What to include in an employment contract in the UAE

When hiring staff as a new owner and manager of a business startup in Dubai, it’s essential to have clear contractual agreements laying out employee responsibilities and deliverables. This is beneficial not only for you and your business, but also lets your employees know what is expected of them.

As a new business startup owner in Dubai, you might be putting together a new team from scratch. As this will be the first time you’re working with them, it is a good idea for expectations to be clearly identified in a mutual agreement.  

The terms of the job

This is where the contract identifies an employee’s departmental position, role, and title in the organization. This section should also note the name of the person to whom employees report. With the rise in virtual offices, and (sometimes global) outsourcing of work in business startups in Dubai, it’s also important to state an employee’s work relationship with your organization, and whether they are a salaried staff, or contractual.

Responsibilities

An employee contract should clearly outline staff roles and responsibilities in an organization. That way they know what they are responsible for, and are agreeing to produce specified deliverables. Business startups in Dubai are part of a new and growing sector, and a solid outline of responsibilities enables employees to understand their role and achieve targets. 

Employment period

When drafting contracts for your prospective employees for your new business setup in Dubai, state whether the period of employment is for a fixed or open-ended term. Documentation on the employment period should also note the hours of an employee workday, including when they are expected to arrive and permitted to leave. It’s crucial that this section of the contract is in compliance with labour laws so that it is a legally-binding agreement.

Termination

In this section of the contract, you’ll want to outline how both you and your employee are allowed to end a period of employment, indicating how much notice is required and should be provided by either party. Here you may also want to mention the terms of severance package, and the cases in which it is applicable. 

Time off

Terms of leave, including days off for illness and vacation should be numbered in an employment contract. Providing this information is connected to how to get a business licence in Dubai and maintaining it, so that your staff are protected under Dubai labour laws. It’s important to specify what qualifies as a sick day at your company, such as illness, family emergency, or recovery time for an injury, and how much is paid and unpaid leave. For vacation days, the contract for your business startup in Dubai should specify the length and the days accrued, and whether these increase the longer an employee has been with an organization.

Confidentiality

Employees must agree not to divulge proprietary information about your startup and its business operations. Stating this in the contract, and specifying the length of gardening leave protects your business from competitors, and the potential loss of knowledge, such as trade secrets, consumer marketing data, and revenues. This section could also include rules about what employees are allowed to post on their social media about the company.

Compensation

This section needs to do more than state an employee’s rate of pay. It needs to note payment schedule, when raises are due, and the terms on which bonuses are earned and received. If employees are entitled to certain benefits above and beyond their salaries, like vehicle or home rental allowances, then these should be identified along with their amounts, in the compensation section of the contract. 

Consult Decisive Zone at [email protected] or +97145847332 to get a free consultation on company setup in UAE and to learn how to prepare employee contracts that mutually protect owners and their staff in business startups in Dubai.