How to Plan your Travel During UAE Resident Visa Process

You have already learnt that the process of resident visa takes anywhere between 3 to 5 weeks on average. And its not a wonder that very often business people, like you, cannot stay all these 30 or 45 days in a row, without leaving the UAE. Very often you need to go on business trips unexpectedly and already next day you shall be attending an event in the other part of the word. We know very well what the life of businessman looks like and in this chapter we want you to learn, how you can best manage your travel schedule, once you prepare to apply for your UAE resident visa.

First of all, let us remind you, what we said before. In many cases, you can apply for your resident visa from outside of the country. To be more precise, there are free zones in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, which accept all documents for visa application in scanned copies and you receive from them electronic Entry Permit, allowing you to enter the country. So no need to be physically present in the UAE at this stage at all. In Northern emirates registration authorities also often process applications relying on scanned copies, but Entry Permit is most of the time issued in hard copy. Since a hard copy needs to be delivered to the airport of arrival, you can either avail of a special Entry Permit drop-off service from registration authority at a certain fee or you can engage services of a Business Consulting or a PRO firm. This way or the other way round, you can complete the first step of application from abroad. As such, if you do not need to be during this time in the UAE, leave the UAE before you apply, go in peace on your business trip, apply for resident visa, once you left the UAE already and come to the country, when Entry Permit is issued. Magic? No. But we just saved around 10 to 15 days you could have stayed in the UAE waiting for your entry permit to be issued.

You might have not noticed it yet, but you just saved other 3 to 5 days on visa status change. Do you remember our example with tourist visa? We mentioned, that if you come to the UAE on a tourist visa and you later need to apply for your resident visa inside the country, once Entry Permit is issued, you need to submit it along with your original passport for visa status change: from a tourist to a resident, and the process takes 3 to 5 days. For a businessman it is very often too long and you already need to fly somewhere. As such, if you apply for resident visa from outside of the UAE, you save 3 to 5 days and skip the step of visa status change. You just arrive, once your entry permit is issued, and go straight to do your medical, Emirates ID and medical insurance, if the latter is required.

But what if I applied for UAE resident visa, when inside the country, you may ask. Say, you are on a visit visa or a tourist visa and you applied for a resident one. Is there any time frame, when you can travel, if need be? Although there is no much flexibility in regards to this, still, yes, you can travel and now we will explain when exactly.

Again, let’s repeat, if you are inside the UAE, applying for a resident visa, it means you initially arrived in the country using your tourist or visit visa or you had a previous resident visa from employee (if you were employed before). Regardless of what visa you currently hold, even if it is a cancelled employment one, once the Entry Permit is issued you have two options: either to proceed with visa status change and wait 3 to 5 days (which should not be a problem, if you do not plan to travel) or leave the country and return to the UAE after your trip. In the last case scenario, you will not need to change the status, as it will be changed automatically in the immigration system the moment you present entry permit at the UAE airport passport control upon your return. As such, if you are watching this chapter and you already applied for your entry permit and you urgently need to travel, wait till entry permit is issued, take it and leave. However, remember that entry permit is valid for 60 days only. So this timeframe is given to complete all formalities with your resident visa.

And finally the most important part. You wont’ be allowed to leave the UAE for travel, if your visa status change has been completed. In other words, the moment you receive your passport after visa status change in 3 to 5 days, you are no longer allowed to travel, until you complete the process of resident visa stamping.

So now you see that there are generally 3 ways of cutting time on getting your UAE residency. Let’s summarize: you can apply from outside the country. Firstly, this way you save 10 to 15 days waiting for the issuance of Entry Permit outside of the country. Secondly, you do not need to apply for visa status change and spend other 3 to 5 days, awaiting your passport return, when you come to the UAE, using your Entry Permit. And in case you applied for your resident visa, being inside the country, you can still leave the UAE after your Entry Permit is issued but your visa status has not been changed yet. This is three. And again a reminder from us: as soon as your visa status is changed, it is not possible to leave the country, until the process of resident visa stamping is completed.

Again, although the resident visa application procedure seems to be very straight forward, there are still so many queries, as to when one can travel throughout the resident visa application process. We hope we helped you to shed some light on the subject and now you will be able to plan your trips with a greater degree of flexibility.

If you want to know more about Dubai freezone company formation, feel free to get in touch with our professional consultant team and we would be delighted to assist you and help you to compare Dubai freezone company setup costs and help you to find that free zone, which would suit your business needs the most.

Disclaimer: Business Boutique UAE-Consultants.com is not affiliated with any particular government or legal entity. Business Boutique does not give professional legal advice nor any other professional advice subject to a public office in the government. This article merely sets out a simple and basic idea as to the reasons of Dubai freezone company setup and Dubai free zone company formation cost. Business Boutique in no way holds nor imposes any official governmental or legal authority and the article herein is only to be taken as a guide. All further governmental or legal issues should be addressed to the corresponding authorities.

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