The United Arab Emirates is one of the most expat-friendly countries to live in. It is made of different Emirates or states. Sharjah, Dubai, Ras Al Khaimah, Ajman, and Umm al Quwain is some of the most popular ones.

When you are looking to move then you must make yourself familiar with the Dubai residence visa needs.

Through the residence visa, you refer to a work permit that allows you to stay and work legally inside the United Arab Emirates.

The first need is the passport copy of the information page on your passport. This should be a clear coloured scanned copy of a passport that has validity for the 6 months.

The Indian nationals must send the first and last page of the passport; and Pakistani nationals need to send the passport information page, the second page of their passport and the national ID copy.

The second Dubai residence visa needs a recent passport size photograph scanned, of yourself standing in front of a white background. You can refrain from wearing open clothes, jewellery,

or glasses since in rare cases the immigration would reject this. You can shave off the beard as some emirates like Sharjah and Umm al Quwain do not accept pictures of people with much facial hair as it tends to hide the face.

The third need is an attested education degree. When you have any sort of higher education certificate that you wish to use in UAE to get a managerial visa position, then you must notarise and attest it at the UAE embassy in your home country and further attest in the UAE at the ministry of foreign affairs (MOFA).

A few UAE free zones ask you to legally translate into Arabic through a legal translator in the UAE.

It is easy to find and charge a reasonable fee of about 100 AED per page.

Some of you may not have education certificates and that is fine too, you can still get a Dubai residence visa with a basic position on your visa like a Sales executive. This works fine as the managerial. The difference is that when you travel to any other Gulf country of UAE with the Dubai residence visa that is managerial, you would be allowed to go inside that country with the Dubai visa.

When you have the basic lower visa positions, you can apply for a visa of each respective Gulf country before you go in.

The fourth need is Visa questions. They only ask for basic information like father’s name, mother’s name, marital status, address of your home country, age, and religion.

Be accurate when answering the question about religion. Finally, you need the employer to ask you to sign an employment contract as proof to you, the employer and the immigration will reside here for work purposes. This is done virtually by email or in hard copies. When you have your own business, in most free zones you will not need to sign an employment contract.