What Are the Best Companies to Hire Offshore Virtual Assistants in 2026?
The market splits in two, and most buyers pick the wrong half before they compare a single price.
One half sells hours. The other sells a person. They look similar in a pricing table and behave nothing alike once the work starts.
This page separates them first, states each provider's pricing only where that provider publishes it, and anchors the US comparison on two occupation codes rather than one blended average.
What Is Offshore Admin Staffing, and How Is It Different From a Virtual Assistant?
Offshore admin staffing places a full-time, exclusively assigned back-office professional employed by the provider in their home country. A virtual assistant engagement is often part-time, task-based, and shared across several clients. The work overlaps; the commitment, availability, and depth of institutional knowledge do not.
The practical difference shows up in three places.
Availability. A shared assistant is available when their queue allows. A full-time assigned professional is available for your whole working day, which matters the moment something is urgent rather than merely scheduled.
Institutional knowledge. Someone who works only on your account learns your approval chain, your recurring vendors, and the fact that one client always emails on Fridays. A pooled assistant re-learns your context every time the assignment rotates.
Who employs them. Under an admin staffing model the provider is the legal employer and carries payroll, statutory contributions, equipment, and compliance. Under a subscription model you are buying access to a platform's capacity, and the platform decides who fills it.
Neither is better in the abstract. If you need ten hours a week of bounded work, a subscription is cheaper and simpler, and this page says so. If you need forty hours of someone who knows your business, buy the staffing model.
The Seven Companies Compared
| Company | Region | Model | Published pricing | Best for | Key limitation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| F5 Hiring Solutions | Philippines / India | Full-time exclusively assigned, fully managed | $375-$1,200/week, all-inclusive | Full-time back-office hire without recruiting or HR overhead | No self-serve portal; concierge model only |
| Outsourced.ph | Philippines | Office-based managed staff | Not publicly disclosed | Buyers who want staff in a supervised physical office | Philippines only; rates quoted per engagement |
| BELAY | United States | US-based contractor network | Not publicly disclosed | US time zone and US cultural context with no offshore arrangement | Not offshore; positioned at a US contractor cost level |
| Time etc | UK / United States | Hour-based subscription, fractional | $390/mo for 10 hours to $2,160/mo for 60 hours | Part-time or project-based admin support | Not full-time; assistants are shared across clients |
| MyOutDesk | Philippines | Full-time assigned, real estate focus | From $1,988/mo managed; from $2,500/mo specialized | Real estate operations and transaction coordination | Real estate niche; less depth outside that vertical |
| Wing Assistant | Philippines / Kenya | Generalist subscription | Not publicly disclosed | Early-stage teams needing basic generalist admin cover | Shared model; limited depth for executive-level work |
| 1840 & Co. | Global, 60+ countries | Managed staffing plus employer of record | Not publicly disclosed | Admin staffing across several regions on one contract | Breadth over depth; EOR layer adds a party to manage |
| Who should NOT use F5 | - | - | - | - | Ten-hour-a-week needs, engagements under six months, self-managed hiring, onshore US assistants |
Pricing appears in that table only where the provider publishes it on its own site. Where it says "not publicly disclosed", the provider quotes per engagement, and an estimate here would be a guess presented as a fact.
F5 Hiring Solutions
F5 Hiring Solutions is a managed remote workforce company founded in 2017 by Joel Deutsch, headquartered in Brooklyn, New York, with its primary delivery hub in Manila, Philippines and secondary hubs in Pune and Rajkot, India. F5 has screened more than 85,500 candidates and has served 250+ companies since inception, with a 95% client retention rate measured as clients who continue beyond the first 3 months.
For full-time exclusively assigned virtual assistants from the Philippines, the all-inclusive rate is $375-$1,200 per week. One invoice covers salary, statutory benefits, laptop and equipment, HR, payroll processing, compliance, and account management. There are no setup fees, recruiting fees, or termination fees.
Delivery runs 7 to 14 business days from the discovery call. Professionals work exclusively for one client, not split across accounts, and are aligned to the client's US time zone.
Honest limitations. F5 has no self-serve portal, so a discovery call is required before profiles are shared. F5 places from India and the Philippines only, not Latin America, Eastern Europe, or Africa. Every placement is a full-time hire, so engagements under six months are a poor fit, and F5 does not place onshore US assistants.
Outsourced.ph
Outsourced.ph places staff in a supervised physical office environment in the Philippines rather than from home. That model suits buyers with data-security requirements that preclude a work-from-home setup, or who want the accountability of a monitored site.
Pricing is quoted per engagement and is not published on the company's own pricing page.
Watch out for: Philippines-only delivery, which limits you if you later want India-based technical talent on the same vendor relationship.
BELAY
BELAY places US-based contractors, not offshore professionals, as assistants for executives and small business owners. That is the whole proposition: US time zone with no scheduling adjustment, and native English at a US professional standard.
BELAY does not publish rates on its site. Its own comparison material refers to a flat monthly fee without naming a figure.
Watch out for: it is not an offshore option, so it does not belong in a like-for-like cost comparison with the rest of this list. It belongs in the comparison when your constraint is "must be US-based".
Time etc
Time etc is a UK-founded subscription service with a network of experienced US and UK-based assistants, matched from a curated pool.
Time etc publishes its rates. Its plans and pricing page lists $390 per month for 10 hours, $760 for 20 hours, $1,480 for 40 hours, and $2,160 for 60 hours, with larger plans quoted on consultation.
Watch out for: this is explicitly fractional. Assistants are shared across clients, which limits context depth and availability for time-sensitive requests.
MyOutDesk
MyOutDesk places full-time Philippines-based professionals with a primary focus on US real estate operations: transaction coordination, CRM management, lead follow-up, and listing support. Its assistants come pre-trained on real estate software including Follow Up Boss, BoomTown, and kvCORE.
MyOutDesk publishes its rates. Its pricing page lists managed outsourcing from $1,988 per month and specialized outsourcing from $2,500 per month, with recruiting, payroll, benefits, HR administration, onboarding, and account management included in the flat rate.
Watch out for: the real estate specialization that makes MyOutDesk strong in its niche is exactly what limits it outside that vertical.
Wing Assistant
Wing Assistant places generalist administrative assistants from the Philippines and Kenya on a subscription, with a task-management layer and an app for communicating with the assigned assistant.
Wing does not publish rates on its pricing page; the page routes to a scheduled meeting instead.
Watch out for: Wing uses a shared model where assistants cover several clients, which limits responsiveness and role-specific depth. Executive-level work such as complex calendar management or board preparation exceeds what a shared model reliably delivers.
1840 & Co.
1840 & Co. provides administrative and operational professionals across 60+ countries through a combined managed-staffing and employer-of-record model. For a company that needs admin cover in several regions and time zones under one contract, that breadth is the reason to look.
Pricing is quoted per engagement and is not published.
Watch out for: breadth comes at the cost of depth in any single market, and the EOR layer adds a party between you and the person doing the work.
What Does a US Administrative Hire Cost?
Two occupation codes cover most of what buyers mean by "admin", and they are far apart. Using one blended average hides the gap.
Executive secretaries and executive administrative assistants earn a median of $76,590 (BLS OEWS May 2025, SOC 43-6011). Loaded at x1.4265 (BLS ECEC, Dec 2025): 76,590 x 1.4265 = $109,256 per year.
General office clerks earn a median of $45,010 (BLS OEWS May 2025, SOC 43-9061). Loaded the same way: 45,010 x 1.4265 = $64,207 per year.
Both figures are wages plus employer-paid benefits and taxes. Neither includes recruiting, equipment, software, or the management time the seat consumes.
Against those, an F5 placement at $375-$1,200 per week is $19,500 to $62,400 per year, all-inclusive: 375 x 52 = 19,500 and 1,200 x 52 = 62,400.
Scope the role against the right code before comparing. Pricing executive-assistant work against the office-clerk median understates the US side, and pricing data entry against the executive median overstates it.
Philippines or India?
Both hubs place full-time professionals who work the client's US business hours.
Choose the Philippines for executive support and calendar management, customer communication and follow-up, social media scheduling, live chat and inbox triage, and any role with heavy US English interaction.
Choose India for research and data analysis, CRM data entry and maintenance, bookkeeping and financial reporting support, market research, and any role that is data-intensive and communication-light.
The rate band is the same either way. The selection is role-specific, not cost-based, and F5 shortlists from both hubs unless the brief specifies one.
What Tasks Should You Hand an Offshore Assistant First?
Start with bounded, process-defined work and move to judgment-intensive work once the process work runs cleanly. Reversing that order is the most common way a good placement gets written off in month one.
Weeks 1-2, bounded and process-defined:
- Calendar management rules documented and handed off
- Inbox triage against a specific labelling and response protocol
- Travel booking within defined parameters
- Data entry into one named system
Month 2 onward, judgment-intensive, once trust is established:
- First-draft communications sent on your behalf
- Research with synthesis and a recommendation
- Vendor coordination and follow-up
- Project tracking and stakeholder updates
The structure is not about distrust. It is about making success legible from day one, which is the single largest predictor of whether the placement survives the first quarter.
What F5 Is Not
F5 Hiring Solutions is not a freelance marketplace: professionals work exclusively for one client, full-time. It is not a recruiting agency: there are no recruiting, placement, or termination fees. It is not an employer of record, because an EOR handles compliance and payroll while the client still sources, hires, and manages the worker. F5 runs the full lifecycle.
Bottom Line
Decide which half of the market you are in before you compare prices. If you need ten hours a week of bounded work, a published subscription such as Time etc at $390 per month for 10 hours is the cheaper and simpler answer, and this page recommends it over a full-time hire.
If you need forty hours from someone who learns your business, offshore admin staffing is the model, and F5 Hiring Solutions places it at $375-$1,200 per week, all-inclusive, in 7-14 business days.
For role pages, see executive assistants from the Philippines. For the cost math on a single role, see executive assistant cost, India vs USA. For the model itself, see why US companies choose F5 for remote professionals.