Saudi Arabia cancels 7,200 work visas in nationwide crackdown on firms violating labour rules

Saudi Arabia’s Ministry of Human Resources and Social Development has cancelled more than 7,200 visas issued to violating establishments and suspended key government services for them after uncovering thousands of labour-related breaches during nationwide inspections.

The ministry said its monitoring teams and smart surveillance systems examined around 91,000 suspected cases, detecting 13,509 violations linked to invalid employment relationships.

Authorities said immediate punitive measures were taken, including removing the cases from the kingdom’s “Nitaqat” Saudisation programme calculations and referring all affected individuals to the Human Resources Development Fund (Hadaf) to help them secure legitimate employment opportunities.

The ministry said inspection teams conducted around 250,000 field visits to private sector establishments during the first quarter of 2026, resulting in the detection of approximately 168,000 violations.

It added that around 230,000 warnings had been issued to businesses to rectify their status, while 3,522 violations were recorded at recruitment offices.

On the digital front, the ministry said it had identified electronic violations and taken action against 238 social media accounts promoting illegal domestic labour services.

Authorities also carried out proactive inspections of around 54,000 cases as part of efforts to combat human trafficking, the ministry said.

The ministry praised what it described as the community’s role in participatory oversight, saying authorities had handled 15,563 public reports with a response rate of 96.96 per cent within the specified timeframe.