Dubai Simplifies Residency and Work Visa Process

Attention, travellers! Planning to move or work in Dubai? Good news awaits. The UAE has streamlined residency visa and work document processes.

Previously, onboarding a new employee took 30 days. Now, it takes five days and requires only five documents, a significant reduction from 16.

Dubai’s Vice President, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid, unveiled this initiative. Named “Zero Bureaucracy”.

The “Employment Package” marks its debut. Sheikh Mohammed aims to speed up, simplify, and refine residency and employment processes.

Services offered include work and residency permit issuance, renewals, medical fitness tests, work permit cancellations, and Emirates ID fingerprinting.

Though the platform operates online, medical and fingerprinting are in-person tasks.

Under the “Invest in Dubai” umbrella, the platform will serve over 275,000 companies in Dubai. Sheikh Mohammed predicts reclaiming 62 million workdays currently lost to procedural delays and anticipates reducing procedures by 25 million annually. This will benefit both the government and private sectors financially. Expansion to other emirates is on the horizon.

Dubai Health, the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation, Dubai Economy and Tourism, the Federal Authority for Identity, Citizenship, Customs and Port Security, and the General Directorate of Residency and Foreigners Affairs in Dubai are partners.

This initiative eliminates the need for new employees to visit each department, simplifying the process.

Lieutenant General Mohammed Al Marri of GDRFA-Dubai expects a 25% increase in service transactions this year following the launch of the new platform.