Practice
About this area

An employment contract that ignores which UAE regime actually governs the relationship is a document waiting to fail at the wrong moment.

Recent employment work includes a 2026 revision and local sign-off of a multinational diagnostics group's UAE limited-term employment contract — incorporating a group-standard data-privacy clause, HR-side amendments, and a confirmation memo on compliance with MoHRE Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021 (as amended), the Executive Regulations, the UAE PDPL, and applicable free-zone employment regimes — alongside an active enforcement action on post-employment restrictive covenants.

On the contentious side, our work extends to the Abu Dhabi First Instance Court Employment Division and through to Federal Supreme Court cassation appeals — including a labour cassation matter involving twenty-five years of service exposure against a major UAE energy operator.

“An employment contract that ignores which UAE regime actually governs the relationship is a document waiting to fail at the wrong moment.”

— Pillar II · Regulatory & Compliance

We advise on end-of-service gratuity, DIFC and ADGM workplace-savings frameworks, and GPSSA interactions where Emirati employees fall within the federal pension regime — with the legal, contractual, and policy layers aligned rather than treated as separate exercises.

The work, in detail

Four matter types we handle in employment and pension.

Contracts, handbooks, and policies.

Employment contract templates aligned to the correct UAE regime (onshore MoHRE, DIFC, ADGM, or free-zone-specific) with embedded data-privacy clauses, restrictive covenants, and conflict provisions — including bespoke local sign-off of multinational group templates against MoHRE Federal Decree-Law No. 33/2021 and PDPL requirements.

Termination, settlement, and restrictive covenants.

Termination risk assessment, entitlement calculations, and mutual-release documentation for employers — and active representation in restrictive-covenant enforcement and post-employment competition matters where the contractual position needs to translate into actual injunctive or damages relief.

Labour litigation and cassation.

Active labour litigation — first instance through Federal Supreme Court cassation — for both employers and senior employees, including matters with multi-decade service exposure, complex executive entitlement structures, and post-termination conflict framework disputes.

Pensions, gratuity, and workforce change.

End-of-service gratuity, DIFC and ADGM workplace-savings framework support, and GPSSA interaction for Emirati employees — plus the workforce-change work (redundancy programmes, transfers in M&A, outsourcing moves) where consultation and documentation discipline materially reduce later exposure.

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