Practical guide
Hiring and employment contracts
Mainland employment runs on MOHRE-registered fixed-term contracts, with prescribed notice, end-of-service gratuity and mandatory health cover. Free zones administer their own regimes, which differ in detail but not in principle.
In practice
Employment contracts and hiring in the UAE
The contract itself
Mainland employment contracts are registered with MOHRE in a prescribed form. Since the 2022 labour law reforms all mainland contracts are fixed-term and renewable, unlimited contracts having been phased out. Terms more generous than the statutory minimum are permitted; terms less generous are not, whatever the employee signed.
What the employer actually owes
Salary through WPS, health insurance, annual leave, end-of-service gratuity accruing from day one of service, and repatriation for terminated employees in defined circumstances. Gratuity is the item most often under-provisioned — it is a real liability accruing every month, not a discretionary payment.
- Contract type
- Fixed-term and renewable on the mainland since the 2022 reforms
- Registration
- MOHRE for mainland; the zone authority for free zones
- Probation
- Maximum six months, with prescribed notice during it
- Notice
- Between 30 and 90 days as agreed, within statutory limits
- Gratuity
- Accrues from the first year; calculated on basic salary
- Health insurance
- Mandatory and checked at visa issuance
The sequence
How it runs.
Get the offer letter right
It becomes the basis of the registered contract and mismatches cause rejections.
Register the contract
MOHRE or the free zone authority, before the employee starts where possible.
Process the work permit and visa
Entry permit, status change or entry, medical, Emirates ID.
Enrol in WPS and insurance
Both before the first salary run.
Provision for gratuity
It accrues monthly whether or not you set the money aside.
Questions
Mainland employment contracts are fixed-term and renewable, registered with MOHRE, following the 2022 labour law reforms which phased out unlimited contracts. Free zones operate their own equivalent regimes.
On basic salary, accruing with length of service, with the rate increasing after five years. It accrues from the first year of service and is a real liability rather than a discretionary payment.
Yes. Employer-provided health cover meeting the emirate's minimum standards is mandatory and is checked as a condition of residence visa issuance.
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.
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