For employees whose passport is sitting in a company safe: the provision of the UAE Labour Law that makes withholding it unlawful, the narrow window in which an employer may legitimately hold it, the fine an employer faces, and the exact escalation path to get the document back.

A UAE employer cannot keep your passport against your will. Article 13(2) of the Labour Law obliges the employer not to withhold the official documents of the worker, which covers the passport and the Emirates ID. The only legitimate reason for the company to have the passport is a specific government transaction such as visa stamping, renewal, or cancellation, and it must be returned as soon as that transaction is done. An employer that refuses to hand it back is in breach of a federal law that carries a fine of not less than AED 5,000 and not more than AED 1,000,000, multiplied by the number of workers affected up to a ceiling of AED 10 million.

This guide covers what Article 13(2) actually says, why the passport is not the employer’s property to hold in the first place, the one situation where the company legitimately has it, what to do the day a refusal happens, the MOHRE and court route with its deadlines, and how the position differs for domestic workers and in the financial free zones. If the passport is not merely being withheld but has gone missing, the procedure is different and is set out in our guide to what to do when you lose your passport in the UAE.

What Article 13(2) of the UAE Labour Law Says

Article 13 of Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021 on the Regulation of Employment Relationships lists the employer’s obligations. The second of them is short and unqualified: the employer must “not withhold the official documents of the Worker or force him to leave the State upon the end of the labor relation.”

Two features of that wording matter. It is drafted as a positive duty on the employer rather than a right the worker has to assert, so there is no threshold to cross and no seniority requirement before it applies. And it is not limited to the passport: “official documents” reaches the Emirates ID, educational certificates, and any other personal document the company has taken in.

Underneath the labour law point sits a more basic one. A passport is issued by, and remains the property of, the issuing state, not the traveler and certainly not the traveler’s employer. A UAE company holding a foreign national’s passport has custody of another government’s document, which is why the practice has no legal footing even where an employee once agreed to it.

Is It Legal for an Employer to Keep Your Passport in the UAE?

No. Article 13(2) of Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021 requires the employer not to withhold the worker’s official documents. The company may hold the passport only for the duration of a specific government transaction such as visa stamping or cancellation, and must return it immediately afterward. Refusing to return it is a breach of federal law.

The One Situation Where the Company Legitimately Has It

Handing your passport to the company PRO for a visa transaction is normal and lawful. Residence visa issuance, renewal, and cancellation all require the physical document, and the employer or its typing center processes those steps on your behalf.

What makes it lawful is that the possession is temporary and tied to a specific transaction. Once the stamping is done and the passport is back from immigration, the employer has no basis to keep it. There is no provision in the Labour Law or its Executive Regulation that permits an employer to retain the document as security, as a guarantee against resignation, to secure repayment of recruitment costs, or as leverage in a dispute over notice.

The practical test is simple. Ask what specific government transaction is in progress and when it completes. A company that cannot name one and give a date is not processing anything; it is holding the document.

Employees are sometimes asked to sign a form agreeing that the company will hold the passport for the duration of employment. That signature does not convert an unlawful retention into a lawful one, for two reasons.

Article 13(2) imposes an obligation on the employer, and the general position under UAE employment legislation is that statutory protections cannot be contracted away to the worker’s detriment. More directly, a consent to deposit is not a consent to be refused. Even reading the form at its most generous to the employer, it records that you handed the document over. It does not create a right to keep it once you ask for it back, and the moment of refusal is the moment the breach occurs.

If you did sign such a form, it is worth requesting the passport in writing anyway, precisely so that the refusal is documented. The written request is the evidence that turns a background arrangement into a live breach with a date attached.

What It Costs the Employer

The Labour Law does not attach a bespoke penalty to Article 13(2). It is covered instead by the catch-all in Article 63, which imposes a fine of not less than AED 5,000 and not more than AED 1,000,000 on any person who violates any other provision of the Decree-Law, its Executive Regulation, or the resolutions issued in implementation of it.

Provision Effect
Article 63 Fine of AED 5,000 to AED 1,000,000 for violating any other provision of the law or its regulations
Article 62 The fine is imposed repeatedly according to the number of workers against whom the violation is committed, up to a maximum of AED 10,000,000
Article 64 On repetition of a similar violation within one year of a previous judgment, imprisonment and/or double the fine
Article 58 These penalties do not prejudice any severer penalty stipulated by another law

The multiplier in Article 62 is the provision with teeth. Passport retention is rarely a one-employee practice; where a company holds documents for a workforce, the fine is calculated per worker. That is worth knowing when a company tells you the issue is trivial.

What the fine does not do is put the passport back in your hand. It is an administrative and criminal penalty payable to the state, not compensation to you, so the recovery of the document runs on a separate track described below.

What to Do on the Day You Are Refused

The order of these steps matters, because each one creates the record the next one relies on.

  1. Put the request in writing. Email HR and your line manager asking for the return of your passport and Emirates ID, and ask for a date. Keep it factual and unemotional. This single email fixes the date of the request and removes any later argument that you never asked.
  2. Ask what transaction is in progress. If the answer names a visa step, ask for the reference and the expected completion date. If there is no transaction, the refusal is now on the record in the company’s own words.
  3. File a complaint with MOHRE. Submit a labour complaint through the ministry’s channels, attaching the written request and any refusal. This is free and does not require a lawyer.
  4. Report to the police where the refusal persists. Withholding another person’s identity document can be reported to the police in the emirate where the employer is based, alongside the labour complaint. The two routes are independent and neither replaces the other.
  5. Contact your embassy or consulate. Your mission has an interest in a passport it issued. Where the document cannot be recovered or its whereabouts are unknown, the embassy is the route to a replacement, and its involvement often changes an employer’s calculation.

Do not stop paying attention to your visa status while this runs. If your employment is ending in parallel, the cancellation and grace-period clock runs on its own timetable regardless of who holds the passport, and the sequence is covered in our guide to resignation, notice periods, and what happens to your visa afterward.

The MOHRE Route and Its Deadlines

Article 54 of the Decree-Law sets out the individual labour dispute procedure, and it applies to a passport dispute in the same way as to an unpaid wage claim. You apply to the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation, which examines the application and takes what it considers necessary for an amicable settlement.

Where the value of the claim does not exceed AED 50,000, or where the dispute concerns a party’s failure to comply with an amicable settlement resolution the ministry issued earlier, MOHRE resolves the dispute by a resolution of its own. That resolution has the force of an executive instrument and is stamped for enforcement under the normal procedures. Either party may file a case before the Court of First Instance within 15 working days of notice of the resolution, and filing suspends its implementation.

Where amicable settlement is not possible and the claim falls outside that band, the ministry refers the dispute to the competent court with a memorandum summarizing the dispute, both parties’ arguments, and the ministry’s recommendation. The court must set a hearing within three business days of receiving the application and resolve the case promptly. Article 54(8) blocks any party from going straight to court without following these steps.

Two deadlines sit around this. Article 54(9) provides that a case for any rights under the Decree-Law is not heard after two years from the date the work relation terminated. And Article 55 exempts labour lawsuits from judicial fees at all stages of litigation and execution, as well as requests submitted by workers or their heirs where the value does not exceed AED 100,000, so bringing the claim does not cost you court fees. The general mechanics of the ministry stage, including what evidence to bring, are covered in our guide to filing a MOHRE complaint and how the ministry handles it.

Where Do I Report an Employer Who Refuses to Return My Passport?

File a labour complaint with the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation, which handles individual labour disputes under Article 54 of the Labour Law free of charge. Where the refusal continues, report it to the police in the emirate where the employer is based, and inform your embassy or consulate, which issued the passport.

Domestic Workers Are Covered by a Separate Law

Domestic workers, including live-in housekeepers, nannies, and drivers sponsored by an individual rather than a company, are not covered by Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021. They fall under the separate federal law regulating domestic workers, which is administered by MOHRE through its own channels and Tadbeer service centers.

The prohibition on retaining documents applies in that framework too, and MOHRE operates a dedicated complaint route for domestic workers. The distinction matters mainly for which complaint channel to use and which contract terms govern, not for whether the practice is permitted. The sponsorship and permit side of that relationship is covered in our guide to the UAE domestic worker visa and sponsor obligations.

DIFC, ADGM, and Government Employment

Article 13(2) sits in the federal Labour Law, which does not apply inside DIFC or ADGM. Both financial free zones have their own employment legislation and their own courts, and an employee there brings a claim under the applicable zone law rather than under Article 13.

The practical position is not materially different, because a passport remains the property of the issuing state wherever the employer is registered, and neither zone’s employment law creates a right to retain an employee’s identity documents. What changes is the forum and the procedure: a DIFC or ADGM employee goes to the zone’s own courts rather than through MOHRE, and the free-zone authority rather than the ministry handles the licensing consequences. The differences between the two zones are set out in our comparison of DIFC and ADGM as financial free zones.

Government-sector employees are covered by their own service regulations rather than the private-sector Labour Law, and the complaint route runs through the employing entity’s human resources authority.

What Actually Happens in Practice

Most refusals do not survive a written request. A company that has held documents out of habit rather than policy tends to return them once an email exists that could be attached to a complaint, because the exposure under Article 62 scales with headcount and the practice is indefensible on its face.

Where a refusal does persist, it is usually attached to something else: a disputed resignation, a claim for repayment of recruitment or visa costs, or an argument about notice. Recognizing that changes how you handle it, because the passport is being used as leverage in a dispute that has its own separate answer. Charging visa and recruitment costs back to a departing employee is itself restricted, and the limits are set out in our guide to what an employer can lawfully charge you for resigning early.

One honest limitation is worth stating. MOHRE’s fastest and strongest tool, the binding resolution under Article 54(2), is framed around claims with a monetary value of up to AED 50,000. A demand for the return of a document is not naturally a money claim, so in practice a passport complaint is often resolved at the amicable settlement stage through ministry pressure on the employer rather than by a stamped enforcement order. That is why the parallel police report matters: it puts the matter in front of an authority whose remedy is the document itself rather than a sum of money.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can my employer keep my passport in the UAE?

No. Article 13(2) of Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021 requires the employer not to withhold the worker’s official documents. The company may hold the passport temporarily for a specific government transaction such as visa stamping, renewal, or cancellation, and must return it once that transaction is complete. Retention as security or as leverage has no legal basis.

I signed a form agreeing my employer could hold my passport. Does that change anything?

A signed consent records that you handed the document over. It does not create a right to refuse to return it when you ask, and Article 13(2) imposes the obligation on the employer regardless. Requesting the passport in writing is worthwhile even where such a form exists, because the refusal is the breach and the written request fixes its date.

What is the penalty for a UAE employer who withholds a passport?

Article 63 of the Labour Law imposes a fine of not less than AED 5,000 and not more than AED 1,000,000 for violating any other provision of the law or its regulations. Article 62 applies that fine repeatedly according to the number of workers affected, up to AED 10,000,000, and Article 64 allows imprisonment and a doubled fine on repetition within one year of a previous judgment.

Where do I complain if my employer will not return my passport?

File a labour complaint with the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation under the Article 54 individual dispute procedure, which is free and does not require a lawyer. Where the refusal continues, report the matter to the police in the emirate where the employer is based and inform your embassy or consulate, which issued the passport.

Can my employer hold my Emirates ID as well?

No. Article 13(2) refers to the worker’s official documents rather than to the passport specifically, so the Emirates ID falls within the same prohibition. The card may be handed over temporarily for a government transaction requiring it, and must be returned once that transaction is complete.

Does my employer have to return my passport when I resign?

Yes. Article 13(2) obliges the employer not to withhold the worker’s official documents and, in the same clause, not to force the worker to leave the State at the end of the labour relation. The passport may be needed briefly for visa cancellation, but retention beyond that step, including as leverage over notice or costs, is not permitted.

How long do I have to bring a claim about a withheld passport?

Article 54(9) provides that a case for any rights under the Labour Law is not heard after two years from the date the work relation terminated. Article 55 exempts labour lawsuits from judicial fees at all stages, and exempts worker requests valued at up to AED 100,000, so the claim does not carry court fees.

Does this rule apply to domestic workers in the UAE?

Domestic workers are covered by a separate federal law rather than Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021, administered by MOHRE through its own channels and Tadbeer service centers. The prohibition on retaining documents applies in that framework as well; what differs is the complaint channel and the governing contract terms.

What if my employer says it needs my passport for visa processing?

That is a legitimate reason for temporary possession. Ask which transaction is in progress, for its reference, and for the expected completion date. Where the employer cannot identify a specific transaction, the possession is not connected to a government process and the passport should be returned on request.

Does Article 13 apply if I work in DIFC or ADGM?

No. Both financial free zones apply their own employment legislation rather than the federal Labour Law, and claims are brought in the DIFC Courts or ADGM Courts rather than through MOHRE. Neither zone’s employment law creates a right for an employer to retain an employee’s identity documents, so the underlying position is the same while the forum differs.

Official Sources

This article references information from the following UAE government authorities and legal sources:

This guide is for informational purposes only and is not legal advice. Information is current as of August 2026. The official Arabic text of Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021 and Cabinet Resolution No. 1 of 2022 prevails in any conflict of interpretation. DIFC, ADGM, government-sector, and domestic-worker employment are governed by separate rules. Complaint channels, procedures, and contact details change, so confirm the current route with MOHRE, and contact your embassy or consulate directly where a passport cannot be recovered.