Oyibopeppeh

I've just come back from Qatar after interviewing a potential candidate for a position to be based in AD. The candidate ticks all of boxes and we are prepared to make him an offer.

The status of his employment is that his wife (a highly qualified Indian national) has accepted an offer with the same company to transfer to AD, which she has taken and is awaiting her UAE visa.

Our candidate (the husband, also an Indian national and degree qualified) would obviously like to accompany his wife to AD and is ready to accept our offer of employment. However, he indicated to me that if he quit his job with is current employer in Qatar, that he would not be allowed to visit Qatar for a period of 2 years.

Although this isn't strictly a deal breaker, it poses a number of problems for my company since we would require our candidate to travel around several GCC countries on company business. The requirement in Qatar is to visit our customers on a monthly basis to inspect equipment we have on rental with them.

Could anyone please advise on where our man stands on this?

co durham boy

If he quits his job he will automatically receive a 2 year employment ban and will have to leave the country within 1 month . This is in place for everyone here regardless of nationality unless you can obtain an N.O.C and transferable visa.

This ban is an employment ban only , if he intended to visit Qatar again he would obviously need a visit or buisiness visa prior to entry . I'm not sure if his nationality would have any bearing on this but i can ask my P.R.O.

Oyibopeppeh

Thanks, if you could give me a confirmation on this it would make things a lot easier, since our man wouldn't be going to Qatar for employment.

He also tells me that he's required to serve a 2 months notice period - how does this work with the requirement to leave the country within a month of giving notice?

co durham boy

He has 1 month to depart after cancellation of his visa , don't quote me as it could be different for certain nationalities but the clock starts ticking as soon as the visa is cancelled. The labour law states a months notice by either party unless it's specifially written into the employees contract , that's rare though as exceptions to the rule are usually very senior roles or roles that are highly sensitive .

I'll let you know

co durham boy

My P.R.O tells me the following . When he has the cancellation stamp in his passport he has 1 week to exit the country , so he should make sure that his present company does not cancel the visa early or he'll be liable for an overstay fine if he doesn't leave within 1 week.

Regarding coming back to Qatar , that is not a problem , if he has residence in the U.A.E he can enter when he wants on the relevant visa . The only restriction is that he cannot legally take up full time employment with a Qatari company as he will still be under a 2 year employment ban.

If he has a degree / Engineering / managerial visa from the U.A.E visas will be even easier to obtain and can be done online by himself prior to entry and collected at Qatari immigration for the cost of 100 QAR per visa.

Hope that helps

Oyibopeppeh

Perfect!

K+