The return, and payment of any tax due, fall due within nine months of the end of your tax period. A company with a 31 December year end therefore files by 30 September of the following year. There is no extension for dormant or loss-making companies, and penalties accrue for each month a return remains outstanding.

Free zone companies are within the scope of Corporate Tax and must register and file like any other UAE entity. The 0% rate applies only to Qualifying Income earned by a Qualifying Free Zone Person that meets every condition throughout the tax period, including adequate substance in the free zone, transfer pricing compliance, audited financial statements and keeping non-qualifying revenue within the de minimis limits. ...

It depends on where you are licensed. Most major free zones, including DMCC, DAFZA, JAFZA, Dubai Silicon Oasis and DIFC, require audited financial statements to be submitted each year, usually as a condition of licence renewal. Some other free zones and mainland companies are not required to file audited accounts but must still maintain proper books. Any free zone company relying on Qualifying Free Zone ...

Registration is mandatory once taxable supplies and imports have exceeded AED 375,000 over the previous twelve months, or where you expect to exceed that figure within the next thirty days. Voluntary registration is available from AED 187,500. The standard rate is 5%, and returns are filed monthly or quarterly depending on the tax period the Federal Tax Authority assigns to you.

For a straightforward company with no disputes, expect roughly two to four months. The process runs through a shareholders resolution, appointment of a licensed liquidator, the notice period set by the authority, clearances from immigration and labour, utility and telecom providers and the bank, and a final liquidator report before the deregistration certificate is issued. What usually extends the timeline is outstanding fines, visas that ...

The licence lapses but the company does not cease to exist. Renewal fines continue to accumulate, the immigration and labour files stay open along with the visas issued under them, and shareholders and managers can find themselves blocked when applying for a new licence, renewing a visa or opening a bank account. Formal deregistration is the only clean exit.

Corporate Tax rules require records and supporting documents to be retained for seven years following the end of the relevant tax period. VAT record-keeping runs to at least five years, and longer for records relating to real estate. Records must be available in a form the Federal Tax Authority can inspect, which in practice means maintaining proper books throughout the year rather than reconstructing them ...

Yes. We act as the outsourced finance function for much of our client base: day-to-day bookkeeping, monthly management accounts, VAT and Corporate Tax filings, payroll and WPS processing, and year-end preparation for audit. Work is prepared on an IFRS basis, so the records stand up when the auditor, the bank or the Federal Tax Authority asks for them.

Yes. We service mainland companies licensed by the Department of Economy and Tourism as well as entities across the UAE free zones, and we act as a registered agent for free zone and offshore structures. That covers company formation, licence amendments, accounting and tax compliance, audit through our group audit firm, and liquidation.