Compliance

Compliance is infrastructure, not an add-on

Zhenlinggong operates to the reseller standard: four flows aligned, every step on record and provable. Regulation raises the industry's floor — we build compliance into the foundation so the cost advantage of elastic staffing stands on solid ground.

Regulatory backdrop

Four regulatory layers landed within twelve months

Instrument	Timing	Core impact
State Council Order No. 810, Provisions on Tax-Related Information Reporting by Internet Platform Enterprises	June 2025	First administrative regulation establishing platform tax-information reporting; flexible-staffing platforms are explicitly in scope
STA Announcements No. 15 and No. 16 of 2025	June 2025	Details reporting entities, content, channels and deadlines; recognises flexible-staffing platforms as one of four platform types
VAT Law and supporting policy	January 2026	HR outsourcing no longer benefits from differential taxation; simplified levy rate adjusted; cross-region billing standardised
Flexible-staffing platform classification rules	August 2026	Platforms classified as reseller, agency or matchmaking, with differentiated documentation requirements
Golden Tax Phase IV deepening	Ongoing	Real-time cross-matching of tax, banking, social-insurance and market-supervision data; "four flows aligned" becomes the floor

Summarised from From Compliance to Competitiveness: the Zhenlinggong flexible-staffing compliance whitepaper (August 2026). Full text in the resources section.

Platform classification

Three platform types decide your input-cost

Classification is not judged on licences but on the substance of operations — local tax authorities examine the operating model.

Zhenlinggong operating standard

Reseller · "we deliver"

Platform recruits, prices, controls quality and bears disputes itself
Qualifying projects obtain full-basis VAT documentation
The client's input-cost can be fully credited

Agency · "we execute for you"

Executes recruitment and payment on client instruction
Only the service fee is documented (differential basis)
Worker pay carries no input-cost documentation

Matchmaking · "we introduce"

Information matching only
Only the matching fee is documented (differential basis)
Staffing management responsibility stays with the client

The five conditions

All five must be met — no exceptions

Self-directed recruitment

Proprietary worker pool and regional communities recruit continuously, so workers are available before a client raises demand.

Self-set pay standards

Pricing set independently by role type, regional market and skill requirement; the client pays a service price, not worker-by-worker payroll detail.

Self-managed service quality

System dispatch, online attendance, service acceptance and rating feedback — quality control across the whole chain.

Independent dispute liability

An in-house legal team handles disputes directly, with workplace insurance underneath; risk is not pushed back to the client.

Own data custody

The group-level platform holds the full business dataset and can independently provide tax authorities with an evidence chain of substance.

Why this matters

Even where a platform is classified as agency overall, a single project meeting the reseller characteristics can still be documented on the full basis — provided the five conditions are met in substance and the records are complete.

Cost model

The measurable gap between the two documentation bases

Cost item (CNY 1m monthly volume example)	Full documentation (reseller)	Differential documentation (agency)
Creditable input-cost	CNY 56.6k	CNY 4.5k
Surcharge effect (approx. 12% of input-cost)	CNY 6.8k	CNY 0.5k
Combined monthly saving	CNY 63.4k	CNY 5.0k
Combined annual saving	CNY 760.8k	CNY 60.0k

Illustrative model: assumes a 15% all-in service rate with pay at roughly 85% of spend; results vary with client structure. Full model and assumptions in chapter 4 of the whitepaper.

Four flowsContract · funds · documentation · service

Six truthsBusiness, people, contract, funds, documentation, voucher

8 tiersWorkplace insurance, bound on the first day

QuarterlyTax-information reporting on record