Labour and employment
Employment and Labour Lawyers in Dubai
Your salary has stopped arriving. Or you were told on Sunday that Thursday is your last day and nobody put a reason in writing. Or you run a business, a former employee has filed a complaint against the company, and you have been given a date to attend the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation.
Licensed advocate practice, licence 593372.
First ten minutes free, with the advocate.
Dubai courts, and coordination for Abu Dhabi.
Proceedings in Arabic, explained to you in plain terms.
The short answer
Employment disputes in the UAE are decided on documents and deadlines, not on how strongly either side feels about what happened. A labour lawyer in Dubai is most useful in the first two weeks, checking that the contract, the payroll record and the written exchanges say what you think they say, and getting the claim in before a time limit runs out.
On this page
Ten free minutes
Enough to say whether this needs a lawyer at all.
Start here
Employment law in the UAE is one body of rules read from two directions. The sections below are grouped so you can go straight to the part that applies to you.
If you are an employee
Read the law that applies to your job, then unpaid wages, then termination. If the problem is money that has not been paid, the detailed page is unpaid salary and end of service gratuity. If you have been dismissed and think it was unlawful, read wrongful termination in Dubai.
If you are an employer
Read employment contracts, then termination, then employer obligations. Most of the claims we defend were winnable at the hiring stage and lost at the exit stage. The commercial side of the same work sits on our corporate and commercial lawyers in Dubai page.
If you do not yet know whether you need a lawyer
Many people do not. A MOHRE complaint is free and you can file it yourself. Advice is worth paying for when the sum is significant, when the employer disputes the figures, when a deadline is close, when your visa is affected, or when you are outside the country.
The law that applies to your job
The current federal labour law
Private sector employment across the UAE is governed by Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021, which replaced the earlier federal labour law and came into force in February 2022, together with its executive regulations and the ministerial decisions issued under it. Much of the advice still circulating online, and in a good number of employer handbooks, describes the old law.
Free zone employment
Most free zone employees are covered by the federal labour law, with the free zone authority handling registration, contracts and visas. Which authority holds your file matters, because it decides where a complaint is made and who you deal with first.
The DIFC and ADGM
The DIFC and ADGM are different. Each has its own employment law and its own courts, and end of service is handled differently there. If your contract names either of them, the MOHRE route described below is not your route, and you should say so at the first conversation.
Who sits outside the federal law
Government employees are covered by their own regulations. Domestic workers are covered by separate legislation, dealt with further down this page. Some further categories sit outside or only partly inside the federal framework.
Labour lawyers in the UAE and the emirate your case sits in
The labour law is federal, so the entitlement itself does not change between Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Sharjah. What changes is the ministry office that handles the complaint and the court that hears it afterwards. People searching for labour lawyers in the UAE are generally looking at the same set of rules wherever they happen to work.
Employment contracts
The offer letter and the registered contract
Three documents commonly exist: the offer letter, the contract you signed, and the version registered with MOHRE or with the free zone authority. They do not always match. Where they differ, the registered version usually carries the most weight, and it is the one people have least often read. Ask for a copy early.
Limited and unlimited term contracts
People still describe their contract as limited or unlimited, and some employers still use both words. The 2021 law changed how contract types are treated, so the old distinction should not be assumed to apply to your situation, particularly the parts of it that affected notice and end of service. What matters now is what your current registered contract actually says, not what the category used to mean.
Probation
Probation has a maximum length, and the rules for ending employment during it are not the rules that apply afterwards. They also differ depending on whether the employee is leaving the country or moving to another UAE employer, and the employer may have a recovery right in the second case.
What counts as your wage
Contracts usually split pay into a basic wage and allowances. The split is not cosmetic, because several entitlements are calculated on one figure rather than on the whole package.
Work models other than full time
The law recognises working patterns beyond the standard full time model, including part time, temporary and flexible arrangements, and entitlements under them are generally worked out in proportion to the hours.
Having a contract reviewed before you sign it
This is the cheapest employment work there is. We read the contract against the registered version, flag the clauses that cause trouble later, and tell you which are worth negotiating.
Working hours, leave and pay
Working hours
The law sets a maximum working day and working week, with recognised exceptions for certain roles and sectors, and reduced hours during Ramadan.
Overtime
Work beyond contracted hours attracts additional pay at defined rates, with different treatment for night hours and for rest days, and a limit on how much can be required. Overtime that is never recorded is the hardest kind to claim, so keep your own note of it.
Annual leave and public holidays
Annual leave accrues with service and is paid. There are rules on carrying leave over, on payment for untaken leave when you leave, and on who chooses the dates. Public holidays are announced separately by Cabinet decision each year.
Sick leave
Sick leave becomes available after a qualifying period and is paid on a scale that reduces across the period of absence. Within limits, an employer cannot end your employment simply because you are using it.
Maternity, parental and other leave
The current law provides maternity leave with a defined split between fully paid and partly paid days, a separate parental leave entitlement available to both parents, and further categories of leave beyond those.
Injury at work
Where an employee is injured at work or develops an occupational illness, a separate compensation framework applies, with reporting obligations on the employer that start immediately.
Unpaid wages and the Wages Protection System
When late pay becomes a claim
Payroll fails and banks delay. The problem starts when late becomes a pattern, or when the explanations stop. Ask for the position in writing, once, politely, naming the month and the amount. An employer’s answer is evidence, and so is their silence.
What the Wages Protection System shows
Most private sector wages are paid through the Wages Protection System, so transfers are recorded and a gap in your salary history is visible rather than deniable. Your own bank statement, showing what actually landed, is one of the strongest documents you can bring to a first meeting.
Deductions from pay
Deductions are permitted only in defined circumstances and within a ceiling. A deduction imposed as a penalty, taken for training costs, or set against a debt you dispute is worth challenging rather than accepting quietly.
End of service entitlements
What a final settlement should contain
A proper final settlement shows the last month of salary, payment for untaken annual leave, any notice pay, any outstanding allowances, commission or reimbursements, and end of service gratuity, each calculated separately. A single lump sum with no breakdown behind it is the usual way an underpayment goes unnoticed.
Gratuity, in outline
Gratuity is a statutory lump sum based on length of service and a defined figure from your pay. It is not a bonus and it is not discretionary. We publish no formula, no day multiplier and no service band anywhere on this site, because the law changed and a wrong calculation costs people real money. The detail, and the questions to ask about your own figure, are on the unpaid salary and gratuity page.
Unemployment insurance
There is a mandatory unemployment insurance scheme covering most private sector employees, with subscription obligations on the employee and a claim route if the job is lost.
Termination, dismissal and resignation
Termination on notice
Either side may end the relationship on notice for a lawful reason, with the notice period taken from the contract within the range the law allows. Notice has to be given properly, and employment continues through it, which means pay, leave accrual and the rest of it continue too.
Pay in lieu of notice
An employer may pay the notice period instead of requiring it to be worked. That payment is calculated on a defined figure and is owed on top of the rest of the settlement, not instead of part of it.
Dismissal without notice
The law lists the specific grounds on which an employer may dismiss without notice, and they are narrow. An employer relying on one of them also has to have followed the investigation and record keeping steps. Poor performance is not generally among them.
Arbitrary and unlawful dismissal
A dismissal can be commercially reasonable and still unlawful if the reason or the process was wrong, and a dismissal that follows a complaint the employee made is treated differently again. What can be claimed, and how it is proved, is set out on our page about wrongful termination in Dubai.
Resignation
Resigning is not a forfeiture. You still give notice, and you are still owed your final settlement in full. There are also defined circumstances in which an employee may leave without notice because of something the employer has done.
Redundancy and restructuring
Redundancy is not a separate legal category with its own protections in the way it is in some other systems. It is a termination, and the same requirements on reason, notice, process and settlement apply to it. Employers who treat it as automatic are the ones who end up defending a claim.
Your visa when employment ends
Residency here is tied to sponsorship, so a termination starts a second clock. Cancellation, the period you may remain afterwards, and the steps to transfer to a new employer each have their own timing, and this is where an employment problem turns into an immigration problem. Status, transfers and overstay are covered on our immigration and residency lawyers page.
Non-competition, confidentiality and leaving a job
Non-compete clauses
UAE law recognises non-competition obligations, but only within limits on duration, geography and the type of work, and a clause that overreaches on any one of them can fail as a whole. There are also circumstances in which the restriction does not apply at all.
Confidentiality and client information
What actually protects a client list is the confidentiality drafting, the access controls and a clean exit process, rather than the restrictive covenant on its own. For a departing employee the practical rule is short: do not take documents or data with you, and do not forward work email to a personal account.
Work bans
A restriction on working for another UAE employer can arise from the contract, from the manner of the departure, or administratively. The route to removing one depends on which of those it is, so the first step is establishing what has actually been recorded against you.
Reports of unexplained absence
An employer report that an employee has stopped attending without explanation creates an administrative problem and can create a legal one, affecting status, movement and the ability to work. The answer depends on whether the report is well founded and on how quickly it is challenged. Do not simply stop attending work without taking advice first.
Employers: obligations and disputes
What has to be on file
If a former employee files a claim, the case is decided on what the company can produce: the signed and registered contract, payroll and WPS records, leave records, written warnings, the investigation note, the termination letter and the settlement calculation. Those records have to exist before anything goes wrong, because they cannot be created afterwards.
Emiratisation and other regulatory duties
Private sector employers carry obligations beyond the individual contract, including workforce nationalisation targets, with penalties for falling short and for artificial compliance.
Handling a complaint or an inspection
Respond within the time given, in writing, with the documents attached. Employers lose winnable cases by treating the first ministry contact as an administrative formality and attending without the file.
Settlement and release documents
A settlement is worth having only if it actually closes the matter. A release signed without a breakdown, or signed under pressure, is challenged more often than employers expect.
Acting for employers in the labour court
We defend claims through MOHRE and then the court, appear for the company, prepare the Arabic filings, and negotiate where settlement is the better commercial answer. Employment law firms in Dubai often act for one side only. We act for both, on different files, and we check for conflicts before accepting instructions.
Domestic workers
A separate framework
Domestic workers, including housemaids, drivers, nannies and cooks, are covered by their own legislation rather than by the federal labour law, with its own rules on contracts, hours, rest, leave and end of service. Advice written for office employees does not transfer to them.
The problems that come up
Wages unpaid or paid late, passports retained, hours without proper rest, and disputes on both sides about what the recruitment office agreed. Holding a person’s passport against their will is not permitted, whatever the contract says.
Where a complaint goes
Complaints by and about domestic workers follow a route of their own rather than the standard labour complaint, and the recruitment office usually has a role in the first stage.
The route through MOHRE and the labour court
Filing a complaint
A labour complaint is made to MOHRE by phone, through the ministry’s app or website, or at a service centre. It is free, and you do not need a lawyer to file it. Free zone employees may need to start with their own authority instead.
What MOHRE does with it
The ministry contacts the other side and tries to settle the matter between you. A great many claims end here, because a recorded complaint usually costs an employer more to fight than to settle. In defined circumstances the ministry can issue a decision itself rather than referring the file onwards.
Referral to the labour court
If it cannot be settled, the file goes to the labour court, where the case is decided on documents rather than on oral argument: the contract, the payroll record and the written exchanges. Employee claims of this kind are generally treated favourably on fees.
Judgment and appeal
A judgment at first instance can be appealed. Appeal deadlines are short, and they run from a defined date rather than from the day you hear about the outcome, which catches out people who were not in the country when judgment was given.
Deadlines, the first question to ask
Time limits apply both to bringing the original claim and to moving from a ministry decision to the court. They are short, they are strict, and missing one can end a claim that would otherwise have succeeded. Ask about timing at the first conversation, even if you have not decided whether to proceed.
If you have already left the country
Leaving does not extinguish what you are owed, and a claim can be run without you here, usually through a power of attorney signed where you now live and then legalised for use in the UAE, with a legal translation into Arabic. The steps depend on the country you sign in, and the practical difficulties are set out on the unpaid salary and gratuity page.
Choosing a labour lawyer in Dubai
What to check before you instruct anyone
Only a licensed lawyer may use the title and appear for you. Ask any practice for its licensing position. Licensing in Dubai is handled by the Dubai Legal Affairs Department, and federally by the Ministry of Justice, under Federal Decree-Law No. 34 of 2022 regulating the legal profession. Ask who will actually handle the file, who will appear, and what the basis of charging is, and ask for that in writing.
Language and translation
The courts work in Arabic, and the file, the pleadings and the judgment are in Arabic. Contracts, payslips and messages in another language generally need certified translation before they can go in, and getting that done early avoids adjournments later. We explain the case to you in a language you are comfortable in.
What to bring to the first meeting
The signed contract and the registered version if you have it, payslips and bank statements, the resignation or termination letter with dates, emails and messages about pay, notice or leave, any settlement calculation you have been given, your Emirates ID, and your passport with the residence visa page. A written timeline with dates is more use to us than a long explanation.
What this costs
Employment work is charged on the basis of the stage and the scope of the work, not on the outcome. How our charges are structured, what is included and what is billed separately is set out on our legal fees page.
Questions people ask us
Is there a difference between a labour lawyer and an employment lawyer?
No. Labour law, labor law and employment law are three names for the same body of rules. Whether you search for an employment lawyer in Dubai, for employment lawyers in Dubai or for lawyers in Dubai for labour law, you are looking for the same work. We use the British spelling across this site because it matches the UAE market.
Can I still claim if I have already signed a final settlement?
Possibly. It depends on what the document actually says, what was paid against it, and the circumstances in which you signed. Bring it in rather than assuming it has closed the matter.
My employer says I resigned, but I was told to leave
This comes up often, and it changes what you can claim. The written record decides it: the resignation letter the employer says exists, the cancellation paperwork, and the messages around the date you stopped attending. Gather those before anyone starts talking about a settlement.
Do I need a lawyer to file a MOHRE complaint?
No, and many people file on their own and are paid. Advice is worth taking where the sum is significant, where the figures are disputed, where the file is heading to court, or where you are outside the country.
Does the labour law work the same way in Abu Dhabi?
The law is federal, so the entitlements are the same. What differs is the ministry office and the court handling the file. Someone looking for a labour lawyer in Abu Dhabi is generally looking at the same rules that apply in Dubai.
Do you act for employers as well as employees?
Yes. We take both sides, on different files, and we check for conflicts before accepting instructions.
How long does a labour case take?
It varies with whether it settles at the ministry stage and with how much has to be translated and proved. Adjournments are normal and do not mean something has gone wrong. We would rather give you a range once we have seen the contract and the payroll record than put a figure on a web page.
Speak to a labour lawyer in Dubai
If you are owed money, have been dismissed, or are an employer facing a claim, the useful step today is to put the documents in one place and find out where the deadline sits. We can do that with you quickly.
Call +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: unpaid salary and gratuity, wrongful termination, corporate and commercial law, immigration and residency, legal fees.
What this costs
The first ten minutes are free. After that a standard fee applies and you are told what it is, in writing, before any work starts. Court and government fees are set by the court and are separate from ours.
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