What does a virtual assistant cost compared with a UK hire?
The honest comparison is not an hourly rate against an hourly rate. It is everything a UK hire costs you, against everything a managed VA includes. Here is the UK side, worked out on the statutory minimums, so you can check it.
What a UK employee costs you
Uses the National Living Wage and the employer rates for 2026 to 2027. Change the rate to what you would really pay.
- Salary£12.71 an hour, 40 hours a week, 52 weeks£2,203/mo
- Employer National Insurance15% above £5,000 a year£268/mo
- Employer pension3% above £6,240 a year£50/mo
£2,522 a month · £30,258 a year
For about 1,856 hours actually worked a year, once statutory holiday is taken.
What being an employer costs, beyond the salary
The figure above is the part you can work out in advance. Employing someone also brings costs that only show up when something happens, and they are easy to leave out of the sums.
Employer National Insurance is the first. It went up in April 2025, from 13.8% to 15%, and it now starts on pay above £5,000 a year rather than £9,100. It is already in the calculator, and it is a large part of why a modest salary costs noticeably more than it did.
Sickness is the second. When an employee is off, you pay statutory sick pay and the work still needs doing, which usually means paying someone else to cover it or doing it yourself.
The third is the employment relationship itself. If a dismissal or a grievance goes wrong, an employee can take you to an employment tribunal, and defending a claim takes time and usually legal advice, whether or not it succeeds.
None of that applies to a managed VA, because your VA is not your employee. With us, they are contracted to Mango & Co.: there is no employer National Insurance on your side, you pay for the hours worked rather than for sick days, and there is no employment relationship between you to dispute. They still get paid holiday and paid personal days from us, because being fair to the people doing the work is part of doing it properly.
What that figure leaves out
- Recruitment: agency fees, or your own time advertising and interviewing
- Holiday and sickness cover, and the work that waits while someone is off
- A desk, equipment and software
- Managing performance, and starting again if the hire does not work out
What goes into a VA's price
A freelance VA found yourself costs least per hour, and everything else is yours: finding them, testing them, their contract, their pay, cover and what happens if they leave.
A managed VA costs more per hour than a freelancer and a lot less than a UK hire. The recruiting, the contract, the pay, the supervision and the replacement are ours.
Our own price depends on the hours and the role, so it is in your free VA Action Plan rather than on a price list. The plan takes about three minutes.
Questions
What hours does the VA work?
UK business hours as standard. Our VAs are in the Philippines, so a UK working day is their afternoon and evening, and every role is advertised in both time zones.
When do I pay?
Monthly, in arrears: you pay for a month after it has been worked. The one-off onboarding fee is the only thing paid before your VA starts.
Is the VA an employee?
No. VAs work as self-employed contractors. On the managed service they are contracted to us and we handle their pay and performance; you direct the work.
Do I have to give them my passwords?
You should not. Give your VA their own login wherever the software allows, or share access through a password manager, so it can be removed in one step.
Will a VA work for your business?
Answer a few quick questions and get a free plan for your business: whether a VA would work for you now, what they would take off your plate, and what it costs next to a UK hire. Your call with us is booked from there.