San Francisco-headquartered payroll + HR for US SMBs. US-only operating but referenced as the SMB HR benchmark.
DISCLOSURE Some links on this site are affiliate links. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Compliance scores and editorial rankings are never influenced by affiliate relationships.
Listed for transparency. Every product on this page is benchmarked against this baseline.
San Francisco-headquartered payroll + HR for US SMBs. US-only operating but referenced as the SMB HR benchmark.
All 3 alternatives ranked by compliance score, benchmarked against Gusto.
| Product | Score | Owner | CLOUD Act | Cert. | Pricing | Action |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Gusto
benchmark · US
|
1.0/5 | OWNERSHIP
Where ultimate control over the operating company sits.
|
CLOUD ACT EXPOSURE
How exposed customer data is to US authorities under the CLOUD Act.
|
SOC 2 no EU framework |
Freemium | your current |
|
Sage HR
United Kingdom
|
VERIFIED SIGNALS
Jurisdiction
Transparency
|
OWNERSHIP
Where ultimate control over the operating company sits.
|
CLOUD ACT EXPOSURE
How exposed customer data is to US authorities under the CLOUD Act.
|
ISO/IEC 27001
|
Paid
€7 / mo
|
View profile → |
|
Personio
Germany
|
VERIFIED SIGNALS
Jurisdiction
Transparency
|
OWNERSHIP
Where ultimate control over the operating company sits.
|
CLOUD ACT EXPOSURE
How exposed customer data is to US authorities under the CLOUD Act.
|
ISO/IEC 27001
SOC 2
|
Paid | View profile → |
|
Factorial
Spain
|
VERIFIED SIGNALS
Jurisdiction
Transparency
|
OWNERSHIP
Where ultimate control over the operating company sits.
|
CLOUD ACT EXPOSURE
How exposed customer data is to US authorities under the CLOUD Act.
|
ISO/IEC 27001
SOC 2
|
Paid
€7 / mo
|
View profile → |
Ranked by feature parity + compliance score. Migration friction is weighted higher than feature breadth.
Sage Group plc's HR cloud product (formerly CakeHR from Riga, acquired 2019); UK-public parent, modular SMB HR.
Munich-based HR flagship for European SMBs (founded 2015); ISO 27001 + SOC 2 + TISAX; ~$770M US-VC-funded.
Spanish HR + payroll + finance SaaS (Barcelona, est. 2016); 16K+ customers, ISO 27001 + SOC 2 + AWS EU, US-VC-funded.
For every product we read the public DPA, sub-processors document, hosting region declaration, and corporate ownership records. Each is timestamped. Compliance score is editorial, re-verified quarterly. We never accept self-attestation.
Reviewed by the EU Vetted editorial team · Editorial guidelines