A first UAE Corporate Tax filing, from no position at all
The regime was new, the deadline was real, and the company's books had never been kept to a standard the FTA would accept as evidence.
The situation
UAE Corporate Tax came into force in 2023 and the company, like most in Dubai, had no framework for it. There was no registration, no assessment of whether free-zone treatment applied, and no financial statements prepared under IFRS - because until the regime existed, none of that had been required.
The management accounts were adequate for running the business and inadequate as tax evidence. Related-party transactions had never been documented, because there had never been a reason to document them.
The company was not avoiding anything. It simply had no position - and a first filing under a brand-new regime is not a good place to improvise one.
What we did
Establishing the position
The first question was not how much tax - it was which regime the entity actually sat in. We tested the free-zone qualifying conditions against the entity's real activities and revenue mix rather than accepting the assumption, and wrote the position down with its supporting analysis.
Rebuilding the books
Management accounts were restated under IFRS to the standard the FTA expects as evidence, including the related-party transactions that had never been separately identified because nothing had previously required it.
Registration and first filing
FTA registration, the tax period established, the computation prepared and reviewed by a CPA and CA, and the return filed. The company now has a documented position it can defend, and a repeatable process for the years after.
The new UAE Corporate Tax was overwhelming. Her team handled registration, books setup, and our first filing - flawless execution.
Founder · Trading company · Dubai, UAE
Where it started, where it landed
- No Corporate Tax registration in place
- Books maintained for management use, not to IFRS
- Free-zone treatment assumed, never tested or documented
- Related-party transactions undocumented
- No view of what the first filing would actually cost
- Registered with the FTA and the tax period established
- Books rebuilt under IFRS to an evidential standard
- Free-zone position tested, written down and supportable
- Related-party transactions documented to the disclosure thresholds
- First Corporate Tax return computed, reviewed and filed on time
Services used in this engagement
Bring us the file you are avoiding.
Fourteen hours, free, on one live client. Most engagements start exactly where these three did.