AAABritishExpat

Degree attestation from a different country
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Thanks, everyone for the great info here. Very helpful and it is my daily read every morning.

My highest degree is from the US and I am a UK citizen living in the UK. Does anyone know if the attestation needs to be in the Saudi Embassy in the UK or the US? Did anyone have a similar situation?

Thanks

dreamerr

Hallo.
I'm italian living in Spain. I 'm attesting my University Degree in Italy where I have studied.
I Hope It can help

AAABritishExpat

Thanks @dreamerr yes it does help
So I guess in my situation it needs to be attested by the Saudi embassy in the US (where I had my degree).

Newopps

On this I can advise with some authority, having been in a few discussions with NEOM on this. Your situation appears similar to mine. UK citizen with UK undergrad degree and N American masters degree. NEOM told me I had to attest my highest degree, but A1 Visas said they could quite happily get my visa by attesting my UK degree only. I told NEOM who said, okay attest the UK degree then.

So ... if you have a UK degree, even if its not your highest, attest that one as it will be quicker (but still about 5 weeks at the moment). If you don't have a UK degree, then you will need to attest one (only) of your degrees, in the country where it was conferred. You can choose which to attest, based on expected timescales.

If you do attest a UK degree, you will need an invitation letter from NEOM Govt Affairs department, which your onboarder will source for you, specifically for that purpose to kick off attestation (your offer letter will not suffice, go figure). Expect that to take about a week. The letter is not required for most other countries, but in looking, it still seemed quicker to attest in the UK than (in my case) Canada.

Hope this helps.

AAABritishExpat

Definitely, very clear and helpful. Thanks @Newopps

ExpatKSA

Hello, I hope I can find an answer to this.

I submitted all of my documents 3 weeks ago and had a phone call with NEOM HR about what to expect moving forward. And she told me that it might take until mid november to get an offer and recently i emailed her and asked her that what is the status on the offer letter and that my background check has already been completed and she told me this: "We are still waiting approval for the role."

Is it normal for jobs in saudi that after you have been selected candidate and done your background check and everything that they need to still approve my role does this mean my role is not for sure? What does it really mean? Thank you all for your help.

Newopps

Only NEOM knows for sure what is going on, anything I or anyone else says will be pure speculation.

But that said, I don't belive they would go to the effort of creating a job description, advertising, interviewing, selecting and requesting documents if there was not substance behind it!

I know this is playing with your mind, but try and be patient. By all means, send a polite email back to HR thanking them for the update and asking them to clarify whether this is a timing issue, or something more fundamental ... I'm sure the former. When you are applying for jobs, every day counts and takes on significance and your mind starts working on overtime, reading into things that are not actually the case. But when you are employed, recruitment tends to be down the day to day priority list.

If this was a private sector company elsewhere, alarm bells might start ringing for me. But at NEOM, recruitment is going through the roof. Budgets may need to be approved, but again, its not like your average private sector company where they might be under pressure in the new economic realities of the world.

Be patient, ask if things are unclear, and see what they say. And remember, once you get past this stage, there's all the other admin to contend with. Think on a 4 month timescale. If its quicker, well done. If its a bit slower, then so be it.

Hope this helps.

AAABritishExpat

Does anyone know the difference between "Under Offer" and "In Offer" for an Application?

TheGman

I received this from them today - sounds a bit fishy if I’m being honest.

“We have been informed by UKSACB that their email and system is done from last week, and they are have apologised and informed us that they are trying to get the system back up again”

AnnieM19

I agree, I do find it hard to believe that a company has had no functioning IT system for a week and have just sat on it and not had it repaired yet. Very strange!

Newopps

But it's not a company, its the Saudi Cultural Bureau! The message is easy enough to verify though, just give the Bureau a call ... +442032497000

AnnieM19

Thanks, I have tried to call this number all of last week but no one answered unfortunately

Newopps

And presumably emails to [email protected] unanswered too? In which case, your hands are tied, unfortunately. I guess this is why everyone says patience is key ...

If they're not even answering the phone, I'd be inclined to believe their systems are indeed down and as they have no good news to tell folk, they're just not bothering.

Jacobv84

Hi all,

I've completed my kick-off call with onboarding 2 weeks ago and now waiting for the CoC attested contract so that I can complete my degree attestation at the Saudi Embassy. Just not getting any response from onboarding anymore, is it normal that it takes this long to receive the CoC attested contract? Or should I even expect it to take much longer? Started my interview process early September so I hopefully in the final stages...

peterpipper12

Hey NEOM Folks!

I recently interviewed with a Director at NEOM and now I have been asked to interview with a recruiter/consultant (ARK People Solutions) - seems a little backward but that's okay! Has anyone else interviewed with ARK? - If so, can you provide any insight?