---
title: "HR and payroll software for NGOs | Relief One"
description: "HR & Payroll. Staff and consultants, managed together. Contract, sign and pay staff and consultants under each country’s rules."
url: https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/hr/
lang: en
---

# HR & Payroll: Contract, sign and pay staff and consultants under each country’s rules.

Your people aren’t all staff.

Some join for six weeks, in another country, on another contract and under that country’s leave rules. The paperwork goes back and forth by email until someone chases the last signature. When the work ends, a consultant’s access often stays open long after.

[Relief One](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/), Run the organisation

## How it works

Staff and consultants, managed together.

1. Start with the contract. A framework agreement or staff contract per person and entity, then an assignment per piece of work: scope, days, rate.
2. Sign online with a code sent to the phone; an authorised signatory countersigns by drawing.
3. Run the month. Leave, expenses and consultants’ invoices come in from their portal, are validated and paid.
4. Close access automatically when the last contract ends, with a grace window for the final invoice.

## What it does.

- **Contracts and assignments**: A framework agreement or staff contract per person, then an assignment per piece of work.
- **E-signature with certificate**: A one-time code by SMS or email, a drawn countersignature, a timestamped certificate.
- **Leave by country**: Leave types follow each country’s rules, approved from the notification bell.
- **Expense reports**: Draft, submitted, approved, paid, with receipts coded to project and fund.
- **Payroll run**: National and international lines in one run, sequential approvers, costs posted by fund.
- **Salary grid**: Levels, location coefficients and the whole team placed, with the cost of closing gaps.
- **Organisation chart**: Board, top-down and compact layouts, drag and drop, exports.
- **Deployment register**: Who is available, on call or deployed today (in full in Emergency Response & Deployments).
- **Offboarding**: When the last contract ends, access closes after a 30-day grace window for the final invoice.

### The full list

- **Assignments**: Consultant + project + days + rate, deliverable-based or time & materials; a volume discount by number of days; a “waiting for you” strip (generate, send, countersign).
- **E-signature with certificate**: One-time code by SMS or email, drawn countersignature, a certificate with document fingerprints and a trusted timestamp; signed documents are frozen.
- **Contracts**: Per entity and type (long term, framework, local labour contracts, short term, deliverable-based), with ending reminders.
- **Leave**: Types follow each country’s rules, half days, approval from the notification bell, payroll exports per country, read-only links for external accountants.
- **Payments**: Monthly cycle, consultants’ requests (invoice + timesheet + receipts), salaries, Wise/SEPA exports.
- **Expense reports**: Draft → Submitted → Approved → Paid.
- **Team records**: Contracts, documents, dated HR events with proof, a sealed HR folder, per-person export.
- **Organisation chart**: Board, top-down and compact layouts, drag and drop, exports to SVG/PNG/PDF.
- **Salary grid**: Levels, location coefficients, a simulator, and the whole team placed on the grid with the cost of closing every gap.
- **Payroll run**: National and international lines in one run, sequential approvers (the preparer cannot approve), exceptions list, payment by bank, payroll provider, money transfer or cash against signature, costs posted by fund.
- **Deployment register and on-call rota**: Who is available, on call or deployed today (presented in Emergency Response & Deployments).
- **Expert roster**: CVs turned into searchable profiles (see Recruitment).

## What makes the difference

- Consultants sign with a code sent to their phone.
- Access closes when the last contract ends.
- The whole team on one salary grid, with the cost of closing each gap.

## With your AI agent

One question can cross several modules.

Salaries, day rates, bank details and home addresses are stripped before anything reaches an AI.

- **A question**: “Who is free for two weeks in Gao in December, with a security briefing and a valid first-aid certificate?”
- **Reads**: HR & Payroll, [Emergency Response & Deployments](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/emergency-response/), [Projects & Time](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/projects/), [Security & Safety](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/security/), [Learning & Training](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/learning/)
- **Comes back**: A shortlist, and a deployment proposal (To validate)
- **On this module’s pages**: CVs read into a profile, and written in your format

- [More use cases](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/ai-agent/)

## Connected to

It shares its records with these modules.

- [Projects & Time](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/projects/): Hours and costs, per project.
- [Finance & Fund Accounting](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/finance/): Does each project cover its costs?
- [Staff & Partner Portals](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/portals/): The ERP as staff and partners see it.
- [Recruitment & Onboarding](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/recruitment/): Hiring in bursts, across countries.
- [Workspace: Home, Drive, Calendar & Office](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/workspace/): Where the team works, wherever it sits.
- [Emergency Response & Deployments](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/emergency-response/): Know who can deploy tonight.
- [Security & Safety](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/security/): Report incidents from the field, offline.
- [Learning & Training](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/learning/): Whose certificate runs out next?

## In numbers

Contract-ending reminders at 30, 15 and 7 days; a 30-day grace window for the final invoice.

## Before you book a demo.

### We pay some national staff in cash. Is that covered?

Yes. A payroll run pays by bank, payroll provider, money transfer or cash against signature, with national and international lines in the same run. The person who prepares it cannot approve it, and costs are posted by fund.

### What can our external accountant see?

A read-only leave overview per entity, opened from a time-limited link. Leave also produces payroll exports per country, ready to hand over.

### Can we start with HR & Payroll alone?

Yes. Each organisation starts with the base, then picks its modules. You can start with one and add others later.

### Can we switch a module off later?

You can, and its data is kept. A module switched off disappears from menus and search, and switching it back on restores it.

### Can you import from our spreadsheets and current tools?

Yes: people, projects, budgets, policies, files (including a one-time import or a live two-way sync with Google Drive), and the content of your existing workbooks. Connectors to your other systems are built as part of the project.

## Next module

- [Recruitment & Onboarding](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/recruitment/): Hiring in bursts, across countries.

### Run the organisation

- [Projects & Time](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/projects/): Hours and costs, per project.
- [Finance & Fund Accounting](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/finance/): Does each project cover its costs?
- [Recruitment & Onboarding](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/recruitment/): Hiring in bursts, across countries.
- [Volunteers](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/volunteers/): Fill volunteer shifts from a phone.
- [Learning & Training](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/learning/): Whose certificate runs out next?
- [Membership & Governance](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/membership/): For associations, federations and their boards.

- [Add to your Relief One](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/build/)
- [The base](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/platform/): The part every organisation gets.
- [Relief One](https://reliefapplications.org/relief-one/)

## Book a demo of Relief One.

Tell us how your organisation works and which modules you are looking at. We show you Relief One on the parts that matter to you.