Immigration and residency
UAE Immigration and Residency Lawyers
If your visa has been cancelled, if you are overstaying, or if you have been told there is a ban against your name, the first question is the same one every time: what is your status on the record today, and what can still be done about it.
Licensed advocate practice, licence 593372.
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Dubai courts, and coordination for Abu Dhabi.
Proceedings in Arabic, explained to you in plain terms.
The short answer
This page is for people whose right to stay in the UAE is in doubt. It covers residency visas and sponsorship, cancellation and change of status, overstay, entry bans, absconding reports and deportation orders. It also covers the part most people find out about late, which is how a criminal case or a labour dispute can change your residency position while you are dealing with something else.
On this page
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What we advise on, and what we cannot
This section is here so you do not waste a phone call.
UAE status is what we handle
Our work is UAE immigration and residency law. That means your status in this country: the visa you hold or held, who sponsors it, what happens when it is cancelled, whether a ban or a report has been entered against your name, and how a decision affecting you can be challenged.
We cannot advise on another country’s immigration law
Many people searching from Dubai want help with a British, American, Canadian or Australian visa. We cannot help with those. A UAE advocate is licensed to practise UAE law and to appear before the UAE courts under Federal Decree-Law No. 34 of 2022. We are not qualified in the immigration law of any other country and we will not pretend otherwise. For an application to another country, speak to someone regulated to advise there.
Where the two sides touch
Sometimes a UAE matter is the obstacle to something you are doing elsewhere. An open file here, or a record that shows on a UAE police clearance certificate, can affect an application you are making abroad. We can advise on the UAE side of that: what the file actually says, and whether it can be closed, settled or challenged here. What we cannot do is tell you how another country will treat it.
Residency in the UAE depends on a sponsor
Most UAE residence visas exist through a sponsor. For most expatriate residents that is an employer. For a spouse and children it is usually a family member. In other cases it is a property owner, a company the person owns, or a long-term residence category. The sponsor is the reason your status exists, so anything that changes that relationship changes your status with it.
Why that matters when something goes wrong
If you resign, are dismissed, separate from a spouse or fall into a dispute with an employer, the residency consequences follow quickly, and they are usually the part nobody explains at the time. People reach us weeks later, once fines have built up or a report has been filed, when the position was far easier to deal with at the start.
The first thing to establish
Find out what your status actually is on the record, rather than what you have been told. A visa you believe is valid may have been cancelled. A cancellation you believe was processed may never have been.
Residency visas and sponsorship
Employment visas
Your employer applies for the visa and holds the sponsorship. The problems we are asked about are consistent: a visa never issued after months of work, a visa issued in the name of a company other than the one you actually work for, a refusal to cancel after you resign, and the retention of a passport during a dispute.
A move to a new employer is the other common failure point. A transfer that is refused, delayed or blocked leaves people out of status through no decision of their own.
Family sponsorship
A resident may sponsor a spouse and children, and in defined circumstances parents and domestic staff. Eligibility turns on the sponsor’s income, the accommodation held, and the category of the sponsor’s own visa. We do not publish the income figure here because it is fixed by regulation and it changes.
Property, investment and long-term residence
Long-term residence, commonly called the Golden Visa, is granted in defined categories that include investors, property owners, entrepreneurs, specialists and people of exceptional talent. We advise on which category a person may fall into, on what the file has to show, and on what to do when an application is refused. We do not quote thresholds or durations, because they are set by the authorities and revised.
Cancellation, change of status and what follows
When a visa is cancelled
A residence visa is normally cancelled when the underlying relationship ends: a resignation, a dismissal, the end of a business, a divorce, a death in the family. Cancellation is a formal step that has to be processed. It does not happen simply because you stopped working somewhere.
Changing status without leaving the country
In some situations a person can move from one visa to another from inside the UAE. In others the change requires an exit and re-entry. Which applies depends on the category you are moving from and to.
The period after cancellation
Once a residence visa is cancelled there is a defined period in which a person may remain lawfully while arranging a new visa or leaving. Past that point the stay becomes an overstay. That period is set by regulation and has changed more than once, so confirm it for your own category before relying on it.
Overstay and fines
How people end up overstaying
Rarely by choice. The usual causes are a cancellation the person did not know about, a job that ended without the paperwork being completed, a transfer that fell through, an illness, or being outside the country when a visa expired.
What an overstay affects
An overstay accumulates a daily fine and it surfaces at the point of exit, or at any transaction that requires status to be clean. It can also complicate a later application, including one made from outside the UAE.
Clearing it
Establish the exact period, deal with the fine, then regularise or exit. Where the overstay was caused by an employer’s failure, that failure is relevant and should be documented rather than absorbed.
Entry bans and how they arise
Where a ban comes from
A ban against a person’s name can arise from a criminal file, from an immigration decision, from a labour matter, or as a consequence of a deportation order. These are not the same thing, and the route to dealing with each differs.
A travel ban is not the same as an entry ban
A travel ban stops a person leaving. An entry ban stops a person coming back. A person can be subject to one without the other, and the terms are often used interchangeably by people describing what happened to them at the airport. Our page on travel bans and absconding cases deals with bans on leaving in detail.
Checking and challenging
There are official channels for checking whether a ban is recorded, and the channel depends on which authority entered it. Where a ban exists, the question is what caused it, because a ban usually comes off when the reason for it is resolved rather than on request.
Absconding reports and your status
An absconding report filed by an employer is an administrative step with real consequences for residency. It affects status, the ability to transfer to a new employer and, in some cases, movement. A report may be filed where the employer’s account of events is simply wrong, for example where the worker stopped attending because they were not being paid.
A report can be contested, and the sooner the better, because a file is easier to correct before other steps are taken on the basis of it. Where the underlying dispute is about pay, notice or dismissal, it usually belongs on the labour track as well; see our page on employment and labour lawyers in Dubai.
Deportation orders
The two routes
A deportation order may follow a court judgment, or it may be issued administratively by an authority without a criminal conviction. The two are not challenged in the same way, so the first thing to establish is which one you are dealing with.
Challenging an order
Where a challenge exists it is usually time limited, and it depends on the basis of the order, on the person’s circumstances, and on what the file shows. We will tell you honestly whether there is a realistic basis, including when there is not.
After an order
A deportation order may carry consequences for returning later, which is the question families ask first.
When a criminal case or a labour dispute changes your residency
This is the connection most people miss.
A criminal case
An open criminal file can affect your ability to leave, and the outcome of a case can affect your right to remain. If there is a case against you, the residency consequences need to be handled alongside the case rather than after it. See our page on criminal lawyers in Dubai.
A labour dispute
A complaint to MOHRE, a dismissal, or an absconding report all touch status as well as money. Winning the labour point and losing the visa is not a good outcome, so the two are worth running together.
A debt or a civil judgment
An unpaid debt or an enforcement action can produce a restriction on movement, which is dealt with on the travel ban page.
What immigration lawyers in Dubai actually do
Most of what immigration lawyers in Dubai do on a residency file is factual before it is legal.
Lawyer, attorney or advocate
People search for an immigration attorney in Dubai and for an immigration lawyer, and the words get used loosely. In the UAE the title that carries rights of audience is advocate, licensed under Federal Decree-Law No. 34 of 2022. Ask any practice for its licensing details before you instruct it.
Establishing the position
What does the record show, which authority holds it, and what triggered it. A great deal of bad advice comes from acting on an assumption about the file.
Representations and applications
Preparing and filing the application, the objection or the representation, with the supporting documents in the form the authority expects, and in Arabic where that is required.
Challenge before the courts
Where an administrative decision is open to challenge, taking that challenge and presenting the case. Not every decision is reviewable and not every review succeeds, and you will hear that from us before you spend anything.
Acting while you are outside the UAE
Many of the people who contact us cannot enter the country, which is the whole problem. A good deal can be done without your being present.
Immigration lawyers in the UAE beyond Dubai
Immigration and residency rules are largely federal, so the substance is recognisable across the country. What differs is the administering authority in each emirate and where an advocate is registered to appear.
Abu Dhabi
Sharjah and the northern emirates
Free zone visas
A residence visa issued through a free zone authority follows that authority’s process, which is not always identical to the mainland process.
What to bring
Your passport and Emirates ID, including expired ones. Any visa, entry permit or cancellation paper you hold. Your employment contract, and any resignation or termination letter. Any fine, notice, summons or decision you have received, with its reference number. A written timeline: when you entered, when the visa was issued, when employment started and ended, when you last left or tried to leave. If documents are in a language other than Arabic or English, tell us, because translation takes time.
What this costs
We charge on the basis of the work and the stage, not the outcome. How our charges are structured, what is included and what is billed separately is set out on our legal fees page. Ask any immigration law firm in Dubai for the basis of charging in writing before you instruct it.
Questions people ask us
Can you help me apply for a UK or Australian visa from Dubai?
No. We advise on UAE immigration and residency only. A UAE advocate is not qualified to advise on another country’s immigration law, and anyone in Dubai telling you otherwise is worth asking about their regulation.
My employer has filed an absconding report. Can I still change jobs?
In most cases, not while the report stands unresolved. The report is the thing to deal with first, and it can be contested where the employer’s account is wrong. Do not wait, and do not assume it will lapse on its own.
My visa was cancelled while I was abroad. Can I come back?
It depends on whether a cancellation alone is what happened, or whether something else was entered at the same time, such as a ban or a report. That is why you establish what the record holds before you buy a ticket.
Does an unpaid loan or credit card stop me leaving the UAE?
It can, where the lender has taken action that results in a restriction on movement. An unpaid balance by itself is not the same as a restriction having been entered.
What language will this be handled in?
Applications and pleadings are filed in Arabic. We will explain the file to you in a language you are comfortable in.
Speak to immigration lawyers in Dubai
If your status is in doubt, the useful step today is to find out exactly what the record says and which authority is holding it. Everything else follows from that, and it is quick to establish.
Call us on +971 50 747 9570 or email help@lawyerindubai.ae. Our office is at Empire Height Towers, Marasi Drive, Business Bay, Dubai. You can also use the form on our contact page.
Related pages: travel bans and absconding cases, employment and labour lawyers in Dubai, criminal lawyers in Dubai, legal fees.
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