British Expats - Non- Competition Clause

Quote:

Originally Posted by IKnowNothing (Post 12214913)

You work for the Daily Mail? Taking things out of context? And while the UAE Legal system is not based on precedent, when you get to the higher courts and compare case a with case b, the judges will usually go with what's happened before.

Um, don't be so sure - especially that such a case will get to the higher courts just because a foreigner wants it to. Lots, and I mean lots, can happen before that point.

If you are making noise about the labour courts and the local is angry enough, you will be out of the country well before any higher court proceeding. Very unlikely that there will be an Emirati vs Emirati conflict over a foreign worker, with its unknown outcome and local social ramifications, except in extreme cases. This is not a Hollywood movie, and the UAE is not a desert UK with UK legal protections for foreign plaintiffs/complainants.

Someone called me "risk averse" earlier, and I agree that in the Western calculation, it is, but "risk" has a different formulation in the UAE that is directly correlated to (using the local term) how many/which locals are "standing behind you." The period when you are switching companies is a gray area as you are leaving one club but haven't joined another - so nobody is "standing behind you" and thus you are vulnerable (see point above - extremely unlikely there will be a messy local vs local fight over a foreign worker. You are not likely to be fought for at new company if someone kicks up a fuss about you at the company you are leaving).

As they say - when the winds fight, the sand loses. There, we are the sand.