Most remote employee onboarding checklist IT guides stop at "send the laptop." That's roughly where the problems start. A new hire in Nairobi, Manila, or São Paulo doesn't need a checklist item that says "order equipment." They need someone who knows which courier actually delivers in their city, what customs documents to file, and how to image a device before it ships. According to a 2023 Gallup study, only 12% of employees strongly agree their company does a great job onboarding. The equipment process is a big reason why.
At Rayda, we handle the device side of onboarding for remote teams across 170+ countries, typically shipping within 4–8 days using local sourcing. Talk to us if you need help right now, or keep reading for the full checklist your IT and people ops teams can actually use.
This article walks through every stage of the IT equipment onboarding process, from the moment a hire is confirmed to their first day, first week, and eventual offboarding.
What Should a Remote Employee Onboarding Checklist IT Teams Use Actually Cover?
A proper remote employee onboarding checklist for IT covers six areas: device procurement, configuration, shipping and logistics, software provisioning, access management, and offboarding prep. Most HR checklists skip the first three entirely, which is exactly why day-one device failures are so common. A good IT checklist starts the moment an offer is accepted.
The typical HR onboarding checklist does a decent job of covering employment paperwork, benefits enrollment, and culture orientation. It rarely says anything useful about what happens to the physical device a new hire will spend eight hours a day staring at.
Here is what gets skipped most often:
- Who orders the device, and from where
- What specs are required for the role
- Whether the device ships from a warehouse or gets sourced locally
- How MDM (mobile device management) gets installed before the device leaves
- What happens if the device gets stuck in customs
- What the employee does if the device breaks in month two
None of this is glamorous. All of it matters.
Pre-Hire Stage: What to Do Before the Start Date
The pre-hire stage of a remote IT onboarding checklist should begin as soon as an offer is signed, ideally 10–14 business days before the start date. This window covers device selection, procurement, configuration, MDM enrollment, and shipping. Starting earlier is better. Starting later means a new hire staring at their personal laptop on day one.
At Rayda, we handle IT equipment onboarding for remote teams in 170+ countries, sourcing locally where possible so devices arrive in 4–8 days instead of the 30–60 days typical of cross-border shipping. Talk to us if that timeline sounds relevant, or keep reading.
Here is what the pre-hire stage looks like in practice:
Step 1: Collect new hire information (Day 0, immediately after offer signed) Get the employee's full shipping address, phone number, role, department, and any accessibility requirements. Do this before anything else. You cannot ship a device without an address, and you would be surprised how often IT teams wait a week to ask for this.
Step 2: Select and approve device specs (Days 1–2) Match the device to the role. An engineer needs more RAM and processing power than an account manager. Use a standard equipment matrix if your company has one. Approve the budget line before ordering.
Step 3: Procure the device (Days 2–5) Order from your preferred vendor, a global IT provider like Rayda, or a local supplier in the hire's country. Local sourcing eliminates customs delays and import duties. For hires in markets like Nigeria, Indonesia, or Colombia, this step alone can cut two to three weeks off the timeline.
Step 4: Image and configure the device (Days 5–8) Install the operating system, company software, MDM profile, and any required security certificates before the device ships. This is called zero-touch deployment when done correctly. The employee should be able to open the box, power on, and be in their company environment within minutes, not hours.
Step 5: Enroll in MDM (same window as step 4) Apple Business Manager, Microsoft Intune, Jamf, or whichever MDM your company uses. The device should be enrolled and policy-compliant before it ships. Not after.
Step 6: Ship with tracking (Days 8–12) Send the device with a tracking number directly to the new hire. Notify the employee and their manager. Include a simple setup card in the box if you have one.
The IT Onboarding Equipment Checklist Table
The table below maps every key task to the right owner, the recommended timeline, and any tools or notes your team needs. Download a copy of this as a template from Rayda's blog to fill in for your own team.
| Task | Owner | Timeline (before/after start date) | Tools / Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Collect new hire shipping address and role details | HR / People Ops | Day 0, offer signed | HRIS, onboarding form |
| Select device specs and get budget approval | IT Manager | Days 1–2 | Equipment matrix, finance approval |
| Procure device from vendor or local supplier | IT Ops | Days 2–5 | Rayda, CDW, local supplier |
| Image device with OS, software, and MDM | IT Ops | Days 5–8 | Jamf, Intune, Apple Business Manager |
| Enroll device in MDM, apply security policies | IT Security | Same window as imaging | Jamf, Intune, Workspace ONE |
| Ship device with tracking to new hire address | IT Ops / Ops | Days 8–12 | Courier with real tracking, not postal |
| Send device arrival notification to employee | HR / IT | Day of shipment | Email template |
| Create user accounts (email, SSO, comms) | IT | 3–5 days before start | Google Workspace, Okta, Azure AD |
| Provision software licenses | IT | 3–5 days before start | License management tool |
| Send welcome IT guide to new hire | IT / HR | 1–2 days before start | PDF or Notion page |
| Day 1: Confirm device arrived and is working | IT (async check-in) | Start date | Slack, email |
| Week 1: Check software access is complete | IT | Day 3–5 | IT helpdesk ticket |
| Asset tag device and record in inventory | IT Ops | Day of shipment | Asset tracking software |
| Offboarding: Schedule device retrieval | IT Ops | 2 weeks before exit date | Rayda, retrieval vendor |
| Offboarding: Remote wipe on final day | IT Security | Last day of employment | MDM console |
| Offboarding: Wipe log documented for compliance | IT Security | Post-wipe | MDM audit log |
Day One: What the IT Onboarding Remote Workers Experience Should Look Like
On day one of remote IT onboarding, the new hire should open a working device, log in with pre-configured credentials, and access every system they need without calling IT. If any of those three things fail, something in the pre-hire stage broke down. Day one is not the time to install software or reset passwords. It is the time to work.
This sounds obvious. In practice, a 2022 survey by Okta found that 68% of employees use 10 or more apps daily. Getting all of those provisioned and tested before someone's first morning is a real coordination challenge.
Here is what a clean day-one experience requires:
- Device powered on and MDM-configured out of the box
- Company email active and accessible
- SSO credentials sent securely (not via plain-text email)
- Slack, Teams, or whatever comms tool your company uses, installed and logged in
- A welcome message from IT with a single point of contact for help
- A short IT orientation session, even 15 minutes async via Loom, explaining how to get help
If the device has not arrived by day one, you need a contingency plan. That means a loaner policy, a temporary cloud desktop, or a clear communication to the new hire's manager. "The laptop is in customs" is not a plan. It is an embarrassment.
Week One: Completing the New Hire Device Setup Checklist
The week-one portion of a new hire device setup checklist covers access verification, peripheral setup, security training, and IT helpdesk orientation. Day one gets the basics running. Week one makes sure nothing falls through. Most IT issues surface in the first five days, not on day one.
Walk through these with the new hire or verify them asynchronously via a short form:
- All required software installed and licensed
- VPN configured and tested
- Company password manager set up
- MFA enrolled on all required systems
- Peripheral equipment received (monitor, keyboard, mouse, headset if applicable)
- IT helpdesk contact and SLA explained
- Acceptable use policy signed
About 40% of IT helpdesk tickets in the first month of employment are access-related, according to data from ServiceNow. Most of those are preventable with a solid week-one checklist.
This is also the moment to record the asset in your inventory system if it was not done at shipment. Log the device serial number, assigned user, location, purchase date, and warranty expiry. That data becomes important when you need to retrieve the device or plan a refresh cycle.
How Do You Onboard Remote Employees in Different Countries?
Onboarding remote employees in different countries requires local device sourcing, country-specific compliance checks, and a logistics partner with real coverage in each market. Cross-border shipping alone can add three to six weeks to deployment timelines in markets like West Africa, Southeast Asia, and Latin America. Local sourcing eliminates that delay almost entirely.
Here is what changes by country:
Customs and import duties. Shipping a laptop from the US to Brazil, for example, triggers import taxes that can exceed 60% of the device value. Local sourcing sidesteps this entirely because the device never crosses an international border.
Keyboard layouts and power adapters. A UK hire needs a UK keyboard and a three-pin plug. This is easy to forget when you are ordering from a US-centric vendor.
Data privacy laws. GDPR in Europe, PDPA in Thailand, LGPD in Brazil, NDPR in Nigeria. Each has different rules about how employee data is handled on company devices. Your MDM policies and wipe procedures need to account for this.
Language and support. If your IT helpdesk only operates in English during US hours, a hire in Jakarta will have a poor support experience. Document-based IT guides in the local language help close that gap.
Rayda sources devices locally in APAC, LATAM, and Africa, which is why deployment in those markets takes 4–8 days rather than the 30–60 days you get with cross-border shipping. Coverage spans 170+ countries. See how it works at rayda.co.
Offboarding: The Part Most IT Checklists Forget
The offboarding section of a remote employee onboarding checklist covers device retrieval, data wiping, and asset redeployment or disposal. Most companies focus on day one and ignore the end of employment entirely. That creates security risks, lost assets, and compliance gaps that can be expensive to fix.
According to a 2022 study by Absolute Software, 1 in 10 enterprise devices goes missing or unaccounted for during employee transitions. In a remote workforce, that number is likely higher.
Here is the offboarding device process:
Two weeks before last day: Notify IT of the exit date. Schedule a device retrieval. Do not wait until the final day. Retrieval logistics, especially international ones, take time.
One week before: Remind the employee that the device needs to be returned. Provide a box, a label, or a pickup window, depending on your provider. Rayda does local device pickups, which means no prepaid labels that sit in a drawer and never get used.
Last day: Remotely wipe the device via MDM. Revoke all access simultaneously: email, SSO, VPN, SaaS tools. Generate a wipe log for compliance documentation.
Post-exit: Inspect the returned device. Determine whether it gets redeployed to a new hire, goes into storage, or gets sent for certified disposal. Document the outcome in your asset register.
Skipping any of these steps leaves company data on devices you no longer control. That is a serious security and compliance problem, not just a logistical inconvenience.
FAQ
What should be on a remote employee onboarding checklist IT teams use?
A remote employee onboarding checklist for IT should cover device procurement, configuration and MDM enrollment, shipping and logistics, software and license provisioning, access management, and offboarding prep. It should assign an owner to every task and include timelines. Most checklists stop at account creation. The physical device process is equally important and frequently mishandled.
Who is responsible for IT equipment onboarding?
IT ops owns device procurement, configuration, and shipping. IT security owns MDM enrollment and access provisioning. HR or people ops collects new hire information and coordinates timing. In practice, the handoff between HR and IT is the most common point of failure. Someone needs to own the overall timeline and make sure both teams are moving in parallel, not sequentially.
How do you onboard remote employees in different countries?
Onboarding remote employees internationally requires local device sourcing, country-specific compliance knowledge, and a logistics provider with real coverage in each market. Cross-border shipping to markets like Nigeria, Brazil, or Indonesia adds weeks of delay and potential import duties. Working with a provider that sources locally in those markets cuts deployment time from 30–60 days to 4–8 days. Country-specific keyboard layouts, power adapters, and data privacy laws also need to be accounted for.
What is the average time to ship a laptop to a remote employee?
With cross-border international shipping, it typically takes 30–60 days to get a device to a new hire in markets like West Africa, Southeast Asia, or Latin America. With local sourcing through a provider like Rayda, that drops to 4–8 days. For US or Western Europe hires using major vendors, standard delivery is usually 3–7 business days, assuming configuration is done in advance.
What MDM tools should be used for remote employee device setup?
The most widely used MDM tools are Jamf (primarily for Apple devices), Microsoft Intune (Windows and cross-platform), and Workspace ONE by VMware. The right choice depends on your device fleet. What matters more than the specific tool is that MDM enrollment happens before the device ships, not after the employee receives it. Post-delivery enrollment is slower, less reliable, and puts more burden on the new hire.
What happens to the IT equipment when a remote employee leaves?
When a remote employee leaves, IT should schedule a device retrieval, perform a remote wipe via MDM on the last day, revoke all access simultaneously, and document the wipe for compliance. The device should then be inspected and either redeployed, stored, or disposed of through a certified IT asset disposition (ITAD) process. Skipping retrieval is one of the most common causes of data security gaps in remote workforces.
If your team is managing device onboarding across multiple countries, Rayda handles procurement, deployment, tracking, and retrieval in 170+ countries, typically within 4–8 days. You can use our process to replace most of what is in this checklist. Book a demo to see how it fits your setup.
