You hired a VA.
You said “I need help about 20 hours a week.”
That number came from nowhere. Maybe you saw it in a job post. Maybe it sounded reasonable.
Three months later, your VA is either bored with not enough work or drowning in tasks that need 40 hours crammed into 20.
Both situations suck. One wastes money. The other burns people out.
Here’s how to actually figure out the right number of hours before you hire.
Three Common Weekly Hour Ranges for Hiring Filipino VAs
When you look at what founders actually do (not what they post in polished job descriptions), three patterns show up.
5 to 10 Hours for Testing the Waters
You’re a solo founder. Side project. Early stage.
You need inbox triage, calendar management, basic formatting, simple reporting.
Not urgent. Not daily. Just stuff that needs doing but you don’t want to do it.
5 to 10 hours per week handles that.
You’re not building a partnership here. You’re offloading specific tasks with clear completion criteria.
Founders start here to see ROI before scaling up.
20 to 30 Hours for Your Core Operations Partner
This is the sweet spot for small growing businesses.
You need someone who owns daily routines. Customer emails. Bookkeeping prep. Content publishing. Project coordination.
20 to 30 hours gives them enough time to actually own these processes.
They’re not stretched so thin they can only react. They can improve systems, catch problems early, and take real ownership.
This range shows up constantly in small business communities as the zone where VAs deliver the most value without burning out.
It’s also officially “part-time” in most labor frameworks, which means it’s real work with predictable patterns, not casual coverage.
35 to 40 Hours for Full Operational Coverage
Someone running major parts of your day-to-day operations.
This aligns with standard full-time in the Philippines and internationally.
At this level, you’re inside normal working time expectations before overtime kicks in.
When people in remote work forums talk about pushing past 40 hours, it’s almost always framed as temporary. A crunch period with extra pay or time off afterward.
Not the default schedule.
Going past 40 hours consistently is where you see burnout, errors, and people quietly checking out.
How to Estimate Based on Actual Tasks
Legal frameworks tell you the boundaries. They don’t tell you if answering customer emails should take 2 hours or 8 hours per week.
Here’s how to figure that out.
List Every Recurring Task
Write down everything you expect this person to do weekly.
Be specific. “Handle customer service” is too vague.
“Answer 15 customer emails per week, update 3 help docs, log issues in Notion” is specific.
For each task, estimate low, mid, and high time per unit.
One customer email might take 10 to 15 minutes including research and follow-up.
15 emails times 12 minutes average equals 3 hours just for email.
Do this for every task on the list. Add them up.
That’s your baseline estimate.
Add 20 to 30 Percent for New Roles
New VAs need time to learn your systems.
They’ll ask questions. Need clarification. Make mistakes and fix them.
If your task-based estimate says 25 hours, budget 30 to 33 hours during the first month.
After they’re up to speed, you can adjust down if the work actually takes less time.
Track Time for the First Few Weeks
Have your VA log time by task for the first two weeks minimum.
Then look at the data.
Are certain tasks taking way longer than you thought? Cut them or simplify the process.
Are other tasks faster than expected? Maybe you can add more to that area.
Founders who actually do this report finding 5 to 10 hours per week of wasted effort.
Tasks that don’t matter. Inefficient workflows. Stuff that can be batched or eliminated.
Adjust your hour estimate based on what you learn.
The Patterns That Tell You Your Estimate is Wrong
Some red flags show up over and over when hours are off.
You Expect Coverage Across Impossible Time Zones
I see this one a lot.
“I need someone available 6am US time and also 10pm Australian time.”
That’s not a schedule. That’s two different jobs.
Even if you only “need” them for scattered tasks during those hours, you’re asking for always-on availability that spans way more than a normal work day.
This violates basic rest requirements in most labor frameworks.
You either need two people covering different shifts, or you need to pick one time zone and work within it.
The Work Clearly Needs More Hours Than You’re Paying For
Your VA consistently works past their contracted hours to hit deadlines.
Or they’re rushing through tasks and quality drops.
Or they tell you “I can’t get to that this week” when the task list looks reasonable.
These are all signs your hour estimate is wrong.
Don’t fix this by adding aggressive monitoring to squeeze more output from the same hours.
Fix it by either cutting scope or increasing paid time.
Philippine guidance on telecommuting specifically says monitoring has to be “proportionate, transparent and purpose-bound.”
Heavy surveillance layered on top of unrealistic hours just drives people away.
They’re Constantly “Busy” But Nothing Gets Done
Opposite problem.
Your VA logs full hours but output is weak.
This often means you over-estimated hours and they’re stretching tasks to fill time.
Or the work doesn’t actually need someone full-time and they know it, so they disengage.
Both waste money and create a weird dynamic where everyone knows the hours don’t match reality but nobody says it.