Sick leave in the UAE private sector is up to 90 days per year of service, continuous or intermittent, once probation is complete: the first 15 days on full pay, the next 30 on half pay and the remaining 45 unpaid. The employee must tell the employer within three days and provide a medical report.
Those numbers are easy to remember. Applying them is harder, because sick days rarely arrive in one block. They arrive as two days in February, a week in May, one day after a long weekend that somebody in HR quietly doubts. This guide sets out the rules under Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021 and then works through real-shaped examples, so you can see exactly which day falls into which pay band.
The rules in one place
These apply to private-sector employers under the federal labour law. Free zones with their own employment rules, such as DIFC and ADGM, and government employers follow different frameworks. A contract can always be more generous than the law, never less.
The bands are cumulative, not per absence
The single most common mistake is restarting the count with every new illness. The 15, 30 and 45 days are a running total across the year of service. A cold in January and a fracture in June draw on the same 90 days, and the June absence starts wherever January left off.
So the only question that matters on any sick day is: how many sick days has this person already used this year of service? Answer that and the pay band follows.
Worked examples
Example 1: a few short absences. An employee past probation is off sick for 3 days in February, 2 days in April and 4 days in September. That is 9 days in total. All 9 fall inside the first 15, so all 9 are on full pay.
Example 2: crossing into half pay. The same employee then has a 10-day absence in November. They had used 9 days, so the first 6 days of this absence complete the full-pay band (days 10 to 15) and the remaining 4 days are on half pay (days 16 to 19 of the year).
Example 3: a long illness. An employee is off for 50 days in a single stretch, having used none before. Days 1 to 15 are full pay, days 16 to 45 are half pay, and days 46 to 50 are unpaid. They have 40 unpaid days left in the 90-day limit if the illness continues.
Example 4: during probation. An employee in their second month of probation is ill for 4 days and brings a medical report. They have no entitlement to paid sick leave. The employer may grant the 4 days as unpaid sick leave, which is very different from recording them as unauthorised absence.
Example 5: a late certificate. An employee is off for two days and sends nothing until the fifth day. The law asks for notification within three days and a medical report. How to treat a late notification is a policy question, so write the rule down in advance and apply it the same way to everyone.
Sick leave is not maternity leave
Illness connected to pregnancy or childbirth is handled under maternity provisions, not the 90-day sick leave pool. Maternity leave is 60 days, the first 45 on full pay and the next 15 on half pay. On top of that, an employee may take up to 45 additional unpaid days if she has an illness resulting from pregnancy or childbirth. Keep these as separate leave types so a maternity absence never eats into someone's sick leave balance.
Where sick leave goes wrong in practice
It is counted in the wrong place. A sick day that is only recorded in a manager's WhatsApp turns into an "absent" day on the attendance report and an unpaid day on payroll, even though the employee was within their full-pay band.
The band is worked out from memory. Nobody can say, on day 14 of an illness in October, how many days this person used in March. So the half-pay band is either missed, which overpays, or applied too early, which underpays and invites a complaint.
The certificate is not kept with the request. Months later, the record says "sick" and nothing else. If the decision is ever questioned, there is nothing to show.
Probation sick days are treated as absence. Unpaid sick leave granted on a medical report is still leave. Recording it as absence makes the employee look unreliable on paper when they were in fact ill.
How Wurxa handles sick leave
In Wurxa Leave, sick leave is its own leave type with a medical certificate box, so the certificate travels with the request rather than sitting in someone's inbox. Employees request it from the phone app, managers approve or decline from theirs, and every decision keeps who made it and when.
You set the allowance on the leave type, for example 90 days, and the Balances tab shows how many sick days each person has used this year next to their other leave. That is the number you need to see which pay band the next day falls into. A request that goes over the allowance is flagged for you rather than silently accepted.
Because leave sits on the same record as attendance, an approved sick day shows on the roster and is not counted as absent. The attendance report, the leave record and payroll all describe the day the same way, which is the difference between a defensible record and an argument.
Maternity, paternity, bereavement and unpaid leave are separate built-in types, so a long absence lands in the right pool from the first day. Leave types also follow each site's country, which matters if you employ people in more than one Gulf state.
Wurxa is free for up to 5 employees, and every new workspace gets every feature free for 14 days, with no card. Start your workspace, set up your sick leave type, and see this year's usage for each person in one view.
This article explains the federal rules for private-sector employers in general terms. It is not legal advice; for a specific case, check the current law and Executive Regulations or take professional advice.
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