UAE gives more time to update tax records - without incurring penalties

Dubai: Still haven't updated your UAE tax records? Then, you can still do it within incurring penalties.

The Federal Tax Authority has issued a directive to those registrants who haven't yet updated tax records to 'take advantage of the UAE Cabinet’s decision to grant a grace period'

This way, they can still do the updating without the fear of getting hit with administrative penalties.

The decision has been done to 'help reduce the tax burden on the business sector, encourage persons and companies to fulfil their tax obligations, and, in doing so, further enhance the UAE’s competitiveness for business'.

The UAE Cabinet decision allows registrants to update information on their tax records during the period from 1 January 2024 to 31 March 2025. (The penalties would have been for failure to inform the FTA of any instance that may require amendments or updates to their tax records.)

Where registrants had been imposed a penalty during the period from January 1, 2024 until the implementation date of the grace period, the imposed penalty will be reversed. There is no need to contact FTA for this as the ‘reversal will be done automatically’.

The registrant shall notify the FTA in the form and mechanism approved by it within 20 business days of any change to their data.

This includes details such as:

"The FTA encouraged those seeking further clarification to read the public clarification issued on the grace period to update information in tax records," said a statement.

This can be accessed through the Public Clarifications service on the FTA’s website at tax.gov.ae/en.

"This service aims to keep taxpayers informed about all technical matters related to taxes and taxpayer obligations, offering detailed explanations to simplify these concepts and enable taxpayers to easily comply with tax legislation," the statement added.