UAE PM Introduces Fee Support To Dubai-Based Businesses

by Lorys Charalambous, Tax-News.com, Cyprus

01 June 2009

Dubai’s government has announced that it is to reduce business and licensing fees by 20% or 30% and will freeze current government fees on essential services and postpone any additional ones. The measure will temporarily support more than 125,000 businesses in Dubai in the hopes of boosting economic growth during the downturn.

Introducing the decree, Sheikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, underlined that the measure was decided upon to aid businesses operating within the emirate by ‘enhancing Dubai's economic competitiveness and augmenting the continued government backing of the investment environment in Dubai, bringing positive affects of this environment on all walks of life’.

According to the report obtained by press agency WAM, the fees included within the decree include:

• Issuing and renewing trade and professional licences.
• Issuing licences for sales and promotional campaigns.
• Issuing property ownership certificate.
• Registering rent-to-own contracts.
• Extending mortgage repayment tenure.
• Termination of rent-to–own contracts.
• Evaluating buildings without land.
• Improving services.
• License for transforming building into hotels or hotel apartments.
• Building modification.
• Analyzing food samples.
• Engineering tests.
• Vocational testing.
• Yearly licensing for food related activities.
• Utilizing areas allocated for desert tourism sanctuaries.

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