By the StartZone UAE Editorial Team | August 2026
Almost every guide to hiring domestic help in the Emirates opens with a price. That is the wrong place to start, and it is the reason free zone company owners so often get the process wrong on the first attempt. Before a single dirham changes hands you have to answer a structural question: who is the legal employer? On this one point, the law is unambiguous, and it does not say what most founders assume.
Federal Decree-Law No. 9 of 2022 on Domestic Workers — as amended by Federal Decree-Law No. 21 of 2023 — defines an employer as “any individual or recruitment agency that hires a worker for domestic duties.” An individual. Not a company, not a trade licence, and not a free zone establishment. Your IFZA, Meydan, SHAMS or RAKEZ licence has no standing in this process whatsoever. When you sponsor maid visa UAE authorities register the worker against you personally, on your own residence file, through the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation and the immigration authority of your emirate — never through the free zone that issued your licence.
That single fact reshapes the whole exercise: the budget, the paperwork, the deposit, the annual renewal, and what happens if the arrangement ends badly. This guide walks the process as it actually runs in 2026, with every statutory figure traced to the federal instrument or the ministry publication it comes from, and with an honest account of the numbers that no official source publishes at all.
Your free zone licence cannot sponsor a domestic worker — you can
The confusion is understandable. As a free zone owner you are already a sponsor: your company sponsors your investor or partner visa, and it sponsors the visas of any staff you hire under your visa quota. Employee sponsorship runs through the free zone authority, which issues the work permit and forwards the file to immigration. If you have been through that, see our walkthrough of how to hire employees in a UAE free zone, where the quota mechanics are set out in full.
Domestic workers sit outside that system entirely. The work permit comes from MOHRE, not the free zone. The residence permit is issued against your personal file at GDRFA or ICP, not against your licence. Your company’s visa quota is irrelevant — it neither helps you nor limits you. And the twenty-odd occupations that qualify as domestic work, from housemaid and nanny to personal driver, cook, gardener, private tutor and household security guard, are listed in the Implementing Regulation of the Decree-Law, which the Minister may amend to meet market demand.
What your licence does give you is the thing that makes the whole chain possible: a valid UAE residence permit of your own. Without one you have no file to sponsor anybody onto. If your investor visa is still pending, that is the first item on the critical path, and our guide to the UAE residence visa through a free zone company covers the sequence.
MOHRE runs three packages, and choosing between them is the real decision
Most cost articles treat “the maid visa” as one product. The ministry does not. MOHRE’s own Awareness Package for Employers of Domestic Workers sets out three distinct recruitment packages, and they differ in who employs the worker, who pays the salary, and who carries the risk.
The Classic Package — the ministry also calls it the traditional package — is direct recruitment through a licensed agency. The worker is registered in your personal file and lives with you for a two-year contract. You pay the salary, you carry the obligations, and the agency provides a two-year guarantee. This is what people mean when they talk about “getting a maid visa,” and it is the only one of the three that puts the worker on your sponsorship.
The Temporary Package provides a worker who stays registered with the recruitment agency for a two-year contract. The agency processes the residence visa before placement, pays the monthly salary and all legal entitlements, and absorbs medical costs. The ministry states plainly that the package price includes basic salary, return ticket, gratuity and dues. You never become the sponsor. Accommodation sits with the agency, though the worker may live with you if you want.
The Flexible Package is hourly, daily, weekly, monthly, six-monthly or annual engagement of an agency-registered worker. The agency handles the visa and the accommodation, and the package amount includes housing precisely because the worker is not living on your premises.
For a free zone founder the choice usually turns on permanence and appetite for administration. If you want live-in help and a long horizon, Classic is the route — and it is the one this guide follows through the fee stack. If you travel constantly, or your household is two people in an apartment, Temporary or Flexible removes the sponsorship, the annual renewal, the Wage Protection System registration and the end-of-service exposure in one move. That trade is worth pricing before you default to Classic because it is what everyone else did.
The government fee stack is small, fixed and published
Here is the part that surprises founders: the actual government charges are modest and knowable. The immigration fee structure for an in-country residence permit issuance runs at AED 200 for the permit, AED 500 as the in-country fee, AED 10 Knowledge Dirham, AED 10 Innovation Dirham and AED 20 delivery — roughly AED 740 before VAT, with the issuance fee stepping up by AED 100 a year once the residency runs past two years. The entry permit for a domestic worker is charged on the same pattern and allows the worker to remain for 60 days from entry while the residency file is completed.
Layered onto that are the two health checks that every residence file needs. The UAE medical fitness test and the Emirates ID application both run on the standard published tariffs, unchanged by the fact that the applicant is a domestic worker rather than an employee.
Add it up and the sovereign portion of a maid visa is in the low four figures. When you are quoted AED 12,000 or AED 15,000, almost none of that is government fee. It is the agency package — and that is a different animal with different rules.
Agency package prices sit under a ministry ceiling, not a ministry tariff
MOHRE lists “Ministry-set price ceilings” among the features of the Classic Package, and Administrative Decision No. 5 of 2024 obliges agencies to provide flexible and temporary packages “within the Ministry’s price limits” and to display package prices clearly at their premises. Charging outside the approved package pricing is an enumerated violation, as is obtaining packages outside the ministry’s electronic systems.
What that means in practice: there is a cap, not a fixed price. Agencies compete below it, and the spread between quotes for the same nationality and the same experience band is real. It also means a quote you cannot see displayed at the premises, or a contract that did not come through the ministry’s system, is a red flag rather than a bargain.
The package price bundles recruitment from the source country, the pre-arrival medical, orientation in local customs, temporary accommodation before placement, and the government fees the agency fronts. The two-year guarantee is part of what you are buying — and it is enforceable in a way most buyers never test.
The refund formula is published, and it is more generous than most employers realise
This is the most under-reported part of the framework. The recruitment agency must refund you — in full or in part — in defined circumstances, and MOHRE publishes both the triggers and the arithmetic.
During the six-month probation period, a refund is owed if the worker is professionally or behaviourally incompetent, is found medically unfit, terminates the contract or refuses to work, or if the agency failed to meet the recruitment conditions you agreed. After the first six months, the trigger narrows to refusal to work or absconding.
The calculation is mechanical. Inside the first month you get the full recruitment fee back. If the worker is found medically unfit at any point in the six-month probation, you get the recruitment fee and the government fees back. After the first month and until the contract expires, the refund is prorated: total recruitment cost, divided by the contract duration in months, multiplied by the months remaining. The ministry’s own worked example is AED 12,000 over a 24-month contract with 10 months remaining, returning AED 5,000 to the employer.
The money must reach you within fourteen days of the worker being returned to the agency or reported absent. If it does not, the complaint route is the MOHRE smart app, the ministry website, or the Labour Claims and Advisory Call Centre on 80084.
Two insurance policies are mandatory, and one of them is a prerequisite to the permit
The domestic worker insurance scheme covers the worker’s financial dues — unpaid wages foremost — up to a maximum of AED 20,000 over a 30-month period, and also covers repatriation of the body in the event of death. MOHRE is explicit that the employer must procure this policy as a prerequisite for issuing the work permit. It is not optional and it is not something the agency can waive for you.
Separately, MOHRE, the Federal Authority for Identity, Citizenship, Customs and Port Security and the Ministry of Health and Prevention have launched a basic health insurance package for private sector employees and domestic workers at competitive prices with nominal treatment costs. Health cover for a resident is mandatory in any case; the joint package exists to give employers a compliant low-cost option rather than a premium corporate plan.
Income and housing thresholds are the one number nobody publishes
Here is where honesty serves you better than confidence. Search for the salary you need to sponsor a maid and you will find AED 6,000, AED 10,000, AED 15,000, AED 20,000 and AED 25,000 asserted with equal certainty, often on the same page. We could not verify any of them against a federal instrument or a published immigration tariff, and neither the Decree-Law nor the MOHRE employer guide sets a sponsor income floor at all.
The reason is structural. Sponsor eligibility for domestic help is administered at emirate level by GDRFA in Dubai and by ICP in the northern emirates, and it is applied with discretion — assessed against your income, your accommodation, your household composition and the profession requested. Two families with identical salaries in different emirates can get different answers, and the criteria are not published as a schedule you can check in advance.
The practical consequence for a free zone owner is that your documented income matters more than your actual income. An owner drawing profits rather than a salary has no salary certificate to submit, so the file is assessed on the trade licence, the establishment card, audited or bank-evidenced income, and the tenancy contract. Get those in order before you approach a typing centre, and use a licensed agency or an Amer or Tas-heel centre to pre-check your specific file rather than budgeting against a number you read online. The same discretion, and the same documentation problem, shows up when free zone owners bring in older relatives — we covered it in detail in the guide to sponsoring parents on a UAE visa.
Deposits are real, but they are not one deposit
The word “deposit” gets used for at least three different things in this process, and conflating them is how budgets go wrong.
The first is the refundable security or guarantee held by the immigration authority or the agency against the worker’s repatriation. It is returned at the end of the arrangement subject to conditions, and its size and existence vary by emirate and by package.
The second is the agency bank guarantee, which is a licensing requirement on the recruitment office itself — not on you. Failure to provide it is a listed violation in the ministry’s schedule. If an agency describes its own licensing guarantee as your deposit, that is a misrepresentation.
The third is the repatriation liability, which is not a deposit at all but a contingent cost. Under Article 20, if the contract ends for reasons not attributable to the worker, you pay the compensation due plus the cost of returning the worker home. If a directly recruited worker terminates after probation for reasons attributable to themselves, they bear their own repatriation — but you must cover it if they genuinely cannot. Where the worker was recruited through an agency, Article 5 puts repatriation cost and replacement on the agency.
Wages run through the Wage Protection System — but not for every profession
Wages are due from the first day of the month to the tenth of the same month, paid in UAE dirhams, through the ministry’s Wage Protection System for domestic workers.
The professions where WPS is mandatory are the white-collar end of the list: private trainer, private tutor, personal healthcare provider, personal public relations officer and private agricultural engineer. For housemaid, nanny or babysitter, housekeeper, cook, personal driver, gardener, farmer, physical labour worker, sailor, security guard, household shepherd, horse groomer and falcon tamer, WPS enrolment is optional.
Three categories are exempt from WPS procedures altogether: a worker with a labour complaint pending in court who is not employed with you, a worker against whom an absence report has been filed, and any new worker within thirty days of the contract start date.
The statutory entitlements are the recurring cost most budgets miss
Salary is the visible number. The entitlements around it are what turn a monthly figure into an annual one.
Annual leave is not less than 30 days for each year of service, paid in full before departure. Between six months and one year of service it accrues at two days a month — so eight months of service earns 16 days of basic salary. Beyond a year it accrues at 2.5 days a month, so a 14-month engagement carries 35 days. On expiry or termination, unused leave is paid out in cash at the last remuneration received.
A return air ticket to the home country is due once every two years when the worker takes annual leave abroad. If both parties agree to end the contract after that leave, you bear the ticket only.
Sick leave is 30 days per year of service, continuous or intermittent, on a medical report from an approved health authority: the first fifteen days at full pay, the next fifteen at half pay. No payment is due where the worker’s own behaviour caused the illness.
Rest entitlements are a paid weekly rest day — compensated with an alternate day or cash in lieu if worked — and at least twelve hours of rest per day, of which at least eight are consecutive. You are also required to provide appropriate accommodation, and meals and clothing necessary for the work where the worker is full-time. End-of-service gratuity rules are adopted by the Cabinet on the Minister’s recommendation. On expiry, compensation is payable within ten days of the contract end date.
Probation runs six months and the worker can move on
An employer may appoint a domestic worker on probation for a period of not more than six months from the date of employment. That window aligns exactly with the agency refund triggers, which is not a coincidence — it is the period in which a mismatch can be unwound at manageable cost.
Transfer to a new employer is permitted where all contractual requirements are met and the original employer’s rights are observed, under conditions set by Ministerial decision. If the worker joins another employer, you are no longer liable for repatriation costs.
The penalty for skipping the permit dwarfs every fee in this article
Employing a domestic worker without obtaining a work permit for them attracts a fine of not less than AED 50,000 and not more than AED 200,000 under Article 17 of the Decree-Law. The same band applies to using a domestic work permit for a purpose other than the one it was issued for, to recruiting or employing anyone under eighteen, and to assisting a worker to abandon employment or sheltering them for illegal employment.
Fines multiply by the number of workers involved, up to a ceiling of AED 10 million, and double on a repeat conviction within a year. Submitting false information or documents to recruit a worker carries imprisonment of up to six months and a fine of AED 20,000 to AED 100,000. A residual band of AED 5,000 to AED 1 million covers any other breach of the Decree-Law or its Implementing Regulation.
Set against a government fee stack in the hundreds and an agency package in the low five figures, the arithmetic of shortcuts is not close. MOHRE also warns employers that recruitment through unauthorised entities exposes the household to undisclosed health conditions, to workers with criminal records or illegal status, and to outright fraud.
Disputes go to MOHRE first, and small claims end there
If a dispute arises and you cannot settle it amicably with the worker, it must be referred to MOHRE. The ministry attempts an amicable resolution; if that fails within two weeks of receiving the complaint, the file goes to the competent court with a memorandum summarising the dispute, both parties’ arguments and the ministry’s recommendations.
Crucially, MOHRE renders a final decision where the value of the claim does not exceed AED 50,000, or where either party fails to comply with an amicable settlement decision regardless of claim value. Most domestic worker disputes fall under that ceiling, which means the ministry — not a courtroom — is where they actually end.
Complaints against the recruitment agency, as opposed to the worker, run through the MOHRE UAE smart application, the ministry website, or 80084.
What a realistic first-year budget looks like
Build the number in four layers rather than accepting a single bundled quote.
Layer one, government fees. Entry permit and residence permit issuance on the published immigration tariff, plus medical fitness and Emirates ID. Low four figures, and largely fixed.
Layer two, the agency package. Capped by the ministry, variable below the cap, and inclusive of source-country recruitment, pre-arrival medical, orientation and pre-placement accommodation. Ask for the displayed price list and the ministry-approved contract form.
Layer three, mandatory insurance. The dues policy covering up to AED 20,000 over 30 months — a prerequisite to the permit — plus health cover.
Layer four, the twelve-month running cost. Monthly salary, accommodation, meals and clothing, 30 days of paid annual leave, sick leave exposure, and a biennial return ticket amortised across two years. This is the layer that separates an AED 15,000 headline from the real annual figure, and it is the layer agency quotes never include.
Then compare that total against a Temporary or Flexible package, where layers three and four sit with the agency. For a founder whose time is the scarce resource, the bundled route often wins on more than convenience.
The sequence that avoids the common rejections
Confirm your own residence permit is valid and has enough runway — you cannot sponsor from a file that is about to expire. Get your documented-income evidence assembled: trade licence, establishment card, bank statements, tenancy contract in your name with accommodation appropriate to the household. Decide the package before you shop, because Classic, Temporary and Flexible are quoted on different bases and comparing them line-by-line is meaningless.
Verify the agency is licensed by MOHRE and that the package price is displayed at the premises. Insist on the ministry-approved contract form and the unified standard employment contract — anything else is outside the system and outside your protection. Arrange the dues insurance before the work permit application, not after. Then run entry permit, medical fitness, Emirates ID and residence stamping in order.
If any of that reads as more administration than you want to own personally, that is a legitimate finding rather than a failure — and it is exactly the point at which the Temporary package earns its premium. Founders working through the wider family file at the same time will find the overlapping steps mapped in our guide to sponsoring family on a UAE free zone visa.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can my free zone company sponsor a maid visa instead of me?
No. Federal Decree-Law No. 9 of 2022 defines the employer of a domestic worker as an individual or a licensed recruitment agency. A free zone establishment is neither. The work permit is issued by MOHRE and the residence permit is attached to your personal file — your trade licence and visa quota play no part in it.
What minimum salary do I need to sponsor maid visa UAE eligibility?
There is no federally published figure. Neither the Decree-Law nor MOHRE’s employer guide sets a sponsor income floor, and the thresholds quoted online range from AED 6,000 to AED 25,000 without a verifiable source. Eligibility is assessed at emirate level by GDRFA or ICP against your income, accommodation and household, with discretion. Have your file pre-checked rather than budgeting against an unverified number.
How much of the quoted maid visa cost is actually government fees?
Very little. In-country residence permit issuance runs at AED 200 for the permit plus AED 500 in-country fee, AED 10 Knowledge Dirham, AED 10 Innovation Dirham and AED 20 delivery — around AED 740 before VAT — with medical fitness and Emirates ID on top. The rest of a five-figure quote is the agency package, which sits under a ministry price ceiling rather than a fixed tariff.
Can I get my money back if the maid leaves during probation?
Yes, in defined circumstances. Within the first month you are entitled to the full recruitment fee. If the worker is found medically unfit within the six-month probation, you recover the recruitment fee and the government fees. After the first month the refund is prorated: total recruitment cost divided by contract months, multiplied by months remaining — MOHRE’s own example returns AED 5,000 on a AED 12,000 fee with 10 of 24 months left. The agency must pay within fourteen days.
Is insurance mandatory when I sponsor a domestic worker?
Yes. The domestic worker dues insurance policy — covering unpaid wages and other financial entitlements up to AED 20,000 over 30 months, and repatriation of remains in the event of death — is a stated prerequisite for issuing the work permit. Health insurance is separately mandatory, and MOHRE offers a joint basic package with ICP and MOHAP for employers.
Do I have to pay a housemaid through the Wage Protection System?
Not necessarily. WPS is mandatory for five domestic professions: private trainer, private tutor, personal healthcare provider, personal PRO and private agricultural engineer. For housemaid, nanny, housekeeper, cook, driver, gardener and the other manual categories, WPS enrolment is optional. Wages are due between the first and the tenth of the month either way, in UAE dirhams.
What happens if I employ a domestic worker without a permit?
A fine of not less than AED 50,000 and not more than AED 200,000 under Article 17. The same band applies to misusing a domestic work permit or employing anyone under eighteen. Fines multiply by the number of workers involved up to AED 10 million and double on a repeat conviction within a year.
How many days of leave is a domestic worker entitled to each year?
Not less than 30 days of paid annual leave per year of service, accruing at two days a month between six and twelve months of service and 2.5 days a month thereafter. Sick leave is 30 days a year — the first 15 at full pay, the next 15 at half pay. A return ticket home is due once every two years, and unused leave is paid out in cash on termination.
Can a domestic worker transfer to another employer?
Yes, where all contractual requirements are met and the original employer’s rights are observed, under conditions set by Ministerial decision. Once the worker joins a new employer, you are no longer liable for the cost of repatriating them.
Get the structure right before the paperwork starts
The households that get this wrong are rarely the ones that underpaid. They are the ones that assumed the licence could sponsor, budgeted the agency quote as the total cost, and discovered layer four twelve months later. Decide the package first, price all four layers, and treat the six-month probation as the window it was designed to be.
StartZone UAE structures free zone licences, investor visas and the family and household files that hang off them — so the residence permit that makes your sponsorship possible is set up correctly from day one. Start your UAE business journey today →
Sources: Federal Decree-Law No. 9 of 2022 on Domestic Workers, as amended by Federal Decree-Law No. 21 of 2023; MOHRE, Awareness Package for Employers of Domestic Workers; MOHRE Administrative Decision No. 5 of 2024 (operation manual implementing Ministerial Resolution No. 676 of 2022); published GDRFA immigration fee structure. Fees and thresholds change — confirm current figures with MOHRE, GDRFA or ICP before committing. This article is general information, not legal advice.
Image: Palm Jumeirah residential villas, Dubai. Photo by Diego Delso, via Wikimedia Commons, licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.
