Visas & Residency
Family Sponsorship
Sponsoring a spouse, children or parents onto your UAE residency. Conditions apply to income and housing, and the documents need attesting before you start.
Once your own residency is issued, you can usually sponsor your immediate family. The application is straightforward; the preparation is where it goes wrong, because marriage and birth certificates almost always need attesting first, and that happens in the country that issued them.
If you are planning a move, start the attestation before you leave. See attestation.
Who can be sponsored
The usual categories.
- Spouse, with an attested marriage certificate
- Sons, subject to the age conditions in force
- Daughters, subject to the conditions in force
- Parents, which carries additional conditions and is assessed case by case
- Domestic workers, under a separate category with its own rules
Conditions
What is assessed.
Income and housing requirements apply, and they are set by the authorities rather than by us. We confirm the current figures for your situation at assessment.
- A minimum salary, which differs depending on who is being sponsored
- Suitable accommodation, evidenced by a registered tenancy or title deed
- Valid medical insurance for each dependant
- Attested marriage and birth certificates, translated where required
Questions
Asked about family sponsorship.
It depends on who you are sponsoring, and the thresholds are set by the authorities. We will confirm the figure that applies to your case in writing rather than quoting a number that may have moved.
It will need legal translation as well as attestation. Both, and in the right order. Send us a photograph and we will tell you the sequence.
Yes, with a work permit obtained by the employer. She does not need to transfer her residency to the employer to do so.
The order to do it in
Sponsor first, then family.
Almost every delay here comes from starting the family application too early or the attestation too late.
Your residency is issued
Not applied for – issued, with the Emirates ID in hand. Nothing can be sponsored before this.
Housing on record
A registered tenancy or title deed in your name. A verbal arrangement or a room in a shared flat will not evidence it.
Attested certificates in hand
Marriage certificate for a spouse, birth certificates for children, attested in the country that issued them. The chain.
Insurance arranged
Medical cover meeting the requirement in force, for each dependant.
Entry permit or status change
Depending on whether the family is arriving or already here.
Medical and Emirates ID
Adults and older children attend in person; requirements differ for young children.
Children born in the UAE
A different sequence, and a clock on it.
New parents are usually told this at the hospital and are in no state to absorb it.
A child born here needs a birth certificate, attestation of it, and then registration onto a parent’s sponsorship. There is a period within which this should be completed, and it is not generous – a residency application for a newborn left until convenient can attract a penalty for the delay itself.
If either parent’s documents are not yet attested, that becomes the critical path at exactly the point when nobody has time for it. This is the strongest argument for attesting a marriage certificate before you move rather than when you need it.
- Birth certificate obtained and attested, with translation where required
- The parents’ own documents already attested and consistent in name order
- The child added to the sponsor’s file and to medical insurance
- Emirates ID and passport arrangements, which may involve the child’s own consulate
After they arrive
The things families ask about next.
Yes. Every resident holds one, including children, and it has its own expiry date that does not always match the visa.
It is possible, it carries additional conditions, and it is assessed case by case rather than granted as of right. We will tell you honestly how your situation reads before you spend anything on it.
Dependants are sponsored on the basis of yours, so their status follows it. If your circumstances are changing, plan the family side at the same time rather than afterwards.
Requirements differ by age and the authorities set them. We confirm what applies to your children before you book anything.
The documents from home
Get them before you need them.
Marriage and birth certificates are attested in the country that issued them, which is the country you no longer live in.
This is the single thing that decides whether family sponsorship takes weeks or months, and it is almost always decided before anyone thinks about sponsorship at all.
A UAE application will not accept a foreign marriage or birth certificate on its own. It has to carry the full attestation chain from its country of origin, and that chain has to be completed there. Once you are resident here, arranging it means acting through a relative, an agent or a consulate – slower, and harder to chase.
What to bring, attested, if you can
- Marriage certificate – required for a spouse, and the document most often missing
- Birth certificate for each child, naming both parents
- Any document recording a legal name change, which matters more than people expect
- Custody or guardianship documents where a child is sponsored by one parent alone
- Death certificate where a sponsor is a surviving parent
Documents not issued in Arabic or English also need legal translation, which is a separate step from attestation and comes after it. How the chain works, and in what order.
If you are reading this before you move, the useful action is to start now, while you are still standing in the country that issued the documents.
Names that do not match
A small discrepancy stops a family file.
Passports, certificates and Emirates IDs have to agree on who everybody is.
Family applications are checked against each other in a way single applications are not: the sponsor’s documents, the spouse’s documents and each child’s documents all have to describe one consistent family. Where they do not, the file stops.
The mismatches we see are rarely anyone’s fault. A name transliterated from another script two ways. A surname recorded differently on a birth certificate than on a passport. A marriage certificate in a maiden name and a passport in a married one. Every one of these is ordinary, and every one needs resolving before submission rather than being discovered at it.
What we check before anything is filed
- Each name spelled identically across passport, certificate and any existing UAE document
- Both parents named on every child’s birth certificate, in the same form as their own passports
- The marriage certificate consistent with the names the couple hold now
- Dates of birth matching across documents, including the order of day and month
- Passport validity comfortable for everyone, not only the sponsor
Where a genuine discrepancy exists, it is usually fixed with a supporting document rather than a new certificate – but that document has to be identified before the application, not after a rejection.
Talk to a consultant
Tell us what you need. We will tell you what it takes.
A short WhatsApp conversation is usually enough to scope a file. No forms, no call centre — you reach a consultant who handles the work.