement (EE)

    Outforce has an EE Committee, which consists of not only Outforce direct support staff, 
      but members from each of our clients’ teams, should they wish to be involved.
    The EE Committee meet monthly to discuss ideas and past events to gauge how we evolve the EE Calendar.
    We run monthly activities and plan our EE calendar every 6 months.
    DECEMBER is the Outforce Annual Year End Party.
      July 2023 Event was a guest speak Coach Chot Reyes (Philippine National Basketball Team), 
      30 attendees in Outforce boardroom and 150+ virtually via zoom. (pics attached)
            -    Championship TEAMwork @ Work - A one-hour talk on teaming and execution on how to achieve lofty goals 
                  and stretch targets through a daily focus on ‘What’s Important Now’ (WIN). For the days of the heroic, 
                  individual ‘superstars’ are over. What we need today are TEAM players who can not only perform their roles well, 
                  but also make others around them better. That is the only way to get to BEST – together. In the words of Deloitte, 
                  “Organizational Performance is a Team sport.” Coach Chot will share his experiences as an entrepreneur, 
                  Head Coach of GILAS Pilipinas, and former TV5 CEO and how to create a high-performance culture: 
    EE is a priority for Outforce, and something we have been conscious of always improving. 
      We have steered away from the generic “call center type dress ups and decorations”, those activities are 
      a bit tired and over done by a lot of BPOs, we always measure the engagement levels, if there’s no interest, 
      we cross it off the list and look to improve. EE examples;
            –    CSR events - attending less fortunate communities or schools and donating our time and items to assist those in need.
                  We aim to attend 3-4 CSR outreach events each year.
            –    Guest Speakers – successful, well known, individuals of influence providing in person 
                  and virtual stream of keynote presentation.
            –    Movie Nights – reserve entire theatres for staff to attend screenings of the latest movies
            –    In-Office Day Spa – a trusted and reputable third party converts part of the office to a day spa 
                  for massages and relaxation of staff.
    All of the above mentioned is Outforce’ contribution to engaging the staff and making them feel part of the Outforce team. 
      We are still mindful of and promote our clients first, over Outforce. So your staff know they are primarily part of your team, 
      and with that we welcome, help facilitate, and strongly encourage any type of engagement activities you wish to run in parallel 
      with the Outforce calendar.

        

Security Deposit

    The Security Deposit is an ongoing monthly charge.

    It is conditional of Basic Salary offered to the Employee, so it will fluctuate with different levels of Salary. 

    Security Deposit is in place to cover the liability of possible redundancies (severance pay) and any bad debt obligations.

    If staff happen to be made redundant due to our agreement ending or you need to downsize the team, 

     we use the Security Deposit to cover this cost.

    If the Employee leaves Outforce of their own accord, or is terminated, and there are no outstanding debts 

     owed to Outforce, the deposit is fully refundable.

    Security Deposit calculation is equivalent to the Redundancy entitlement        

     of the Employee = 1 (one) month Basic Salary + Total Allowances per year of service

     We amortize this cost over 12 months, so at the end of 12 months, we will have collected 

     exactly 1-month Basic Salary + Total Allowances for each Employee. 

    Most BPO’s charge this Security Deposit UPFRONT, and then on every anniversary, 

     and it’s generally 1 or 2 months TOTAL operating costs. 

     We have chosen to charge only what we require to look after the Employee, 

     and we have chosen to charge it monthly to remove barriers to entry.

        

Training & Development

    Outforce runs soft skills training sessions as part of a “bolt on” to some of our engagement activities. 

    We have 3rd party vendors we partner with (but not exclusively), who can assist with any specific or technical trainings. 

     We can help source the right vendors and facilitate. Many of our tech industry client partners have put their staff 

     through tech certification and accreditation courses.

        

Standard IT Equipment & Support

    24/7 IT Tech Support.

    Laptop Set with Endpoint protection.

OS: Windows 10 Pro

Processor: Intel 5 11th Gen

RAM: 12GB

Hard Drive: 256GB SSD

Monitor: 24” LED

Headset: Jabra Noise Cancelling


Any additional equipment or higher spec units can be sourced and quoted on request.

        

Invoicing

    Invoices are issued on the 5th of the invoiced month and due on the 12th of the same month. 

Any adjustments due to attendance and/or loadings (holidays, night shift, overtime) 

are included for the previous FULL month.

    We run quite a tight schedule in terms of generating and issuing these invoices, receiving payments, 

      transferring funds, and then disbursing on time to staff. As the bulk of it is staff wages, we are quite strict 

      on sticking to the due dates, here is a timeline of the process; 

-    End of month 

-    1st – 3rd : process previous full month payroll report showing attendance for all staff, 

      including deductions for absences, and loadings for extra hours worked. 

-    4th : run invoicing process for the month.                             

-    5th : invoices checked and issued to clients. 

-    12th : invoices due 7 days after issuing, funds transferred to Philippine bank accounts. 

-    16th – 19th: staff payroll computation for the current month 

-    20th : staff are paid using remittances from clients (pay day can fall on the 18th if the 20th falls on a Sunday)


Contract Termination & Notice

    Outforce strictly follows the Philippine labor guidelines to ensure staff are treated accordingly, and this forms the basis of our terms.
    The contract term is in line with active employment of your staff
      The rolling 90 days is in place to protect the staff and ensure compliance should we have to let them go. 
      90 days is the maximum amount of time we would ever need, regardless of tenure, to adhere to the guidelines.
    The table below outlines the different employment periods along with actions and timelines for separation of employment; 

 Reasoning Training (1 - 30 days) Probation (31-179 days) Regular (180 days +)
Terminable Infractions ImmediateImmediateImmediate
Performance Issues Immediate 1-2 weeks 
Staff have been evaluated by the client during the training period and passed, if performance drops off during the probationary period, we can let them go relatively quick providing we have documentation/evaluations of staff not meeting expectation. 
30-90 days 
Staff have passed probation so we need to ensure everything is documented and a Performance Improvement Plan (PIP) has been executed by Outforce HR, and not successfully met by the staff before we can end their employment. 
Redundancy 
(no infractions or performance issues, simply a business decision to end the engagement)
Immediate 

30 days’ notice 

1 month salary severance pay 

30 days’ notice 

Severance pay entitlement equal to 1 month salary / year of service 
•   In any case, if the decisions were made for our engagement to come to an end, we will wrap things up as quick as possible, 
     and the time frame will be determined heavily by tenure of staff (stated in the table above)
     However, the 90 days is an absolute maximum to ensure we are covered if/when staff tenures become longer term.