Practical guide
Customs client code
A customs client code links your trade licence to the customs authority of the emirate you import through. Without it your goods cannot clear. It is inexpensive, quick, and routinely discovered at the port by companies who did not know it existed.
In practice
Customs code registration in the UAE
What it is and why it is separate
The trade licence tells the economic department what you are permitted to do. The customs code tells the customs authority who you are when goods arrive. They are different systems run by different bodies, and holding one does not give you the other.
Per emirate, not per company
Customs is administered at emirate level. A code registered with Dubai Customs does not clear goods arriving at Khalifa Port in Abu Dhabi or Hamriyah in Sharjah. Importers using multiple ports need multiple registrations.
- Issued by
- The customs authority of the emirate of entry
- Prerequisite
- A valid trade licence with a trading or import activity
- Cost
- Modest — a registration fee rather than a deposit
- Renewal
- Annually, alongside the licence
- Multiple emirates
- A separate registration for each port of entry
- Free zones
- Free zone companies register too, and additionally hold zone-specific arrangements
The sequence
How it runs.
Confirm the licence permits import
A services licence will not support a customs registration.
Register with the emirate's customs authority
Dubai Trade for Dubai, and the equivalent portal elsewhere.
Link the licence and bank details
Duties and deposits are settled through the registered account.
Appoint a clearing agent if you need one
Customs brokerage is a separate licensed activity — most importers use an agent.
Renew with the licence
A lapsed code stops shipments at the port.
Questions
A registration linking your trade licence to the customs authority of the emirate you import through. It is required before you can clear any goods and is separate from the trade licence itself.
Yes if you import through more than one. Customs is administered at emirate level, so a Dubai registration does not clear goods arriving in Abu Dhabi or Sharjah.
Yes. Free zone companies register for a customs code and additionally operate under their zone's own customs arrangements for goods entering and leaving the zone.
One question
Where are you in this?
Then this is the cheap moment to get it right. Structure, jurisdiction and activity codes are the decisions that are expensive to reverse once a bank account and six visas hang off them.
Answer five questionsOr just ask usMost of what goes wrong at this stage is a document mismatch rather than a refusal — the wrong activity on the licence, an unattested certificate, a name that does not match the trade. Usually fixable faster than it looks.
Tell us what is stuckOr just ask usWe quote a single all-in figure with every government fee itemised beside our own, before you commit to anything. No commission from any authority.
How we chargeOr just ask us