Gratuity after dismissal in the UAE

Does dismissal forfeit end-of-service gratuity in the UAE?

No. Article 39 of Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021 lists dismissal from service among the disciplinary penalties while expressly preserving the worker’s right to end-of-service gratuity.

Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021, Article 39(1)(g). Quotation checked on 27 August 2026 against a published English text of the decree and corroborated by Galadari Law and the Gulf News Ask the Law column.

Article 39 sets out the disciplinary penalties an employer may impose. It runs from a written caution to dismissal, and the last item on the list settles the question in its own words:

“g. Dismissal from service while preserving the Worker’s right to end-of-service gratuity.”

Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021, Article 39(1)(g). The full clause opens: “The Employer or his representative may impose any of the following sanctions on the Worker who violates the provisions of this Decree by law, its Executive Regulation and the resolutions issued in implementation thereof”.

The drafting is deliberate. The legislator put the most severe penalty available to an employer on the same list as a written warning, and then wrote the preservation of the gratuity into the penalty itself. There is no separate forfeiture provision elsewhere in the decree that takes it back. The entitlement in Article 51 is tied to completed service, not to the manner of leaving.

So the only route to no gratuity is less than one full year of continuous service. Above that line the accrued amount is payable whether you resigned, were made redundant, or were dismissed for cause. Work out what that amount is with the UAE gratuity calculator.

What was the rule before, and when did it change?

Federal Law No. 8 of 1980 did forfeit gratuity on dismissal. Article 139(1) removed the entitlement where a worker was dismissed on an Article 120 ground. That law ceased to apply on 2 February 2022.

Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021 repealed Federal Law No. 8 of 1980 and came into force on 2 February 2022. Employers had until 31 December 2023 to convert existing unlimited contracts.

The belief is not invented. It was the law for forty-two years, and anyone who worked in the Emirates before 2022 will have been told it. Under the 1980 law, Article 120 listed the grounds on which an employer could dismiss a worker without notice, and Article 139(1) then provided that a worker dismissed on one of those grounds lost the severance pay. The two provisions worked together, which is why they are usually cited together.

Note the last row. The accrual bands did not change in 2022, which is part of why the stale pages survive: their arithmetic still produces a plausible number, so nothing looks broken. Only the answer to who gets paid changed, and that is the part that decides whether a dismissed worker walks away with the money or without it.

Which live UAE gratuity pages still state the repealed rule?

Two live UAE gratuity calculator pages did, re-read on 28 August 2026. Both attach forfeiture to Article 44, which contains no forfeiture provision, and one cites the repealed Article 120 directly.

Each page was read on 27 August 2026 and re-read on 28 August 2026, and the wording below is quoted from it as it stood on both days. Neither page had been corrected in between. This is a correction of a statement of law, not a comment on the businesses that publish it.

Naming pages is uncomfortable, and it is the only way a correction is checkable. The rule below is simple: quote what the page says, date the reading, and say plainly what is wrong with it. If a page is corrected we will remove it from this list. If you publish one of these pages and believe we have read it wrongly, message us on WhatsApp and we will re-check it the same day.

gratuitycalculatoruae.ae

Under a heading listing who is not eligible for gratuity, the page carried this item, read 27 August 2026 and again on 28 August 2026:

“Dismissed for gross misconduct (Article 44)”

What is wrong with it. Article 44 governs dismissal without notice. It sets out ten grounds and the written-investigation procedure, and it says nothing about end-of-service gratuity. The provision that speaks to gratuity on dismissal is Article 39(1)(g), and it preserves the entitlement. Listing an Article 44 dismissal as a bar to gratuity states the position under the repealed Article 139(1) of Federal Law No. 8 of 1980.

workforce.ae/uae-gratuity-calculator/

The workforce.ae page carried two separate statements, read 27 August 2026 and again on 28 August 2026:

“Employees terminated for serious misconduct, however, may lose gratuity rights under Article 44.”

“You committed gross misconduct under Article 120”

What is wrong with it. The first sentence attaches a consequence to Article 44 that Article 44 does not contain, and that Article 39(1)(g) contradicts. The second cites Article 120 of Federal Law No. 8 of 1980, a provision of a law that ceased to apply on 2 February 2022. A reader dismissed today and told they have lost their gratuity on either basis has been told the law as it stood before February 2022.

What does dismissal under Article 44 actually cost you?

Your notice period and the pay attached to it. Article 44 lets the employer end the contract without warning, so the 30 to 90 days of notice in your contract, and the wage inside it, are what you lose.

Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021, Article 44. Accrued gratuity, unpaid wages and untaken annual leave are outside the penalty and remain payable.

Put a number on it. On a basic salary of AED 15,000 with three completed years of service, the gratuity at stake is AED 31,500: 63 days of basic pay at AED 500 a day. A 30-day notice period on the same basic is worth AED 15,000. An employer that treats the dismissal as cancelling both is withholding AED 31,500 it is not entitled to withhold.

What are the Article 44 grounds for dismissal without notice?

Ten, and they are exhaustive. Article 44 also requires a written investigation before the dismissal and a written, reasoned decision handed to the worker.

Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021, Article 44. Summarised from the decree text; none of the ten grounds carries a gratuity consequence.

1. Impersonating another person, or submitting false certificates or documents.
2. A mistake causing grave material loss to the employer, or deliberate damage to the employer’s property that the worker acknowledges, with the ministry notified within seven business days.
3. Breaking written workplace safety rules that are displayed in a visible place and that the worker was told about.
4. Failing to perform basic contractual duties and continuing to do so after a written investigation and two written warnings of dismissal.
5. Disclosing industrial or intellectual-property work secrets, causing loss to the employer or personal gain to the worker.
6. Being found drunk or under the influence of a narcotic or psychotropic substance during working hours, or committing an act contrary to public morals in the workplace.
7. Assaulting the employer, the responsible manager, a superior or a colleague, verbally or physically.
8. Absence without a legitimate reason for more than 20 non-consecutive days, or more than 7 consecutive days, in one year.
9. Illegally exploiting the job position for personal results and gains.
10. Working for another establishment without following the required process.

Two procedural points are worth as much as the list itself. The dismissal must follow a written investigation with the worker, and the decision must be in writing, reasoned, and handed to the worker. A dismissal delivered verbally, or with no reason given, is vulnerable on procedure before anyone reaches the merits. Ask for the written decision and keep it: it is the document that dates the end of the contract, and the 14-day payment clock runs from there.

What do I do if my employer withholds my gratuity after dismissing me?

File a labour complaint with MOHRE on its toll-free line 80084 or through its online service. Wages and all other entitlements are due within 14 days of the end of the contract.

MOHRE can decide claims of AED 50,000 or less itself, and refers larger or unresolved disputes to the competent court within 14 days of the application. A claim is not heard once two years have passed since the employment relationship ended.

The route is free and it does not need a lawyer to start. Before you file, gather four things:

• The written dismissal decision. It dates the end of the contract, which starts the 14-day clock.
• Your MOHRE-registered contract. The basic salary on it is the figure the gratuity is built on, not the basic on an offer letter.
• Your start date and last working day in writing, and any unpaid leave, which is excluded from the service length.
• Recent payslips, to evidence the basic salary actually paid.

Then call 80084 or use the MOHRE register a labour complaint service. MOHRE first tries to settle the matter amicably. If it cannot within 14 days of the application it refers the dispute to the competent court with a summary and its own recommendation. State the claim in the terms of the statute: the gratuity accrued under Article 51 and preserved on dismissal by Article 39. If the employer is relying on Article 44, say plainly that Article 44 carries no gratuity consequence and that the provision it is thinking of was repealed in 2022.

What if the dismissal itself was unlawful?

That is a separate claim and it does not change the gratuity. Where a dismissal is arbitrary, the court may award compensation of up to three months’ wage on top of the notice and the end-of-service entitlement.

Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021. Arbitrary dismissal includes ending the contract because the worker filed a valid complaint with the ministry or brought a case that succeeded.

Keep the two claims apart in your own head, because employers sometimes merge them to muddy the water. The gratuity claim asks a narrow question: did you complete one year, and what does Article 51 make that worth? It does not depend on whether the dismissal was fair. The arbitrary-dismissal claim asks whether the employer was entitled to end the contract as it did, and it is what compensation attaches to. You can win the first and lose the second, and the money from the first is still yours.

How much gratuity is at stake after a dismissal?

21 days of basic pay for each of your first five years and 30 days for each year after, on basic salary alone, capped at two years’ wage. Three years on AED 15,000 basic is AED 31,500.

Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021, Article 51. Figures generated from the site’s own gratuity function on 27 August 2026, daily rate = monthly basic ÷ 30.

Enter your own basic salary and dates in the UAE gratuity calculator for the exact figure, including the pro-rated part-year and the two-year cap. For the same calculation alongside your take-home pay and your basic-versus-allowance split, use the take-home and gratuity calculator. If you are still weighing an offer, decode my Dubai job offer flags a low basic before you sign, and already working in the UAE covers free-zone rules. You can read our sources and review process on how we work.