June 23, 2023 • 31 mins
In this video, I will be sharing my experience as an entrepreneur from the UK of setting up a free zone company in Dubai. If you are thinking of starting a business in the UAE, setting up a free zone company can be a great option.
In the video, I will be discussing all the important things that I wish I knew before so that you can establish a free zone company in Dubai. From selecting the right free zone to register your business to obtaining the necessary approvals and licenses, I will be covering everything I’ve discovered to make the process easier and more streamlined for you.
I will also be sharing some tips and insights based on my own experience, including the challenges and obstacles that I faced during the setup process, how I overcame them and things to watch out for that may not seem that important at first but could really cause you issues down the line!
Whether you are a foreign entrepreneur or a resident looking to start a business in Dubai which is just one of seven UAE free zones, this video will provide you with valuable information and guidance on setting up a free zone company in the city.
So, if you are interested in learning more about setting up your own freezone company in Dubai, be sure to watch this video till the end and don't forget to like and share if you find it helpful!
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💬MENTIONS:
Mabel Goulden video about setting up a free zone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0G4-DYJxdkA
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WHAT YOU MIGHT NOT KNOW ABOUT ME
Hey there! I'm Aaron Henriques, a British entrepreneur, business investor, private pilot, and former police officer from London. For over a decade, I've operated remote service-based businesses, gaining expertise in leadership, strategic thinking, digital marketing and idea generation. Sharing my journey and lessons learned, I hope to help others succeed faster than I did. I hope this is useful for you or someone else you know!
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
I set up my free zone company
in Dubai, UAE, in May 2023,
and it was such a complicated process
and there's a lot of research I did.
I thought it'd be worth doing
a quick episode on the process.
(00:40):
I thought it'd be worth
doing a quick episode on the process
because I'm sure there's lots of people,
particularly from the UK,
United States, Australia
and a few other places around the world
where they're not
really sure of the process.
And it can get really confusing
when you start searching online.
So the first thing that struck me
was when I was searching how to do this.
(01:02):
You just get tons
and tons of companies
that are offering
business set up services
for free zones in Dubai, and there's over
40 free zones to choose from in the UAE
with 20 of them alone
or might be more than 20 just in Dubai.
So there are some that specialise
in certain industries,
and the cost,
(01:22):
depending on where you're looking,
can really, really range from anywhere
from around
like 3000 dirhams all the way to,
you know, 100,000.
I've even seen as,
as a setup fee
with lots in the middle, about 50,000
which is around,
you know, around £10,000.
I don't know what's
that about 13,000 USD approximately.
(01:45):
And that's just a lot of money
to set up a company.
And there are tons
and tons of agencies
that are out there
offering these services.
And I actually was searching for ages
and I come across the free zone.
I ended up incorporating the company
with like setting up
the free zone company with directly.
(02:05):
I come across them weeks
before
I realised they were the actual authority
who you have to set up
the free zone with.
I just thought
they were just another one of the many,
many companies that are out there
who are offering these set up services.
So do you need to use an agent in Dubai?
Well, I didn't.
(02:27):
I may if you listen to the video
about a year ago, I did mention about a
one of the setup companies
where they help
people like you set up
your businesses in Dubai
or anywhere, you know, in the UAE,
full stop
as a free zone
and they charge you a fee for that.
But I wanted to go direct
with the authority
(02:48):
just because I was seeing
this crazy range of prices.
And I'm just like, well,
clearly there's even some of you
that are just scamming people
and taking money,
which is just a scam
where it's really low
or there's some of you
where you're just charging
extremely high service
fees for the introduction.
And so I just thought, you know what,
(03:09):
let me try and find the authority.
So that's what I did.
Now, how do you choose which free zone
to open up your company
with, first of all?
So that was one of the issues.
There are
lots of free zones that I mentioned.
There's like over 40 in the UAE
and some of them specialise
in individual things.
And some of these websites that you land
(03:31):
on where I've mentioned
about these agents,
they may appear
like they are the actual free
zone company,
the free zone
sort of authority in themselves,
but they're not.
But they will lead you
to believe they are
and there were tons of them
that I saw
with an absolute ton of reviews
which just look like spam to me.
(03:52):
Really, really fantastic reviews
We have like the probably
the real ones in the middle,
which were absolutely horrendous.
But anyway, I found the free zone
that I'm registered with.
Like I mentioned weeks before,
I didn't realise that the official body
and I literally must have done
15 to 20 hours of research
just working out
which free zone to pursue
and avoided the agents
(04:13):
that have those, you know,
really shady looking reviews.
I started seeing like you get like
really one really, really bad comment.
And then within a couple of days
there's suddenly like
50 really positive ones
and it's just like probably not real.
But in any case,
there are some things
that you need to pay
attention to, things to note.
And one of the first things I'd say is
(04:34):
being careful of the hidden fees.
That wasn't an issue in my case,
but I've seen lots of reviews.
Like I said, I did delve into this
where agents don't tell you
about a number of the fees
that you're going
to have to pay on the line.
And one of the things that I discovered
when I set up with the free zone
I ended up setting up with, is that
(04:59):
that free zone?
Anyway, if
you set up for an agent
in the future, if you have any issues
around the fees or anything like that,
you have to go through the agent.
You can't go direct to the free zone.
I'm sure it's just some agreement
that they've got between
they're the agents
that pass those deals to them.
So if you go have an agent,
you cannot contact
the free zones directly
(05:20):
or at least the one that I'm with
and that's
if you have any issues or concerns
you need to go through your agent
and they may charge you
their own fees, you know,
which they may
have not disclosed at the outset,
but they sort of
have got a hold over you in that sense.
Certainly with the free zone
that I'm with now,
there are lots of business categories
(05:42):
and that was one of the
most confusing thing.
They seem to be really,
really strict and specific
about what you can and cannot do.
You cannot sell within the UAE
outside of your free zone.
And there's also potentially issues
over this new 9% corporation tax.
If you do sell inside your free zone
or anywhere in the UAE potentially.
(06:03):
So that's not completely clear right now.
I will come back to that another point.
Once I finally got that ironed out,
the corporation tax is not 0% anymore
for businesses in Dubai or the UAE.
Full stop.
See the video that I did a year ago,
which I link to,
but it may still be free.
Okay, There's a caveat.
(06:24):
It may still be free,
but I want to make sure I've got hundreds
and accurate information
before I stop putting that out to you
and you start making plans on that.
But don't make plans
based on anything I say.
Anyway,
if you want to close it down,
you'll have to pay quite a substantial
sum of money.
Potentially it might be like £1,000.
It could be more to
close down the company
and some free zones allow you to do
(06:45):
the company setup process from abroad
as mine did
others require
you actually to be present in the country
if he's about to set it up.
Now, if you don't have an office space,
there's lots of free zones
I've seen where they require you
to have an office space,
so you must lace an office space
even if you don't need it.
Like lots of businesses
like mine are online.
You don't need an office space,
(07:06):
and even if you don't need it,
they require you to have a lease.
And actually
the way that mine was pitched
is that you don't
require to have a lease.
And actually
when I did set it up,
I did get a lease agreement with it,
but I've not paid some extra for that.
So it just seems to be something
that they've just done to get past
whatever the rules are
with the government.
So what are the costs
(07:27):
with the exchange rate?
At the time
I paid around £3,700
and that included my establishment card
that allows that new company
that I have out in Dubai
to sponsor foreign workers,
including myself.
Yes, they have to sponsor me,
which if you compare
the cost of setting up to the UK,
(07:47):
I mean, they're not comparable.
The UK is £13. Yes.
One three pounds
to set up a company in the UK versus 3700
to set it up in Dubai as a free zone
and you're really limited in what you can do
in the UK.
If you set up your company at £13,
you pretty much do what you want with it.
(08:08):
In the United States. Similar thing.
I think theirs is like $150
or something like that to set it up,
which is still a massive difference from,
you know, £3,700.
That's about 5,000 USD.
It's a humongous sum of money
and that's not a one time payment.
Even people
that is something
that you are going to pay
on an annual basis.
(08:28):
So the way I'm seeing that
in my head in justifying
that is it's basically like a tax.
That's how I'm saying
even though it's not a tax
I'm seeing as a tax
and I'm seeing as a tax
that if that company was in the UK
and I was remain resident in the UK,
£10,000 profit,
I would have paid about that much.
So if I make more than about £10,000,
(08:49):
probably a bit more than before,
I make more than about £10,000 profit,
then I'm better off with this company
set up in Dubai.
So the application process, how was it?
First of all,
you've got to select
your business category and I mentioned it
earlier, it's a bit complicated
and they are really restrictive.
So with the free zone I set up with, it's
(09:12):
three, three of them.
So three are included within the fee,
but you can choose up to six
different business
categories on your licence.
Now, some of you
who operate businesses in
the UK will be saying Yes,
but we have SIC codes,
SIC codes in the UK and yes, we do,
but it's a very different thing.
You can have an SIC code right now,
(09:35):
you can set up a business
selling microphones today and tomorrow.
In that same business
you could start selling sandwiches
if you chose to.
In the UAE, it's not like that.
They're very restrictive
on what you can do.
So there are nonregulated and regulated
categories.
Regulated categories
probably isn't for the vast
majority of you.
(09:56):
I had to look for some of them.
Most of these entrepreneurs
that will be listening to
this are going to be interested
in, and they require
specific approval from the government
and special licences,
which I don't know anything about at all.
So you're in the wrong place
if you are
looking for a regulated business,
but if it's not a regulated company,
that's the vast
majority of the options on there.
(10:17):
There are things like,
you know, professional licences
for consulting
a commercial trading
licences for import and export.
And if you have categories
in both professional and commercial
in my free zone,
any way you can combine them
for an extra fee
rather than having to set up
a completely separate free zone company.
Some categories require a degree,
(10:38):
which is bizarre.
Okay.
Well, it's not that bizarre.
It's not bizarre if you're a vet. Yes.
If you're going to set up
a veterinary practice
and you're going to be the vet,
then yes, absolutely.
I understand why you would need a degree.
However,
what I do not understand
is if you're a search
engine optimisation company,
why you would need a degree.
(10:59):
But you do
a businessman management degree. Bizarre.
I have no idea why,
but it that is a requirement.
So there are some odd things out there
which you can see
if you're looking on YouTube,
but it's one of those things
where you just have to abide
by the rules.
That's that's their rules.
You want to,
you know, benefit from the nicer,
(11:19):
potentially a nicer lifestyle
depending where you live and,
you know, much lower taxes,
then you've got to abide by the rules
and quite rightly, too.
So the application form so my free zone,
I thought the application form
was really straightforward.
And this is one of the reasons
why once I realised they were
I don't know why I said that so loud,
like I was singing.
Yeah.
Once I realised who
(11:40):
who they were
and was able to get in contact
with them directly
and it was like
using live chat by the way,
I'll speak about that later,
but it wasn't that difficult
to fit in the rest of the process.
So I'll be honest guys, and I'm
sorry if you are an agent
or one of these brokers or whatever,
but from my experience,
honestly, I couldn't have justified
having one.
Now it just doesn't make any sense.
(12:00):
But anyway,
that online form
is pretty straightforward.
You can choose it with
or without a residency visa.
Now, I didn't really pay much attention
to this at the start,
but it is quite an important decision to make
With the residency visa,
What that allows you to do,
it allows you to sponsor yourself,
basically that gives you
the establishment card
so that you can then sponsor yourself
to go and live in Dubai
(12:21):
or UAE for up to two years at a time.
It used to be free.
It's now two years on your visa.
I decided to do with the visa option
and you have to pay an extra fee
of about £500 for about $750,
something like that. I don't really know.
Like the exchange rates dollars
in the UK at the moment.
It's been going up and down,
but it's around there somewhere
and the additional cost
(12:42):
of allowing the visa plus the visa costs.
Okay, the application form,
personally
I thought it was pretty straightforward
and after I actually finally found out
who the authority was
that I could go directly with them.
And that was super simple, by the way.
And it was, you know,
the communication was fantastic.
The process was pretty slick
going forward.
I honestly,
(13:02):
having done this now, and I'm sorry
if you are in the business
of like brokering
or setting up these companies for people,
but if you are being set up
with the free zone
I'm with and using a broker
and paying a lot more money for it.
Personally,
I honestly don't see the point.
I don't know what you would have
possibly gained from it
other than saving yourself
probably about an hour of your time
(13:24):
to set it
up, like to complete all the forms.
and you get Emirati ID
and you can do everything
there basically.
But I'll do a video on that
when I get round doing the visa
just so that
you know what the process is.
So you can choose to get more than a year
and get a discount.
Now, normally
I'm quite
you know, I'm
the person who will sign up
(13:44):
to a year for fee, you know,
and there's like a 12 month plan
and it'll do like 12 months
for the price of ten or whatever.
I wouldn't
normally do that
because I just
don't like paying extra money
when I don't have to.
But in this case,
I had come across a video
and I'm going to try and find it
because I feel like I probably should,
you know, shout her out a bit.
It's a British entrepreneur and okay,
(14:04):
so I went and found the video,
so I'm going to put the link in
the show notes
and it's a British entrepreneur.
Her name is Mable Goulden
Hopefully I said that right.
And she had a bit of an experience with
one of these
companies.
She set
up a free zone company initially and paid
for a number of years
to get that discount.
And then I can't remember exactly,
(14:25):
but since I watched the video,
this video from last year, from 2022,
she had some issues with them
and needed to set up with someone else.
And basically
it was just a waste of money.
So I just thought
let me just air on the side of caution.
And yes, even now
I plan on being succeeding.
Of course,
I wouldn't want to sort of dump
in five years
worth of money
(14:46):
when ultimately it might fail.
And then I lost all that money.
So anyway, I decided on the one year.
So the most confusing part
was the share allocation,
which is just your liability.
So similarly in the UK
with a limited liability company
or an LLC in the United States
or various places around the world,
you you are limited by your share capital
(15:08):
that you have
now the minimum share capital of in
for the free zone
for at least my free zone company
I don't know about the others is 10,000AED
which is
well 10,000 Dirham
which is what £2,000.
£2,250 out of that.
Yes. It's 10,000 dirhams
It's about
(15:29):
it's a minimum of
about £2,200 or 2,700 USD.
But the recommended minimum is 48,000AED
which is about £10,000
or about
12,500-13,000 US dollars.
And that's if you is
if you need to have a partner
or investor residence visa.
(15:50):
Otherwise you cannot have it.
You can only be classed
as like a general manager
or some other title in the business.
And funnily enough,
I might as I mention it,
Managing Director,
if you want the title
of Managing Director,
which is normal in the UK,
anyone setting up a business
become Managing director.
If you want that title,
and then you have to have
(16:11):
a business degree
or there was like
a certain number of years
in an intimate, only recognised
corporation, I think
like a big corporation. Bizarre.
But again,
you know, this is just how it is.
But if you want the investor
or residence visa, there is no difference
to the right to have a visa but yet
pay extra for it.
So anyway, that's the application form.
(16:34):
Honestly, it was straightforward.
You know, the most confusing part
was the share allocation.
If you're not used to what that means.
And by the way, if you're wondering
do you have to actually
put that money into the bank?
No, you only need to put that money
into the bank
if you want your share certificate.
Yeah. Yeah, that's right.
So if you want your share certificate
(16:55):
for them to print out and actually say
these are the shares that you own,
you need to have put that money
into the bank
and the bank can issue a statement
to say, yes, they've deposited this money
and then no issue of shares typically.
So you'd need that
if you're going to do something
like selling the business.
So something else I just for,
it's not basically a right notes here.
(17:15):
It's not in my notes right now.
But one of the questions
it would probably come up around
limited liability
is, is a free zone company,
a limited liability company.
Now I searched for that for ages.
And to be honest with you,
I couldn't find a real answer.
But it was when I dealt
with this free zone
and the guy Switty
who I dealt with it been honestly,
(17:37):
he's been incredible. He's so helpful.
He pointed me to some information
and basically long and short of it is.
Yes, it is.
You are limited to your
your share capital.
So, for example,
if you end up getting similar to the UK,
if you end up getting sued for a shit
ton of money
because you thought you're limited to
whatever you put your share cap
to as as your personal liability
(17:57):
in the business.
So whether that's 10,000 dirhams
or 40,000 dirhams or whatever,
whatever you,
that's what you're limited to.
So the minimum is 10,000.
They recommend a minimum of 40,000
if you want an investor slash partners
residence visa.
Now the payment, how does that work?
So I'll be honest with you,
I was still a bit nervous
(18:17):
at that time about,
you know, it's a complete these forms.
And the thing that made me
nervous was the the free zone
Some of these free zones
pretty much all of them.
I've seen their website addresses.
They're not official government
website addresses, not like .gov
or anything like that.
It's kind of like, you know, the trust factor
that is not quite there.
And I was still thinking at this point,
am I being scammed?
(18:37):
You know,
is this the point
where I send my money
and I will never hear from Switty
or his friends again
who've been helping me out
on my application
and I was a bit nervous
about sending the money,
I'll be honest about that.
And so I just thought,
yeah, they give you the option
to pay
by credit card with a fee,
which is about 2% extra
to cover that processing costs.
I didn't use a credit card,
(18:59):
although I was thinking
I was thinking at one point
maybe I should be like,
you know, a fairly easy
way to get my money back if I needed to.
But there's two reasons why
I didn't want to use a credit card,
the main one being
if you pay for it,
you've got to pay in dirhams, right?
And you know, where did I go?
United States.
I paid.
I pay for something in dollars
(19:20):
and I had an extortion fee
and he was the conversion rate
terrible on my credit card.
They they put an extortionate fee
on top of the transaction as well,
just for the fact that they
it was a foreign transaction.
So I was like I'm not doing that.
Plus then also paying the 2% for them.
So I thought,
well I'm not going to do that.
So I use wise
(19:42):
and it is not an advert for wise.
By the way,
why is do not sponsor me and my 201,
my 226
followers or whatever I've got wise
I've used for a long time,
I've used it for paying my virtual
assistance abroad,
which is what this company is for.
This company
I've set up in the United Arab
Emirates, in Dubai, is
(20:03):
a virtual assistant company,
and that's what I've set up there.
Now I use wires to transfer the money
because once you get the best conversion
rate out there,
I've used it for a long time
to pay my staff.
I know it goes really quickly,
so I pay my staff,
like in the Philippines
and it goes super quick.
They get it usually within
sort of half
an hour of notice that next day.
(20:25):
So I knew is going to get there.
I paid on Friday,
the 5th of May in the afternoon UK time.
They don't want weekends every day.
And I just like, nope, no work,
that's fine.
So I paid on Friday afternoon
UK time,
which was already the evening their time.
So they they,
they picked that up till Monday.
I emailed the proof of payment
(20:46):
which is all they wanted.
They didn't want to verify
the payment
had actually arrived
before they move on
to the next part of the process
and they started work on it on Monday
the 7th of May.
It only took a few days.
Thankfully it didn't take very long.
So if you're thinking
how long did it take to get set up?
Was it weeks?
Was it months? No, it wasn't.
My free zone
(21:06):
company was set up
and all the documents
sent to me on Thursday
11th of May and morning
and the establishment card
was sent to me a few days later.
And like I mentioned earlier,
the establishment card again,
is something I didn't know what it was,
so I had to research it and find out.
And ask Switty, he must hate me.
I've asked him so many questions,
but it's there
so that you can sponsor people
(21:27):
to come into the UAE for the business.
So what documents do you get now?
If you're on YouTube, I'm
going to show you these.
Some bits might be blurred out
if I don't need to know certain
bits of information about me,
but they're going to be showed.
So if you're listening on the podcast,
hop over to YouTube,
the links in show notes
anyway, so you can do that,
(21:47):
but what documents do you get?
So I've got them all saved
in case I ever get asked to produce it.
So I put it into my phone,
I put it onto my laptop
and in my cloud, just in case.
I don't know.
I've got this like, freakish feeling
that something bad is going to happen
and they're going to be like,
Where are your documents?!
or you're going to go to prison forever.
But you get a certificate of formation,
which is incorporation
(22:07):
from the government.
You get a trade licence,
which shows the business categories.
I mentioned earlier
that you are allowed to trade in.
You get a memorandum of association,
which is same as the UK.
It shows the share capital
and if you you know
how the company will operate,
it's just the bog standard version.
You get a unit lease agreement.
(22:28):
So as I mentioned earlier
with this, with this free zone,
you don't need to actually
take a new lease.
I have to pay for it for an office
or anything like that.
They just include a unit lease agreement,
which I think covers the UAE law.
I don't actually have an office.
It's a registered office effectively,
but I can get offices there and a
surprisingly like compared
to the price of housing there
Anyway, that's another story.
(22:49):
An establishment card
that allows you to sponsor,
employ foreign workers.
So all of those things, apart
from memorandum of association,
I don’t know what any of them were.
And I’ll have to ask Switty
Tell me what all of those things meant
and why the numbers are different
on the certificate
of formation and trade licence again,
I thought they had me off.
Are they conning me or something?
Because the numbers don't match up.
(23:10):
It's really strange to understand,
but he just says it's
literally always like that,
so I've just had to take it.
That is the case.
So the share certificate
I’ve sort of already touched on,
you cannot get share certificate
until you've opened up
the bank account and deposit
at least the share capital,
in my case, 48,000 a day.
I think I've put down 50,000 and I need
(23:30):
the bank has got to provide proof.
proof to the free zone
basically that you have deposited
that money
and they’ll issue a certificate to you.
So how to open up a bank
account in Dubai?
Oh, my God.
So I haven't quite done it yet.
So there’s a few things.
you actually
can't open up the bank account
for the business.
(23:50):
As far as I'm aware,
you cannot do that
without the Emirates ID.
So this is where
the potential problem was
if you chose not to get a residency visa
because you might have the option
not to early on
then realise
you can't open up a bank account
without getting your residency visa
and then you'd have to pay
another £500 as a fee,
an admin fee
plus the cost of the residency visa.
(24:12):
That's why I specifically mentioned it
because it is issue.
This is where there seems
to be masses of problems,
like you need Emirati ID and the visa
and you need to be in the country
to apply for the account.
Which is strange
because you know, the UAE,
they seem so advanced in everything.
Like technology is just
everything is led by technology
(24:32):
there, it looks like anyway.
But then they've got proper
old school, crappy banking,
you know, old school,
sort of like 1990s banking in the UK.
And I'm really not looking forward to it.
Literally the best
banks, the best banks that I could find
so far
recommended by several UK business owners
(24:53):
that I've spoken to on
Facebook group Brits in Dubai.
And the best one is as been recommended.
The most so far is NDB Bank.
Now guess how much work
their star rating is on Trustpilot.
It's a massive 1.3 stars.
I've never seen that in my life.
Not for a
like a major company
(25:14):
and the highest rating for banks so far
that I found a 1.7 stars.
So clearly there's a disconnect
because the vast majority of people
in Dubai,
particularly are foreigners.
And it's like 85, 90% are foreigners.
I would be one, obviously a foreigner,
and they've got some like crappy
banking way of doing banking.
(25:35):
You know,
you can literally open up
a bank account now
on your phone here,
like I probably say, no problem,
unless it's a business bank,
then you can have a problem opening it,
which I have done in the past.
Even with the challenger banks.
But anyway, it seemed like it's
going to be a challenge
and so
I'm not really looking forward to that.
But I'd have to get the visa,
I'd have to get a residency sorted out
to be able to even open up
a bank account there,
which is really annoying.
(25:56):
But it's going to have to be done
if I want a bank account now.
So what about the visas and residency stuff?
As I'm losing my voice,
I have to wrap this up.
I'm going to do another video
about these.
Okay.
Once my visa is issued,
I think I'm going to do a video about it.
If you're a UK resident now
and you get the residents
visa in Dubai
or anywhere in the UAE, just bear in mind
(26:17):
that alone
does not automatically mean
you're going to pay 0% income tax.
You know,
if that not only does it
not automatically mean
that it's so far from it,
the rules are really complex.
There is a double tax treaty
which is complex,
and I've even got my account
to do some homework for it.
So once he's come back to me
on that, I'm
also going to be speaking
(26:38):
to an accountant in Dubai at some point
and the fees they differ massively
depending on
if you're inside the UAE
or outside the UAE when you apply.
Interestingly, it's actually
more when you're inside the UAE
to apply for a visa
than when you're outside the UAE.
I think there's some admin fees around
changing the visa
that you're currently like in there
(26:59):
with whatever is a tourist visa
wherever you've got.
So, yeah, I will do another video on that
just because I think that on its own
it's going to be a really long
topic, a long process
and I haven't been through it yet,
so I don't know.
Now to wrap this up personally,
I'm really glad
I'm really glad that I took the time
to do the research
and find the direct
free zone of authority to go directly
(27:21):
with rather than using a broker,
if only for the fact
I can go directly to the free zone
if I have issues with them
or payments
or anything like that, you know,
they they're accountable to me for
the should
the payments and all the costs
and stuff
that they've already sent to me.
Some of these agents operating out there,
they know
certainly is my free zone,
(27:42):
which actually gets
recommended a lot by them. Okay.
So I've gone to a number of brokers
as well as both of them,
and I recommended the free zone.
I'm with.
You get recommended a lot,
but your hands are tied with them
if you need any
any changes to be done
or if they come up with some random fees
that you have to pay.
You know,
I've been fees that they make up.
They can charge you.
They may not have told you about
(28:03):
for anything to get done.
The other thing
is there's literally so many bad reviews
among literally hundreds
and hundreds
of what look like fake Google reviews
where they seem to take the money
and then the people are waiting months
to get their company sets up,
they're free zone, company sets up,
which is crazy.
It literally took me
(28:23):
what from can't remember
the dates that I put down here.
It literally took five days
from the point
that they picked up my location
and proof of payment
for them to have it set up
and all the documents sent to me.
That was me going directly.
So honestly,
I just don't see the point
in using a broker or an agent.
I don't even know what I code.
I don't know what you'd call them.
What would you call them
if you know, let me know. Right.
I'm in the notes
(28:43):
because I don't know what they call,
but I'm calling
that broken agent wherever they are
and potentially hidden fees.
And then there's just loads of reviews
about complete fraud
where they've taken the money
and never heard back from them again
and they've not been able
to reclaim their money.
So yeah, I'm
so glad I took the time to go
directly with the free zone.
Who knows, maybe I'll go out there
and I realise actually
I've been scammed all along
(29:04):
and they're all fake documents
and I go to jail
and you never hear from me again.
Who knows?
But the free zone I'm aware of,
honestly, it's
not the cheapest,
but it's also nowhere near
the most expensive. By a long, long way.
You get a lot of freedom with it.
You know the pros.
You can also set it up
when you're not in the country,
which is a big thing
for people like myself who, you know,
(29:24):
I don't want to have to fly to Dubai
just to set up the company when it's
maybe not the convenient
time for me to go.
I've got it set up
while I'm still in the UK.
The freeze in are really helpful.
So the account manager assigned to me
a guy called Switty, he was so helpful
answering my questions.
He was you.
Honestly,
sometimes it was like live chat.
(29:44):
Send me an email. Bang.
I get an email back within a few minutes.
I'm like, Hold on guy, you are too quick.
Are you a bot?
But he's, he's
so knowledgeable and really helpful.
I never spoke to the guy.
once on the phone even on a conference call
it’s all been through WhatsApp
but a WhatsApp and email.
But yeah really helpful.
Couldn't recommend them enough.
And if you do want to speak to him
(30:05):
directly, let me know.
I'll put you in direct contact with him
because he was so helpful to me
and he said
I can park people over to him.
So the process for me was really swift
is me sort of held up the visa stage
so I wasn't sure
if I wanted to go for the visa
or not at that point, but I held that up.
I've now got the visa issued.
I'll mention about that another time
(30:26):
and I'll be going to Dubai
in June, in June 23, for three weeks
just to check it out,
you know, see if I like it,
see if I when I go
and get my full visa issued.
And if you do want to set up,
you can be like
I said, get in touch
in a can of show notes
with your name and your email
and I'll connect you,
direct you, Switty,
you know, so helpful to me,
I can't recommend him enough.
(30:46):
I also don't
speak to anyone else
from the free zone, apart from the people
who help with the visas
and stuff afterwards.
But as the initial sort
of point of contact.
Yeah, definitely.
I would highly recommend them.
And the free zone. I've been with
Again, I’m Aaron and I will
definitely share
some footage of being in Dubai.
Look out for that.
I'll probably put it on my Instagram.
So if you're not following me on Instagram,
(31:07):
Go to Aaron Henray (@aaronhenray) on Instagram
Links and the Show Notes.
Bye!
I set up my free zone company
in Dubai, UAE, in May 2023,
and it was such a complicated process
and there's a lot of research I did.
I thought it'd be worth doing
a quick episode on the process.
(00:40):
I thought it'd be worth
doing a quick episode on the process
because I'm sure there's lots of people,
particularly from the UK,
United States, Australia
and a few other places around the world
where they're not
really sure of the process.
And it can get really confusing
when you start searching online.
So the first thing that struck me
was when I was searching how to do this.
(01:02):
You just get tons
and tons of companies
that are offering
business set up services
for free zones in Dubai, and there's over
40 free zones to choose from in the UAE
with 20 of them alone
or might be more than 20 just in Dubai.
So there are some that specialise
in certain industries,
and the cost,
(01:22):
depending on where you're looking,
can really, really range from anywhere
from around
like 3000 dirhams all the way to,
you know, 100,000.
I've even seen as,
as a setup fee
with lots in the middle, about 50,000
which is around,
you know, around £10,000.
I don't know what's
that about 13,000 USD approximately.
(01:45):
And that's just a lot of money
to set up a company.
And there are tons
and tons of agencies
that are out there
offering these services.
And I actually was searching for ages
and I come across the free zone.
I ended up incorporating the company
with like setting up
the free zone company with directly.
(02:05):
I come across them weeks
before
I realised they were the actual authority
who you have to set up
the free zone with.
I just thought
they were just another one of the many,
many companies that are out there
who are offering these set up services.
So do you need to use an agent in Dubai?
Well, I didn't.
(02:27):
I may if you listen to the video
about a year ago, I did mention about a
one of the setup companies
where they help
people like you set up
your businesses in Dubai
or anywhere, you know, in the UAE,
full stop
as a free zone
and they charge you a fee for that.
But I wanted to go direct
with the authority
(02:48):
just because I was seeing
this crazy range of prices.
And I'm just like, well,
clearly there's even some of you
that are just scamming people
and taking money,
which is just a scam
where it's really low
or there's some of you
where you're just charging
extremely high service
fees for the introduction.
And so I just thought, you know what,
(03:09):
let me try and find the authority.
So that's what I did.
Now, how do you choose which free zone
to open up your company
with, first of all?
So that was one of the issues.
There are
lots of free zones that I mentioned.
There's like over 40 in the UAE
and some of them specialise
in individual things.
And some of these websites that you land
(03:31):
on where I've mentioned
about these agents,
they may appear
like they are the actual free
zone company,
the free zone
sort of authority in themselves,
but they're not.
But they will lead you
to believe they are
and there were tons of them
that I saw
with an absolute ton of reviews
which just look like spam to me.
(03:52):
Really, really fantastic reviews
We have like the probably
the real ones in the middle,
which were absolutely horrendous.
But anyway, I found the free zone
that I'm registered with.
Like I mentioned weeks before,
I didn't realise that the official body
and I literally must have done
15 to 20 hours of research
just working out
which free zone to pursue
and avoided the agents
(04:13):
that have those, you know,
really shady looking reviews.
I started seeing like you get like
really one really, really bad comment.
And then within a couple of days
there's suddenly like
50 really positive ones
and it's just like probably not real.
But in any case,
there are some things
that you need to pay
attention to, things to note.
And one of the first things I'd say is
(04:34):
being careful of the hidden fees.
That wasn't an issue in my case,
but I've seen lots of reviews.
Like I said, I did delve into this
where agents don't tell you
about a number of the fees
that you're going
to have to pay on the line.
And one of the things that I discovered
when I set up with the free zone
I ended up setting up with, is that
(04:59):
that free zone?
Anyway, if
you set up for an agent
in the future, if you have any issues
around the fees or anything like that,
you have to go through the agent.
You can't go direct to the free zone.
I'm sure it's just some agreement
that they've got between
they're the agents
that pass those deals to them.
So if you go have an agent,
you cannot contact
the free zones directly
(05:20):
or at least the one that I'm with
and that's
if you have any issues or concerns
you need to go through your agent
and they may charge you
their own fees, you know,
which they may
have not disclosed at the outset,
but they sort of
have got a hold over you in that sense.
Certainly with the free zone
that I'm with now,
there are lots of business categories
(05:42):
and that was one of the
most confusing thing.
They seem to be really,
really strict and specific
about what you can and cannot do.
You cannot sell within the UAE
outside of your free zone.
And there's also potentially issues
over this new 9% corporation tax.
If you do sell inside your free zone
or anywhere in the UAE potentially.
(06:03):
So that's not completely clear right now.
I will come back to that another point.
Once I finally got that ironed out,
the corporation tax is not 0% anymore
for businesses in Dubai or the UAE.
Full stop.
See the video that I did a year ago,
which I link to,
but it may still be free.
Okay, There's a caveat.
(06:24):
It may still be free,
but I want to make sure I've got hundreds
and accurate information
before I stop putting that out to you
and you start making plans on that.
But don't make plans
based on anything I say.
Anyway,
if you want to close it down,
you'll have to pay quite a substantial
sum of money.
Potentially it might be like £1,000.
It could be more to
close down the company
and some free zones allow you to do
(06:45):
the company setup process from abroad
as mine did
others require
you actually to be present in the country
if he's about to set it up.
Now, if you don't have an office space,
there's lots of free zones
I've seen where they require you
to have an office space,
so you must lace an office space
even if you don't need it.
Like lots of businesses
like mine are online.
You don't need an office space,
(07:06):
and even if you don't need it,
they require you to have a lease.
And actually
the way that mine was pitched
is that you don't
require to have a lease.
And actually
when I did set it up,
I did get a lease agreement with it,
but I've not paid some extra for that.
So it just seems to be something
that they've just done to get past
whatever the rules are
with the government.
So what are the costs
(07:27):
with the exchange rate?
At the time
I paid around £3,700
and that included my establishment card
that allows that new company
that I have out in Dubai
to sponsor foreign workers,
including myself.
Yes, they have to sponsor me,
which if you compare
the cost of setting up to the UK,
(07:47):
I mean, they're not comparable.
The UK is £13. Yes.
One three pounds
to set up a company in the UK versus 3700
to set it up in Dubai as a free zone
and you're really limited in what you can do
in the UK.
If you set up your company at £13,
you pretty much do what you want with it.
(08:08):
In the United States. Similar thing.
I think theirs is like $150
or something like that to set it up,
which is still a massive difference from,
you know, £3,700.
That's about 5,000 USD.
It's a humongous sum of money
and that's not a one time payment.
Even people
that is something
that you are going to pay
on an annual basis.
(08:28):
So the way I'm seeing that
in my head in justifying
that is it's basically like a tax.
That's how I'm saying
even though it's not a tax
I'm seeing as a tax
and I'm seeing as a tax
that if that company was in the UK
and I was remain resident in the UK,
£10,000 profit,
I would have paid about that much.
So if I make more than about £10,000,
(08:49):
probably a bit more than before,
I make more than about £10,000 profit,
then I'm better off with this company
set up in Dubai.
So the application process, how was it?
First of all,
you've got to select
your business category and I mentioned it
earlier, it's a bit complicated
and they are really restrictive.
So with the free zone I set up with, it's
(09:12):
three, three of them.
So three are included within the fee,
but you can choose up to six
different business
categories on your licence.
Now, some of you
who operate businesses in
the UK will be saying Yes,
but we have SIC codes,
SIC codes in the UK and yes, we do,
but it's a very different thing.
You can have an SIC code right now,
(09:35):
you can set up a business
selling microphones today and tomorrow.
In that same business
you could start selling sandwiches
if you chose to.
In the UAE, it's not like that.
They're very restrictive
on what you can do.
So there are nonregulated and regulated
categories.
Regulated categories
probably isn't for the vast
majority of you.
(09:56):
I had to look for some of them.
Most of these entrepreneurs
that will be listening to
this are going to be interested
in, and they require
specific approval from the government
and special licences,
which I don't know anything about at all.
So you're in the wrong place
if you are
looking for a regulated business,
but if it's not a regulated company,
that's the vast
majority of the options on there.
(10:17):
There are things like,
you know, professional licences
for consulting
a commercial trading
licences for import and export.
And if you have categories
in both professional and commercial
in my free zone,
any way you can combine them
for an extra fee
rather than having to set up
a completely separate free zone company.
Some categories require a degree,
(10:38):
which is bizarre.
Okay.
Well, it's not that bizarre.
It's not bizarre if you're a vet. Yes.
If you're going to set up
a veterinary practice
and you're going to be the vet,
then yes, absolutely.
I understand why you would need a degree.
However,
what I do not understand
is if you're a search
engine optimisation company,
why you would need a degree.
(10:59):
But you do
a businessman management degree. Bizarre.
I have no idea why,
but it that is a requirement.
So there are some odd things out there
which you can see
if you're looking on YouTube,
but it's one of those things
where you just have to abide
by the rules.
That's that's their rules.
You want to,
you know, benefit from the nicer,
(11:19):
potentially a nicer lifestyle
depending where you live and,
you know, much lower taxes,
then you've got to abide by the rules
and quite rightly, too.
So the application form so my free zone,
I thought the application form
was really straightforward.
And this is one of the reasons
why once I realised they were
I don't know why I said that so loud,
like I was singing.
Yeah.
Once I realised who
(11:40):
who they were
and was able to get in contact
with them directly
and it was like
using live chat by the way,
I'll speak about that later,
but it wasn't that difficult
to fit in the rest of the process.
So I'll be honest guys, and I'm
sorry if you are an agent
or one of these brokers or whatever,
but from my experience,
honestly, I couldn't have justified
having one.
Now it just doesn't make any sense.
(12:00):
But anyway,
that online form
is pretty straightforward.
You can choose it with
or without a residency visa.
Now, I didn't really pay much attention
to this at the start,
but it is quite an important decision to make
With the residency visa,
What that allows you to do,
it allows you to sponsor yourself,
basically that gives you
the establishment card
so that you can then sponsor yourself
to go and live in Dubai
(12:21):
or UAE for up to two years at a time.
It used to be free.
It's now two years on your visa.
I decided to do with the visa option
and you have to pay an extra fee
of about £500 for about $750,
something like that. I don't really know.
Like the exchange rates dollars
in the UK at the moment.
It's been going up and down,
but it's around there somewhere
and the additional cost
(12:42):
of allowing the visa plus the visa costs.
Okay, the application form,
personally
I thought it was pretty straightforward
and after I actually finally found out
who the authority was
that I could go directly with them.
And that was super simple, by the way.
And it was, you know,
the communication was fantastic.
The process was pretty slick
going forward.
I honestly,
(13:02):
having done this now, and I'm sorry
if you are in the business
of like brokering
or setting up these companies for people,
but if you are being set up
with the free zone
I'm with and using a broker
and paying a lot more money for it.
Personally,
I honestly don't see the point.
I don't know what you would have
possibly gained from it
other than saving yourself
probably about an hour of your time
(13:24):
to set it
up, like to complete all the forms.
and you get Emirati ID
and you can do everything
there basically.
But I'll do a video on that
when I get round doing the visa
just so that
you know what the process is.
So you can choose to get more than a year
and get a discount.
Now, normally
I'm quite
you know, I'm
the person who will sign up
(13:44):
to a year for fee, you know,
and there's like a 12 month plan
and it'll do like 12 months
for the price of ten or whatever.
I wouldn't
normally do that
because I just
don't like paying extra money
when I don't have to.
But in this case,
I had come across a video
and I'm going to try and find it
because I feel like I probably should,
you know, shout her out a bit.
It's a British entrepreneur and okay,
(14:04):
so I went and found the video,
so I'm going to put the link in
the show notes
and it's a British entrepreneur.
Her name is Mable Goulden
Hopefully I said that right.
And she had a bit of an experience with
one of these
companies.
She set
up a free zone company initially and paid
for a number of years
to get that discount.
And then I can't remember exactly,
(14:25):
but since I watched the video,
this video from last year, from 2022,
she had some issues with them
and needed to set up with someone else.
And basically
it was just a waste of money.
So I just thought
let me just air on the side of caution.
And yes, even now
I plan on being succeeding.
Of course,
I wouldn't want to sort of dump
in five years
worth of money
(14:46):
when ultimately it might fail.
And then I lost all that money.
So anyway, I decided on the one year.
So the most confusing part
was the share allocation,
which is just your liability.
So similarly in the UK
with a limited liability company
or an LLC in the United States
or various places around the world,
you you are limited by your share capital
(15:08):
that you have
now the minimum share capital of in
for the free zone
for at least my free zone company
I don't know about the others is 10,000AED
which is
well 10,000 Dirham
which is what £2,000.
£2,250 out of that.
Yes. It's 10,000 dirhams
It's about
(15:29):
it's a minimum of
about £2,200 or 2,700 USD.
But the recommended minimum is 48,000AED
which is about £10,000
or about
12,500-13,000 US dollars.
And that's if you is
if you need to have a partner
or investor residence visa.
(15:50):
Otherwise you cannot have it.
You can only be classed
as like a general manager
or some other title in the business.
And funnily enough,
I might as I mention it,
Managing Director,
if you want the title
of Managing Director,
which is normal in the UK,
anyone setting up a business
become Managing director.
If you want that title,
and then you have to have
(16:11):
a business degree
or there was like
a certain number of years
in an intimate, only recognised
corporation, I think
like a big corporation. Bizarre.
But again,
you know, this is just how it is.
But if you want the investor
or residence visa, there is no difference
to the right to have a visa but yet
pay extra for it.
So anyway, that's the application form.
(16:34):
Honestly, it was straightforward.
You know, the most confusing part
was the share allocation.
If you're not used to what that means.
And by the way, if you're wondering
do you have to actually
put that money into the bank?
No, you only need to put that money
into the bank
if you want your share certificate.
Yeah. Yeah, that's right.
So if you want your share certificate
(16:55):
for them to print out and actually say
these are the shares that you own,
you need to have put that money
into the bank
and the bank can issue a statement
to say, yes, they've deposited this money
and then no issue of shares typically.
So you'd need that
if you're going to do something
like selling the business.
So something else I just for,
it's not basically a right notes here.
(17:15):
It's not in my notes right now.
But one of the questions
it would probably come up around
limited liability
is, is a free zone company,
a limited liability company.
Now I searched for that for ages.
And to be honest with you,
I couldn't find a real answer.
But it was when I dealt
with this free zone
and the guy Switty
who I dealt with it been honestly,
(17:37):
he's been incredible. He's so helpful.
He pointed me to some information
and basically long and short of it is.
Yes, it is.
You are limited to your
your share capital.
So, for example,
if you end up getting similar to the UK,
if you end up getting sued for a shit
ton of money
because you thought you're limited to
whatever you put your share cap
to as as your personal liability
(17:57):
in the business.
So whether that's 10,000 dirhams
or 40,000 dirhams or whatever,
whatever you,
that's what you're limited to.
So the minimum is 10,000.
They recommend a minimum of 40,000
if you want an investor slash partners
residence visa.
Now the payment, how does that work?
So I'll be honest with you,
I was still a bit nervous
(18:17):
at that time about,
you know, it's a complete these forms.
And the thing that made me
nervous was the the free zone
Some of these free zones
pretty much all of them.
I've seen their website addresses.
They're not official government
website addresses, not like .gov
or anything like that.
It's kind of like, you know, the trust factor
that is not quite there.
And I was still thinking at this point,
am I being scammed?
(18:37):
You know,
is this the point
where I send my money
and I will never hear from Switty
or his friends again
who've been helping me out
on my application
and I was a bit nervous
about sending the money,
I'll be honest about that.
And so I just thought,
yeah, they give you the option
to pay
by credit card with a fee,
which is about 2% extra
to cover that processing costs.
I didn't use a credit card,
(18:59):
although I was thinking
I was thinking at one point
maybe I should be like,
you know, a fairly easy
way to get my money back if I needed to.
But there's two reasons why
I didn't want to use a credit card,
the main one being
if you pay for it,
you've got to pay in dirhams, right?
And you know, where did I go?
United States.
I paid.
I pay for something in dollars
(19:20):
and I had an extortion fee
and he was the conversion rate
terrible on my credit card.
They they put an extortionate fee
on top of the transaction as well,
just for the fact that they
it was a foreign transaction.
So I was like I'm not doing that.
Plus then also paying the 2% for them.
So I thought,
well I'm not going to do that.
So I use wise
(19:42):
and it is not an advert for wise.
By the way,
why is do not sponsor me and my 201,
my 226
followers or whatever I've got wise
I've used for a long time,
I've used it for paying my virtual
assistance abroad,
which is what this company is for.
This company
I've set up in the United Arab
Emirates, in Dubai, is
(20:03):
a virtual assistant company,
and that's what I've set up there.
Now I use wires to transfer the money
because once you get the best conversion
rate out there,
I've used it for a long time
to pay my staff.
I know it goes really quickly,
so I pay my staff,
like in the Philippines
and it goes super quick.
They get it usually within
sort of half
an hour of notice that next day.
(20:25):
So I knew is going to get there.
I paid on Friday,
the 5th of May in the afternoon UK time.
They don't want weekends every day.
And I just like, nope, no work,
that's fine.
So I paid on Friday afternoon
UK time,
which was already the evening their time.
So they they,
they picked that up till Monday.
I emailed the proof of payment
(20:46):
which is all they wanted.
They didn't want to verify
the payment
had actually arrived
before they move on
to the next part of the process
and they started work on it on Monday
the 7th of May.
It only took a few days.
Thankfully it didn't take very long.
So if you're thinking
how long did it take to get set up?
Was it weeks?
Was it months? No, it wasn't.
My free zone
(21:06):
company was set up
and all the documents
sent to me on Thursday
11th of May and morning
and the establishment card
was sent to me a few days later.
And like I mentioned earlier,
the establishment card again,
is something I didn't know what it was,
so I had to research it and find out.
And ask Switty, he must hate me.
I've asked him so many questions,
but it's there
so that you can sponsor people
(21:27):
to come into the UAE for the business.
So what documents do you get now?
If you're on YouTube, I'm
going to show you these.
Some bits might be blurred out
if I don't need to know certain
bits of information about me,
but they're going to be showed.
So if you're listening on the podcast,
hop over to YouTube,
the links in show notes
anyway, so you can do that,
(21:47):
but what documents do you get?
So I've got them all saved
in case I ever get asked to produce it.
So I put it into my phone,
I put it onto my laptop
and in my cloud, just in case.
I don't know.
I've got this like, freakish feeling
that something bad is going to happen
and they're going to be like,
Where are your documents?!
or you're going to go to prison forever.
But you get a certificate of formation,
which is incorporation
(22:07):
from the government.
You get a trade licence,
which shows the business categories.
I mentioned earlier
that you are allowed to trade in.
You get a memorandum of association,
which is same as the UK.
It shows the share capital
and if you you know
how the company will operate,
it's just the bog standard version.
You get a unit lease agreement.
(22:28):
So as I mentioned earlier
with this, with this free zone,
you don't need to actually
take a new lease.
I have to pay for it for an office
or anything like that.
They just include a unit lease agreement,
which I think covers the UAE law.
I don't actually have an office.
It's a registered office effectively,
but I can get offices there and a
surprisingly like compared
to the price of housing there
Anyway, that's another story.
(22:49):
An establishment card
that allows you to sponsor,
employ foreign workers.
So all of those things, apart
from memorandum of association,
I don’t know what any of them were.
And I’ll have to ask Switty
Tell me what all of those things meant
and why the numbers are different
on the certificate
of formation and trade licence again,
I thought they had me off.
Are they conning me or something?
Because the numbers don't match up.
(23:10):
It's really strange to understand,
but he just says it's
literally always like that,
so I've just had to take it.
That is the case.
So the share certificate
I’ve sort of already touched on,
you cannot get share certificate
until you've opened up
the bank account and deposit
at least the share capital,
in my case, 48,000 a day.
I think I've put down 50,000 and I need
(23:30):
the bank has got to provide proof.
proof to the free zone
basically that you have deposited
that money
and they’ll issue a certificate to you.
So how to open up a bank
account in Dubai?
Oh, my God.
So I haven't quite done it yet.
So there’s a few things.
you actually
can't open up the bank account
for the business.
(23:50):
As far as I'm aware,
you cannot do that
without the Emirates ID.
So this is where
the potential problem was
if you chose not to get a residency visa
because you might have the option
not to early on
then realise
you can't open up a bank account
without getting your residency visa
and then you'd have to pay
another £500 as a fee,
an admin fee
plus the cost of the residency visa.
(24:12):
That's why I specifically mentioned it
because it is issue.
This is where there seems
to be masses of problems,
like you need Emirati ID and the visa
and you need to be in the country
to apply for the account.
Which is strange
because you know, the UAE,
they seem so advanced in everything.
Like technology is just
everything is led by technology
(24:32):
there, it looks like anyway.
But then they've got proper
old school, crappy banking,
you know, old school,
sort of like 1990s banking in the UK.
And I'm really not looking forward to it.
Literally the best
banks, the best banks that I could find
so far
recommended by several UK business owners
(24:53):
that I've spoken to on
Facebook group Brits in Dubai.
And the best one is as been recommended.
The most so far is NDB Bank.
Now guess how much work
their star rating is on Trustpilot.
It's a massive 1.3 stars.
I've never seen that in my life.
Not for a
like a major company
(25:14):
and the highest rating for banks so far
that I found a 1.7 stars.
So clearly there's a disconnect
because the vast majority of people
in Dubai,
particularly are foreigners.
And it's like 85, 90% are foreigners.
I would be one, obviously a foreigner,
and they've got some like crappy
banking way of doing banking.
(25:35):
You know,
you can literally open up
a bank account now
on your phone here,
like I probably say, no problem,
unless it's a business bank,
then you can have a problem opening it,
which I have done in the past.
Even with the challenger banks.
But anyway, it seemed like it's
going to be a challenge
and so
I'm not really looking forward to that.
But I'd have to get the visa,
I'd have to get a residency sorted out
to be able to even open up
a bank account there,
which is really annoying.
(25:56):
But it's going to have to be done
if I want a bank account now.
So what about the visas and residency stuff?
As I'm losing my voice,
I have to wrap this up.
I'm going to do another video
about these.
Okay.
Once my visa is issued,
I think I'm going to do a video about it.
If you're a UK resident now
and you get the residents
visa in Dubai
or anywhere in the UAE, just bear in mind
(26:17):
that alone
does not automatically mean
you're going to pay 0% income tax.
You know,
if that not only does it
not automatically mean
that it's so far from it,
the rules are really complex.
There is a double tax treaty
which is complex,
and I've even got my account
to do some homework for it.
So once he's come back to me
on that, I'm
also going to be speaking
(26:38):
to an accountant in Dubai at some point
and the fees they differ massively
depending on
if you're inside the UAE
or outside the UAE when you apply.
Interestingly, it's actually
more when you're inside the UAE
to apply for a visa
than when you're outside the UAE.
I think there's some admin fees around
changing the visa
that you're currently like in there
(26:59):
with whatever is a tourist visa
wherever you've got.
So, yeah, I will do another video on that
just because I think that on its own
it's going to be a really long
topic, a long process
and I haven't been through it yet,
so I don't know.
Now to wrap this up personally,
I'm really glad
I'm really glad that I took the time
to do the research
and find the direct
free zone of authority to go directly
(27:21):
with rather than using a broker,
if only for the fact
I can go directly to the free zone
if I have issues with them
or payments
or anything like that, you know,
they they're accountable to me for
the should
the payments and all the costs
and stuff
that they've already sent to me.
Some of these agents operating out there,
they know
certainly is my free zone,
(27:42):
which actually gets
recommended a lot by them. Okay.
So I've gone to a number of brokers
as well as both of them,
and I recommended the free zone.
I'm with.
You get recommended a lot,
but your hands are tied with them
if you need any
any changes to be done
or if they come up with some random fees
that you have to pay.
You know,
I've been fees that they make up.
They can charge you.
They may not have told you about
(28:03):
for anything to get done.
The other thing
is there's literally so many bad reviews
among literally hundreds
and hundreds
of what look like fake Google reviews
where they seem to take the money
and then the people are waiting months
to get their company sets up,
they're free zone, company sets up,
which is crazy.
It literally took me
(28:23):
what from can't remember
the dates that I put down here.
It literally took five days
from the point
that they picked up my location
and proof of payment
for them to have it set up
and all the documents sent to me.
That was me going directly.
So honestly,
I just don't see the point
in using a broker or an agent.
I don't even know what I code.
I don't know what you'd call them.
What would you call them
if you know, let me know. Right.
I'm in the notes
(28:43):
because I don't know what they call,
but I'm calling
that broken agent wherever they are
and potentially hidden fees.
And then there's just loads of reviews
about complete fraud
where they've taken the money
and never heard back from them again
and they've not been able
to reclaim their money.
So yeah, I'm
so glad I took the time to go
directly with the free zone.
Who knows, maybe I'll go out there
and I realise actually
I've been scammed all along
(29:04):
and they're all fake documents
and I go to jail
and you never hear from me again.
Who knows?
But the free zone I'm aware of,
honestly, it's
not the cheapest,
but it's also nowhere near
the most expensive. By a long, long way.
You get a lot of freedom with it.
You know the pros.
You can also set it up
when you're not in the country,
which is a big thing
for people like myself who, you know,
(29:24):
I don't want to have to fly to Dubai
just to set up the company when it's
maybe not the convenient
time for me to go.
I've got it set up
while I'm still in the UK.
The freeze in are really helpful.
So the account manager assigned to me
a guy called Switty, he was so helpful
answering my questions.
He was you.
Honestly,
sometimes it was like live chat.
(29:44):
Send me an email. Bang.
I get an email back within a few minutes.
I'm like, Hold on guy, you are too quick.
Are you a bot?
But he's, he's
so knowledgeable and really helpful.
I never spoke to the guy.
once on the phone even on a conference call
it’s all been through WhatsApp
but a WhatsApp and email.
But yeah really helpful.
Couldn't recommend them enough.
And if you do want to speak to him
(30:05):
directly, let me know.
I'll put you in direct contact with him
because he was so helpful to me
and he said
I can park people over to him.
So the process for me was really swift
is me sort of held up the visa stage
so I wasn't sure
if I wanted to go for the visa
or not at that point, but I held that up.
I've now got the visa issued.
I'll mention about that another time
(30:26):
and I'll be going to Dubai
in June, in June 23, for three weeks
just to check it out,
you know, see if I like it,
see if I when I go
and get my full visa issued.
And if you do want to set up,
you can be like
I said, get in touch
in a can of show notes
with your name and your email
and I'll connect you,
direct you, Switty,
you know, so helpful to me,
I can't recommend him enough.
(30:46):
I also don't
speak to anyone else
from the free zone, apart from the people
who help with the visas
and stuff afterwards.
But as the initial sort
of point of contact.
Yeah, definitely.
I would highly recommend them.
And the free zone. I've been with
Again, I’m Aaron and I will
definitely share
some footage of being in Dubai.
Look out for that.
I'll probably put it on my Instagram.
So if you're not following me on Instagram,
(31:07):
Go to Aaron Henray (@aaronhenray) on Instagram
Links and the Show Notes.
Bye!
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