The New Rule is that the following nationalities receive 30-day single-entry visas.

• Great Britain
• Ireland
• USA
• New Zealand
• Australia
• Canada
• Malaysia
• Singapore
• Hong Kong
• Japan

What has changed?

The old rule: Previously if you re-entered UAE before your original 30-day visit visa had expired, you would not receive a new visa. It was a multiple-entry visa and could only be renewed by overstaying and traveling in the 9 day grace period between 31-39 days. This led to a huge amount of confusion and many customers paying to overstay fines that they were unaware they had or being thoroughly confused as to when they needed to exit.

The new rule: Effective immediately, Every time you enter UAE or re-enter UAE you will get a new visa. This much simpler rule means that the nationalities above can exit any time within their 30 day visa period by doing a visa run with us and return with a new visit visa. There is currently still a 9 day grace period, so overstaying the 30-day visa is an option, however, this grace period is not officially mentioned anywhere we can find and might be cancelled without notice.

As such we do not recommend or advise any customers to travel during the grace period if it can be avoided because many customers miscalculate or forget and end up paying to overstay fines that could easily have been avoided.

We recommend all our customers from the countries above to travel before the 30-day visa expires.

Other Rules:

As for all countries, the date of the entry stamp in your passport is counted as day number 1.

If you entered through the airport E-gate and didn’t receive a stamp in your passport, the day that you entered is counted as day number 1.

If you have a cancelled residence visa and need to exit to change status you will need to exit before the expiry date of your Cancellation paper. This is usually a 28-30 day period from when the visa is cancelled to when you need to exit the country.

If you have an Entry permit for a new Residence visa, you can travel with us at any time to change status from tourist to resident, but its recommended to do it as soon as possible otherwise your entry permit may expire and you will have to re-do the whole visa application process.

Schengen nationalities (all the EU countries excluding Great Britain and Ireland) still receive 90-day multiple-entry visas. These are issued every 180 days. Days spent outside the UAE during the 180 day period do not count towards the total of 90 days permitted.