A company cannot sponsor anyone until it holds an establishment card, and a surprising share of the visa problems we are asked to fix start exactly there. The card is GDRFA's record of your company as a sponsor. It is separate from the trade licence, it has its own renewal date, and every immigration transaction the company files runs against it.
This page covers the company's immigration file in Dubai: the card, the sequence for each person, renewals and cancellations, what GDRFA charges, and what we charge on top.
Start with the establishment card
A new card needs a copy of the appendix naming the partners, passport copies of the authorised signatories, and, where a manager is signing, an authorisation certified by a notary public. GDRFA takes the application through its website and app around the clock, or at an Amer centre during opening hours, and lists 48 hours as the expected completion time.
Let it lapse and the arithmetic is unpleasant rather than catastrophic: GDRFA fines AED 100 for every month it goes unrenewed. The real cost is that visa work for the whole company stops until the card is valid again, which tends to be discovered on the day somebody needs to travel.
What GDRFA charges
| Transaction | GDRFA fee |
|---|---|
| Establishment card, issue or renewal | AED 200, before VAT and small knowledge, innovation and service charges |
| Urgent handling | AED 100 on top |
| Residence permit renewal, private sector | AED 200 |
| Where the applicant is inside the country | a further AED 500 |
Read from GDRFA's own service pages in September 2026. Submitting through an Amer centre rather than the app carries its own additional charge, which GDRFA states separately on each service.
The sequence for one person
- Entry permit, issued against the company's quota and its establishment card.
- Entry or status change. Somebody outside the country enters on the permit; somebody already inside changes status without leaving, which is where GDRFA's inside-country fee appears.
- Medical examination. GDRFA requires it for applicants over 18 as part of the file.
- Emirates ID biometrics with ICP, which issues the card itself.
- Residence issued and recorded, after which the person can sponsor family of their own.
Two variables move the total: nationality, and whether the person is already in the country. That is why we quote per person rather than publish one number. The itemised sums live in what an employment visa costs for staff, the investor and partner visa guide for owners, and sponsoring your family after setup once somebody's own residence is done.
What we charge per person
| Our fee | Amount |
|---|---|
| Visa typing | AED 200 |
| Portal access | AED 300 |
| Unemployment insurance (WPI) | AED 300 |
| Health insurance, from | AED 500 |
| Total per visa, from | AED 1,300 |
That is our side of it. Government charges for the entry permit, the medical and the Emirates ID are billed at cost on top, because they move with nationality and route and we would rather pass them through than pad them into a package price.
Renewals, cancellations and the grace period
A residence renewal needs the medical again for anyone over 18, and the Emirates ID is renewed alongside it. ICP fines a late Emirates ID renewal AED 20 a day up to AED 1,000, and expects changes to personal data to be reported within 30 days.
Cancellation has an order that cannot be reversed. For private-sector staff, GDRFA asks for an extract of the work permit cancellation from the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation before it will cancel the residence, so the labour file is closed first and the immigration file second. That is the labour side.
Opening or increasing your visa quota
Before any of this, the company needs a quota. GDRFA's published requirements for opening or increasing work visa quotas are the request itself, a copy of the commercial licence, a copy of the establishment card, a copy of the lease contract (it names the Ijari), the passport of the owner, partner or service agent, and a certificate of classification of the establishment from the Department of Economy and Tourism.
Read that list again and the logic of UAE hiring falls out of it: the quota is granted against registered premises and a classified licence, not against an address. If your space is a desk or a virtual office, what that supports is worth settling before you promise anyone a visa.
Outside Dubai, the counterpart is ICP
A Dubai company's immigration file sits with GDRFA. Elsewhere in the country it sits with ICP, and the establishment card rules differ in detail: ICP allows 30 days after expiry, then fines AED 100 a month up to AED 1,000, and will only renew where the trade licence is valid and the fines owed by the establishment have been paid. If your company is licensed in Ajman or one of the northern emirates' zones, that is the route your file takes.
Company visa FAQs
It is the immigration authority's record of your company as a sponsor, and yes: without it the company cannot issue an entry permit or a residence visa to anybody, including its own owner. It is renewed on its own cycle, separately from the trade licence.
GDRFA lists 48 hours for establishment card transactions. The person's own steps depend on appointments: the medical, the biometrics, and whether they are inside or outside the country when the entry permit issues. We give a date range once we know the route rather than quoting an average that fits nobody.
Yes, for private-sector employees. GDRFA asks for the extract of work permit cancellation from the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation as a requirement of the residence cancellation, so doing it the other way round simply stalls at the counter.
Yes. GDRFA's digital channels are open 24 hours a day and take applications directly. What you need is the company's login and somebody who knows the order of the steps. The alternative, having a member of staff hold GDRFA's representative card, comes with conditions covered on our PRO services page.
Fines accrue daily once the grace period ends, at the rate ICP publishes, and the employer is expected to be able to show the person left. Because GDRFA's own pages give thirty days in one place and sixty in another, the safe plan is thirty and a record of the departure.
Once the owner's own residence is issued, family sponsorship becomes possible and brings its own income and housing conditions. Those are set out in sponsoring your family in the UAE after setting up.
The cost guides behind each visa
If what you actually need is the arithmetic rather than the process: employment visa costs for first hires, investor and partner visa costs, the Emirates ID process and its timing, and the golden visa routes for business owners. For the company's other government deadlines, the PRO service keeps them on one calendar.