Dubai Forums Dubai Expat Forums Dubai Expat Help Forum

Hi,

Would greatly appreciate help and advice on the subjects below.

I am UK expat, been here 8 months with a UK company. I have residency and employment visa etc.

For many reasons I don't want to continue working with my current company for much longer. I am interested in working on my own doing consultancy in the same field I am currently employed in (my current company would argue that I am a competitor and in the english contract I have, it says that I can't work in a related field for 12 months).

The options as I see it are:

Leave now - probably means I wouldn't get an NOC - would I therefore get banned? - if so can I overturn this by simply leaving the country and returning and paying 6000 AED?

Wait until my contract expires (4 months)? Do I still need an NOC and do my company have any legal comeback in the UAE regarding the wording of my UK contract (they have failed to honour several aspects of it, so I don't see why I should not work in a related field!)

Can I seek employment in the freezone if I have a ban?

As far as my future work goes I have 2 options:

Set up on my own - how hard/costly is this?

Work under the umbrella of a local company (I have one in mind) -effectively they would employ me but I would be solely doing my own work and all monies my work generates would come back to me). Could I do this now with a ban and just make visa runs to Oman (I know this wouldn't be legal so totally hypothetical) and when ban expires (6 months) get the company to employ me?

One final issue is my wife - she is from an eastern european country that recently joined the EU. Can I sponsor her?

Sorry for all the questions. I have done some searches on here but none of the results seems to cover my predicament.

Thanks in advance.


John

I would work out the 4 months and use the time to establish and set-up your business. Registration, identitiy design, stationery printing, marketing, networking so you arr ready to hit the ground running (after sorting out the rest of your issues)

So my current company can do nothing about it after contract expires? i.e after contract runs out I don't need a NOC to get a new job?

THanks..

john smith wrote:Hi,

Would greatly appreciate help and advice on the subjects below.

I am UK expat, been here 8 months with a UK company. I have residency and employment visa etc.

For many reasons I don't want to continue working with my current company for much longer. I am interested in working on my own doing consultancy in the same field I am currently employed in (my current company would argue that I am a competitor and in the english contract I have, it says that I can't work in a related field for 12 months). - Check what it says on the labour contract given to the ministry. On pg 2 there is a section marked others. If it says as per offer letter then it is valid. Also use the search function for this particular question. It has already been answered.

The options as I see it are:

Leave now - probably means I wouldn't get an NOC - would I therefore get banned? - if so can I overturn this by simply leaving the country and returning and paying 6000 AED? Very few companies give NOC. If you leave a organisation even if the company doesnt ask for a ban the ministry puts a 6month labour ban. Yes if you pay the fee the ban is deleted.

Wait until my contract expires (4 months)? Do I still need an NOC and do my company have any legal comeback in the UAE regarding the wording of my UK contract (they have failed to honour several aspects of it, so I don't see why I should not work in a related field!) - Only contract valid here is the one submitted to the ministry of labour. Nothing else. Changing a job you require a NOC from your employer unless you are in a free zone.

Can I seek employment in the freezone if I have a ban? - Yes. Labour ban is not appplicable in the free zone as it is outside the labour ministry.

As far as my future work goes I have 2 options:

Set up on my own - how hard/costly is this? - Depends where you set up. Which freezone dubai, shj, rak etc.

Work under the umbrella of a local company (I have one in mind) -effectively they would employ me but I would be solely doing my own work and all monies my work generates would come back to me). Could I do this now with a ban and just make visa runs to Oman (I know this wouldn't be legal so totally hypothetical) and when ban expires (6 months) get the company to employ me? - [color=orange]If you are self employed then the rules for the ban might be different. They might not be applicable also.[/color]

One final issue is my wife - she is from an eastern european country that recently joined the EU. Can I sponsor her? - If you are working your salary is above Dhs 4000, yes you can sponsor her.

Sorry for all the questions. I have done some searches on here but none of the results seems to cover my predicament.

Thanks in advance.


John

Hope this helps..

peace

Thanks again.

On page 2 8.c there is nothing in others...

Does this mean that I am free to work in any field/company I like?

Also - it has never been mentioned in my UK contract, but am I legally entitled to gratuity - i.e 1 monhs wages after 12 months employment? If I request it do my company have to pay it? Also do I have legal possesion to my return flight or could they cancel it?

Also I notice that my contract states only 8000 AED salary when actually I get double that. I never noticed that before...


THanks

john smith wrote:Thanks again.

On page 2 8.c there is nothing in others...

Does this mean that I am free to work in any field/company I like? - Technically yes. But they are free to go to laour to fight it.

Also - it has never been mentioned in my UK contract, but am I legally entitled to gratuity - i.e 1 monhs wages after 12 months employment? If I request it do my company have to pay it? Also do I have legal possesion to my return flight or could they cancel it? - Yes you are. Also on visa cancellation they have to provide a one way tkt back to your home country.

Also I notice that my contract states only 8000 AED salary when actually I get double that. I never noticed that before... - That might be your basic salary. HRA + car etc are mentioned separately.

THanks

There is a dummy labour contract copy uploaded. Check if urs looks the same.

peace

From my understanding, after being through this recently, you cannot be banned if you have completed a minimum of one (1) year of your employment contract. If you do not complete a minimum of 1 year, then you will be banned for 6 months.

If you are banned, then you will have to do two monthly visa runs until the expiration of your ban.

it is not the company that bans you, it is the labour Department. If you complete one year, fullfil your obligations as per resignation etc, then you will not be banned. Your visa will be cancelled and you can apply for a new one.

However, I am not sure about starting up your own consultancy. You may need a local sponsor to do this, and the local will have to own 51% of your company as they are now your sponsor.

As someone has said above, i would stick out the remaining period and ensure that you complete 1 year, and to be safe, make sure it is 1 year from the signing of your labour Contract, not your employment contract.

If you're banned you're banned, even in the Freezones I believe.

The reason for this is your FZL sponsorship is done through the Freezone issuer (i.e. Tecom, JAFZL etc.) and not directly through your employer. The Freezone sponsership is still registered and applicable with the ministry of Labour.

The only thing you can do without being banned is move from one freezone company to another in the same freezone.

yorky500 wrote:From my understanding, after being through this recently, you cannot be banned if you have completed a minimum of one (1) year of your employment contract. If you do not complete a minimum of 1 year, then you will be banned for 6 months.

Yes that is true..But depends on what category visa you are under. You might be a Engineer but your visa applied for is a sales exec then the 1yr min service is not applicable.
There are various permutations to that also. Maybe u are a sales exec with a master degree then maybe the 1yr service completion might be applicable. etc etc

^ian^ wrote:If you're banned you're banned, even in the Freezones I believe.The only thing you can do without being banned is move from one freezone company to another in the same freezone.

Nope. Labour has nothing to do with the free zone visas. If you are banned by labour ministry you can still get a free zone employment visa no probs on that.

devilsdiciple wrote:

^ian^ wrote:If you're banned you're banned, even in the Freezones I believe.The only thing you can do without being banned is move from one freezone company to another in the same freezone.

Nope. Labour has nothing to do with the free zone visas. If you are banned by labour ministry you can still get a free zone employment visa no probs on that.

Well, not going to argue, and only going by what I heard, but FZ or no FZ, if you're black stamped, you're black stamped. I looked at shifting to another company not so long ago, but the visa hassles were just insurmountable.

Yup that they were. But now they have separated the labour and immigration. They dont stamp ur passport when you get a standard labour ban. Just make a entry into the system. So you can still enter the country on a visit visa etc...only thing is a labour card will not be issued to you for 6 months....

Saying this cus I was banned by the labour dept for 6 months std practise on resigning from my previous job, and got a visa from the free zone no issues at all....

devilsdiciple wrote:Yup that they were. But now they have separated the labour and immigration. They dont stamp ur passport when you get a standard labour ban. Just make a entry into the system. So you can still enter the country on a visit visa etc...only thing is a labour card will not be issued to you for 6 months....

Saying this cus I was banned by the labour dept for 6 months std practise on resigning from my previous job, and got a visa from the free zone no issues at all....

I only used the black stamp 'figuratively', but you can still get employed even if you're black stamped if your employer is part of a certain group of companies. We do it, I've been told bans aren't a problem when hiring.

Only two things work here...Money and waasta...LOL