TGFKASE

Meow, my dear...

An aquaintance of mine is considering leaving their employment and moving to another employer.

They have been told by the company GR that, as per the new Labour Law, you cannot apply for another employment visa within the first 2 years of your employment with your existing employer, unless your new salary is above 12000dhs.

Is this true?

Bahtatboy

A bit more complicated than that, according to today's National (not that that's necessarily anything to go by):

Low-paid manual workers with at least a secondary-school education can now move to a better job without their employer's permission, provided the new job pays at least the minimum wage for their educational qualifications.

...

It depends on their qualification. If the worker has completed secondary school, they can get a job in admin for a minimum of Dh5,000; if they have diploma, then it would be Dh7,000, and for a bachelor's degree it is Dh12,000," Mr Al Jabri said. Skilled workers have been allowed since January to change jobs without a No Objection Certification (NOC) from their employer, but that change did not apply to unskilled and semi-skilled workers in the first two years of a job.

Now, if a worker in an unskilled or semi-skilled job is offered a new post that requires a secondary-school certificate or better - and pays the minimum wage for those educational categories - he can leave without clearance from his employer, regardless of how long he has been on staff.

In cases where no NOC is required, workers need instead to have their residence visa stamped by the ministry.

http://www.thenational.ae/news/uae-n...rkers-mobility

hnd

Ah, well, that makes everything clear doesn't it

ctfc

It is indeed complicated. If leaving within the first two years you are theoretically subject to an automatic six month ban from MoL before starting a new job.

There are however a whole bunch of exceptions, see the "No labour ban" section (near the bottom) on http://www.dubaifaqs.com/visa-ban-uae.php

The simplest no ban situations are (i) moving to a government job (ii) moving from one sponsorship to another within the same freezone.

There's also this exception listed: "Expats who have completed 1 year of an unlimited contract AND get a No Objection Certificate (NOC) from the current employer. It may be a requirement that the new job has the same job title as the old job."

It's as clear as mud basically. However, if a current employer really wants to block it, usually they can. The problem is one for the new employers PRO to sort out, though in my experience a lot of PROs are pretty lazy and don't keep up with what's going on.

The MoL hotline are almost always very helpful, worth a call.

Welivehere

I would be careful with that line, there is an arguement that the prospective new employer has provided you with a role, if you cannot accept it due to issues with your previous sponsor / employer that is not their resposibility to resolve. A lot of co's will support / help you but they are not obliged to do so. I guess the amount of assistance you will get woudl be dependent on your value to them as future employee....