How UULA Runs Compliant, Multi-Country Payroll in a Single Day

Website

UULA.com

Employees

100+

Industry

Education technology

Locations

Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain

UULA is a rapidly growing EdTech company operating across Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Bahrain. As they scaled, their HR team faced an increasingly complex challenge: running accurate, compliant payroll across multiple jurisdictions, without slowing down operations.

Their existing setup at the time – a no-code platform stitched together with Excel – was no longer scalable. Calculations had to be manually checked. Employee documents were scattered across systems. Contractor management added yet another layer of friction.

By switching to Zelt, they now run fully compliant payroll for all four countries in a single day per month – with better reporting, reduced employee admin, and a clearer view of payroll and employee data.

The Impact

How Zelt has helped UULA

Automated payroll

Run payroll across 4 countries in 1 day per month

Built-in compliance

Compliance with PIFSS (Kuwait), GOSI (Saudi Arabia) and EOSG (UAE)

Centralised employee data

Better visibility with a secure, centralised document system

The Challenge

Complex, risk-prone payroll across countries

As UULA grew its team across the GCC, payroll processing quickly became a challenge.

The HR team was managing payroll for employees and contractors across four GCC countries, each with its own payroll calculations and social insurance schemes – PIFSS (Kuwait), GOSI (Saudi Arabia), EOSG (UAE), and others.

Before Zelt, UULA relied on a custom-built system using a no-code platform and Excel, which was inefficient and difficult to maintain, and exposing the company to compliance risks.

The HR team had to:

Spend hours manually managing salaries in multiple currencies
Stay compliant with PIFSS, GOSI, EOSG, and other local schemes
Handle payroll outside their HRIS, increasing the risk of error
Share documents and data over spreadsheets and email, raising privacy concerns

Daria Nikushina

HR Director

"The most uncomfortable part was the manual work to double check the correctness of every calculation"

Making a decision

Why Zelt: Built for multi-country complexity

UULA chose Zelt for its ability to unify payroll, compliance, and documentation – across multiple countries and currencies – in a single platform.

Key decision drivers:

Native payroll support for multiple GCC social insurance schemes and currencies
Integrated payroll, contractor management, documentation, and open banking payments
Automated workflows for onboarding and offboarding

Zelt offered more than an HR & Payroll software. It gave UULA a source of truth for their employee data.

The Solution

Streamlining payroll & regional compliance

With Zelt, UULA’s HR team was able to run a fully compliant payroll for four countries in a single day each month.

Instead of validating calculations manually, rules are built in. Payroll is compliant with regional social insurance schemes such as PIFSS, GOSI, EOSG. Invoices and payslips are auto-generated. Payments are initiated through open banking. And every document – from contracts to payroll reports – is stored centrally for both HR and employees.

What this meant for UULA:

Eliminated friction for contractors, who no longer need to generate their own invoices
Automated pension and social insurance deductions in compliance with PIFSS, GOSI, EOSG and others
Gained better visibility through built-in payroll reports and historical data access
Gave back time to the HR team to dedicate to strategic initiatives instead of manual payroll adjustments

Daria Nikushina

HR Director

“From the employees’ perspective - they do not have to create invoices now, so the payroll process for them became much easier”

The Solution

Source of truth for all employee documents across payroll, pension and tax

Before Zelt, UULA’s employee documents were scattered across multiple systems, spreadsheets, and email threads. Employee and contractor records were fragmented, which increased the risk of missing or inconsistent data.

Zelt provided a single platform to centralise all employee and payroll-related documents – from contracts to bank details to payslips – in one secure, centralised system. This gives both HR and employees a consistent, self-serve experience while improving internal compliance processes.

They can now:

Automatically generate and store tax, payroll and pension documents in-app
Eliminate the need to send sensitive data over email
Produce audit-ready reports quickly and reliably
Provide a better experience for employees and contractors, helping UULA maintain its reputation as a top EdTech employer.

The Solution

Automated onboarding and offboarding workflows at scale

UULA’s reliance on contractors required frequent and manual onboarding and offboarding processes that drained HR resources.

With Zelt, these workflows are now automated. New joiners can complete all necessary steps (document upload, tool access, compliance sign-off…) without heavy HR involvement. Offboarding is similarly streamlined, reducing the risk of human error and helping UULA maintain its reputation as a top EdTech employer within the GCC region.

Daria Nikushina

HR Director

"Zelt has helped save the HR team a huge amount of time by eliminating lots of previously manual payroll tasks"

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