Seven survival tactics if your job is cut in Dubai

If you lose your job as an expat in Dubai, it’s something of a triple whammy. Firstly, there’s imminent unemployment, then there’s the prospect of leaving the country within 30 days as employer sponsorship is removed and, perhaps most bitingly of all, redundancy payments are not mandatory.

The whole concept of ‘redundancy’ is not recognised under employment law in Dubai, which means that employers are not legally required to provide parachute payments to the staff they cut. Understandably, this doesn't sit well with the people being axed, but disputing this through the courts is unlikely to be successful.

In 2009, for example, six back office employees cut from Rasmala Bank filed for unfair dismissal. They were initially successful after the Small Claims Court awarded them around three months' pay as compensation for losing their jobs. However, Rasmala contested the decision in the DIFC Court and, not only was the money rescinded, but the claimants ended up footing the bill for the bank's legal fees.

In short, if you follow the letter of the law, employees have very few rights if their job is curtailed. An employer simply has to prove that they just cause for terminating a job, and this includes changing business conditions or redundancy of a role. Employees instead have to rely on less formal methods to make sure they’re covered. After all, job cuts in the Middle Eastern financial sector are increasing currently.

What to do if you want to stay in the country:

1. Stay on good terms with your employer

No matter how disgruntled you are at the prospect of being fired, don’t make your departure acrimonious. Once your employment is terminated, you have 30 days to find another job before employer sponsorship runs out and you’re required to leave Dubai. If this happens, it’s harder to find a job than if you had remained on the ground, where networking and word-of-mouth about opportunities will aid your job search.

“As a practical matter, financial services employers are putting their employees on administrative leave, where they can stop working at the end of their notice period, but have an additional three months of sponsorship in which they can try to find work,” says Stuart Walker, partner in the banking and finance division of lawyers Afridi & Angell.

2. Spread your wings (slightly)

Dubai might be your preferred option, but it’s more likely these days that companies in other GCC nations will be open to taking you on. Bahrain is still highly-unpopular with expats, so the competition isn’t as stiff, while employers in Abu Dhabi, Qatar and Saud Arabia are more likely to be expanding.

3. Plead your case for wanting to stay in the Middle East

If the alternative to looking for another job in the Middle East is going home, why should your employer care? After all, if it’s a relatively healthy employment market in places like the US, Australia or Asia, you’ve every chance of securing a position in your home country. However, if prospects are bleak then it’s more likely your soon to be ex-employer will be more sympathetic.

“Recently, we’ve been working with a senior banking executive from Greece to extend his stay in the UAE despite him having be laid off,” says Walker. “It’s now also more common for UK citizens to want to avoid going home.”

4. Go it alone

This could be a stop gap, or a chance to really crave out a niche for yourself, but one way of extending your stay is to establish a company in one of the Middle Eastern freezones and it’s increasingly common for financial services professionals in Dubai to do this, says Magdy El Zein, managing director of headhunters Boyden Middle East.

“It’s not a cheap option – it can cost between $8,000-10,000 – but it increases options for financial services professionals,” he says. “You can contract for a while, or use your expertise to start a niche, boutique operation.”

How to ensure you have some sort of severance pay:

1. Increase the length of your fixed term contract

Because there’s no statutory redundancy payment, employees need to make sure that they get a long-term contract from the outset, stating that you will be compensated should your employment be terminated before that period, says Walker.

“This is important not just if you lose your job entirely, but if you’re being forced into taking an alternative role you don’t necessarily want. We had a case recently involving someone being transferred from the DIFC to Saudi, and they enacted the length of their contract as a defence,” he says.

2. Have an employment lawyer insert provisions into your contract

If it’s not standard practice to have redundancy compensation provisions in an employment contract, draw up your own before accepting the role. “It’s perfectly possible to insert a clause which states that if you lose your job because of reason X, you should be given Y in compensation,” says Walker.

3. Don’t work your notice

A common tactic, according to both Walker and El Zein, is to convince your employer to pay you for an extended notice period that is never worked. Three months' salary paid in lieu is standard, they suggest, which both gives you a little money to ease the pain of the job cut and allows you more time to search for a new position before the visa restrictions kick in.