r/SmallBusinessUAE

Pls suggest I have a gifting business and I'm looking for affordable delivery rates especially from Dubai to Dubai.

Many business owners in the UAE blindly trust third-party consultants and channel partners without ever reviewing what’s actually being submitted or charged behind the scenes.

Today, I met a business owner for coffee who told me he was constantly being asked to “just pay this amount” every quarter with no proper explanation or transparency. Within 1 hour of reviewing the records, I identified major VAT filing mistakes, corrected the errors, and helped save him over AED 10,000 in unnecessary overpayments.

Guys, this is your hard-earned money. Don’t just pay random figures because someone tells you to. Understand what’s being filed, review your records properly, and make sure the people handling your business actually know what they’re doing.

Sometimes the biggest damage to cash flow doesn’t come from the market — it comes from poor handling behind the scenes.

Hi everyone!

So I am planning to start a business online. I understand that I should get a DED license to operate, but I wanted to know what other things I should consider for the safety of my business and to protect it from scams and so forth.

so what personal experinces did you have so i can keep in mind.

I missed that part. I am going into the printing service business — as in albums, photo frames, such kind of things — with a different twist of course for market competition.

I know this topic comes up from time to time, but with the landscape and regulations continually changing, I thought it's worth asking again.

Is there a legal way for a small business to accept Crypto (USDT) payment? I've gathered that even if it is possible to set-up a business Crypto account (albeit very difficult), the bank may not permit transactions connected to Crypto conversion, even through legitimate channels.

Has anything changed or is my understanding not quite accurate?

Hello there fellow redittors and aspiring business owners.
So I’m planning to start a cleaning business here in the UAE:

Here are current informations in hand
Business license - a friend has agreed to give me one (he already has a cleaning license for other purposes)
Car - two 5 seater cars
Cleaners - Over 10 cleaners with their own ID’s and experience
Background - I have digital marketing, design and service based businesses (teaching) experience
Budget - 25k+ max is what I’m willing to invest in this

Current situation: I’m employed with 10k salary and planning to be financially not free but flexible.

I wanted advice and inputs from people that are already in the industry or have been.

We’re looking for aspiring UGC creators, whether you’re just starting or trying to grow your content journey.

In my opinion, one of the biggest mistakes is spending too much money before generating any revenue.

Many new business owners spend heavily on:

• Fancy office spaces
• Expensive branding and websites
• Unnecessary staff
• High setup costs
• Marketing without a clear sales plan

But the real question is: Shouldn't the focus be on getting the first paying customers before making major expenses?

What do you think?

If you've started a business in the UAE, what was the biggest financial mistake you made in the beginning?

Hi everyone,

I’m dealing with a very strange UAE immigration / SHAMS Free Zone issue and wanted to see if anyone experienced something similar or knows what might actually be happening behind the scenes.

Situation:

• I previously had a SHAMS company which was officially cancelled in 2024. I cancelled my Investor visa as well
• Then I got employed in 2024 and held employee visa, My previous UAE employment visa is fully cancelled in ICP this yaer.
• I checked:
  • ICP
  • UAE Pass
  • GDRFA
  • visa validity
  • fines/violations
• Everything appears completely clean.
• No overstay fines.
• No absconding.
• No active visa.
• No travel issues.

Recently I opened a new SHAMS company and the establishment / immigration card application got rejected.

The problem:

• Immigration does not disclose the rejection reason.
• SHAMS support says they cannot see the reason either.
• They escalated internally and even tried arranging a PRO meeting but I have to be in UAE for this and I can't be there without entry permit and visa.

At this point, I strongly suspect one of these:

• old establishment card linkage,
• UID/unified-number conflict,
• incomplete propagation of previous company cancellation,
• old e-channel linkage,
• or some backend ICP discrepancy because I previously had another SHAMS entity.

What makes this even stranger:

• all my systems/logins work normally,
• all visas show correctly cancelled,
• no fines exist anywhere,
• and support itself seems unsure what the actual issue is.

Has anyone dealt with something similar?
Especially:

• opening another company in same free zone after previous cancellation,
• establishment card rejection without explanation,
• UID linkage issues,
• stale immigration file,
• or hidden ICP blocks?

Would really appreciate insights from PROs or people who went through this before.

Looking to open a new license.
P.s. People in agencies please don’t bother as I didn’t have a good experience with previous agencies as no one can confirm or guarantee anything or even answer my doubts or just charging way too much.

Hi, I am looking to add the POD hoodies service to my website, but I didn't find any cheap ones. The cheapest one I found is 75 per hoodie from Merchlist. So if anyone has a place to suggest, it will help me a lot. Thanks

Most UAE SMB IT contracts are structured so the provider makes *more* money when your environment is messy. More licenses, more incidents, more  'projects.' There is no incentive for them to optimize your spend — and most don't.

We do free 30-minute IT cost reviews for SMB owners. No deck, no pitch, just a list of where your money's going and what's actually optional.

We're UAE based.

Hey everyone,

I’m working on a tool that analyzes short-form videos for social media (for now testing quality and virality factors).

The idea is pretty simple: you upload a video from a social or your PC, and the tool gives feedback on things like:

• video quality
• pacing
• hook
• visual clarity
• technical issues
• possible virality score
• what could be improved before posting

I'm now trying to understand what could help social media marketers and content creators opinion regarding processes they use before posting a video, how they build video progression and any helpful info to improve the tool.

What would you expect a software/tool like this to help You understand about your video?

P.S: It has a RAG inside that you can ask questions and it will tell You how to improve your video for a specific social or specific social + category (i.e improve SaaS product video on Reels) and I want to make it as good as it can get.

I configured F5BOT to monitor reddit for specific keywords and since F5BOT sends a lot of emails to my inbox (which I can't read all btw), I went ahead and built a simple workflow that reads the emails I receive from F5BOT, classifies them as business opportunity or irrelevant post and only notifies me via telegram, for posts with significant business opportunity.

The benefit of this: I no longer need to check my email every second a keyword is captured by F5BOT. I turn off email notifications on my phone and only receive telegram alerts for posts where significant opportunity lies.

In the telegram alerts, I receive a summary of the post, why it could be a genuine lead, AI confidence score and a link to the post/comment on reddit.

Telegram alert

Email from F5BOT

n8n email filtering workflow

I just started taking clients for simple to complex AI Chatbot services and simple plug and play automations like the one above. I'm willing to work with a few clients in the UAE who need AI powered chatbots for their businesses or automations of every day repetitive tasks, for very affordable prices just to build up a rapport in the UAE and get a better understanding of the market.
My DM's are open if anyone's interested.
You can find me on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/bertson-timoh-63644b217

Given the challenges due to the current situation in the region, I'm starting a community for eCommerce founders / business owners so we help one another.

If you're interested to join it, please DM me the below info or leave it in the comments and I'll reach out to you:

1. Are you an eCommerce business owner?
2. The industry you're serving
3. Size of your team

About me, I've been into eCommerce & digital marketing since 2010, and since 2015 when I came to Dubai. I've built connections and knowledge of the UAE market in those 11 years, and I'm always keen to meet people who are passionate and smart.

PS: to clarify, the community is free to join.

Hi all,

I’m a student in the UAE and I recently started a small subscription-based service called Contiflo.

It’s a simple monthly content service where I create high-quality Instagram posts for businesses. No reels — just clean, consistent posts designed to make your page look professional and active.

I noticed a lot of businesses and some small businesses here either:

• Don’t have time to manage social media properly
• Or end up posting inconsistent / low-quality content
• Or pay agencies a lot for basic content that doesn’t really stand out

My goal is to offer something more affordable, but still focused on strong visual quality and branding — the kind of posts you’d expect from top brands like Nike or Apple in terms of style and attention to detail.

Right now I’m looking for 2–3 early clients who are willing to try it out and help out so I can build a good reputation in the market.

To make it easy, I can first create 2 free sample posts for your business, so you can see the style and decide if it works for you before committing to anything.

If you like it, we can continue with a plan. If not, no problem at all.

Feel free to comment or dm me if you want to try it out will send my website linked with my project and plans.

Hi all,

Looking for some advice.

A friend will renew their license now, going into 3rd year.

Currently they are dealing with an issue where RAKEZ is saying they don’t want to accept cheque payments.

RAKEZ told them to go with Tabby option (weird suggestion) and RAKEZ told them to go with CC card option and convert to installment (another weird thing to say)

My friend avoids such thing due to unforeseen events and general debt avoidance, in all 2yr+ they never took loan or credit card from any bank for the business and personal they don’t have.

It looks like RAKEZ is not willing to support small businesses?

Hey everyone, I run a small sticker business on Amazon UAE and I’m planning my next designs.

I wanted genuine opinions from people here, what type of stickers do you think people buy the most currently?

Funny/meme stickers
Car stickers
Anime/gaming
Minimal aesthetic
Laptop decals
Islamic/Arabic quotes
Gym/sports
Kids/cartoon themes

Or is there another niche you think has strong demand?

Would love to hear your thoughts before I start designing the next batch.