Services (money pages)
VAT Deregistration in the UAE
When UAE VAT deregistration becomes compulsory, the 20-business-day window you get, what the FTA charges, and the final return that closes the file.
vat deregistration
A UAE registrant must apply to the Federal Tax Authority for VAT deregistration within 20 business days of stopping taxable supplies, or of taxable supplies over 12 consecutive months falling below the AED 187,500 voluntary threshold. The application is free of charge and filed in EmaraTax. Applying late costs AED 1,000 and the same amount monthly, up to AED 10,000.
Basis: Federal Tax Authority, as published by the Ministry of Finance
- Application window
- 20 business days from the occurrence
- FTA fee
- Free of charge
- Late application penalty
- AED 1,000, then the same amount monthly, capped at AED 10,000
- FTA processing time
- About 20 business days from a complete application
- Final return deadline
- 28 days after the end of the last tax period
Article 14(1), Cabinet Decision No. 52 of 2017 (VAT Executive Regulation)
FTA, VAT Deregistration service card
Table 1 item 4, Cabinet Decision No. 40 of 2017 as amended
FTA, VAT Deregistration service card (updated 19 August 2026)
Article 64(1) and 64(2), Cabinet Decision No. 52 of 2017
#When the law forces you out of the system, and when it merely lets you leave
Two different provisions of Federal Decree-Law No. 8 of 2017 are routinely collapsed into one, and the difference decides whether you are facing a deadline or an option.
Article 21(1) is compulsory. A registrant shall apply for deregistration if it stops making taxable supplies, or if the value of taxable supplies made over 12 consecutive months is less than the voluntary registration threshold — AED 187,500 — and it does not meet the forward-looking test in Article 17(2), that is, it does not anticipate exceeding that threshold in the next 30 days.
Article 22 is optional. A registrant may apply to deregister if taxable supplies over the past 12 months were less than the mandatory threshold of AED 375,000. Falling between AED 187,500 and AED 375,000 therefore puts you in a choice, not a deadline: you can stay registered and keep recovering input tax, or you can leave.
One restriction cuts across both. Article 23 stops a person who registered voluntarily under Article 17 from applying for deregistration within 12 months of the date of registration. Registering voluntarily to look established in front of a customer is a twelve-month commitment, not a reversible one.
| Your situation | Compulsory or optional | Provision | Deadline |
|---|---|---|---|
| You have stopped making taxable supplies altogether | Compulsory | Article 21(1)(a), Federal Decree-Law No. 8 of 2017 | 20 business days from the occurrence |
| Taxable supplies over 12 consecutive months fell below AED 187,500 and you do not expect to exceed it in the next 30 days | Compulsory | Article 21(1)(b) read with Article 17(2) | 20 business days from the occurrence |
| Taxable supplies over the past 12 months were below AED 375,000 but above AED 187,500 | Optional | Article 22 | No deadline — it is your choice |
| You registered voluntarily less than 12 months ago | Blocked | Article 23 | You may not apply until 12 months have passed |
| The FTA decides your registration prejudices the integrity of the tax system | Imposed by the Authority | Article 21(2) and Article 14 bis of the Executive Regulation | The Authority decides and notifies you |
#The 20-business-day clock, and the date it actually starts
Article 14(1) of the Executive Regulation, Cabinet Decision No. 52 of 2017, gives 20 business days from the occurrence of any of the cases in the Decree-Law. Business days exclude weekends and official federal holidays, so the window is roughly a calendar month — but it runs from the event, not from the day you noticed it, and not from the day the trade licence was cancelled.
That is where dormant companies get hurt. A business that quietly stopped invoicing in January and cancelled its licence in September did not get eight months of grace: the clock started when taxable supplies stopped.
The Authority also has to be satisfied of the substantive conditions before it accepts the application. Article 14(2) sets out two: that you have stopped making the supplies referred to in Article 19 of the Decree-Law and do not expect to make any over the next 12 months, and that the value of those supplies, or of taxable expenses, over the previous 12 months is below the voluntary threshold with no expectation of exceeding it in the next 30 days.
#What VAT deregistration costs
The Federal Tax Authority's VAT Deregistration service card records the service fee as free of charge, filed through EmaraTax, with an estimated 45 minutes to complete the submission. There is no government charge for leaving the VAT system, in the same way there is none for entering it.
The real cost of a deregistration sits in three places, and none of them is a fee:
- The late-application penalty, AED 1,000 rising monthly to a AED 10,000 ceiling, if you missed the 20-business-day window.
- Everything outstanding. Article 14(7) of the Executive Regulation requires a registrant applying to deregister to pay all tax and administrative penalties due and to file the final tax return. The penalty for applying late therefore blocks the very exit it was imposed for missing — you cannot clear the account without paying it.
- Output tax on what you keep. Article 14(8) treats any goods and services forming part of the business assets as supplied immediately before deregistration, with the tax due included in the final return. Unsold stock, fit-out, vehicles and equipment are taxed as though they had been sold, unless the business is being carried on by a legal representative.
We do not publish a price for handling a deregistration on this page, and no figure here is a quote.
#The application in EmaraTax, step by step
Deregistration is filed in the same portal as the return, from the taxable person account rather than from the main dashboard. The FTA's service card and its VAT Deregistration user manual describe the route.
Establish the date the obligation arose
Fix the date taxable supplies stopped, or the month in which the rolling 12-month total dropped below AED 187,500. Every later date on the file — the deadline, the effective date and the final tax period — is measured from it.
Open the taxable person account
Sign in to EmaraTax, click through from the dashboard into the taxable person account rather than the user account, then choose Actions against the VAT registration and select De-Register.
State the reason and the requested effective date
The form asks for the basis of deregistration and, where supplies have fallen below the mandatory threshold, allows you to nominate a preferred date. Article 14(5) lets the Authority use the date you request, the date of submission where you name none, or a date it specifies.
Attach the supporting evidence
The document set follows the reason given: cessation is evidenced by the cancelled or amended trade licence, a fall in turnover by a turnover declaration and supporting records. Attach what your basis calls for, not a generic bundle.
Clear the account and file the final return
Article 14(7) requires all tax and administrative penalties to be paid and the final return filed. Article 64(2) requires that final return for the last tax period in which you were registered, on the ordinary 28-day deadline in Article 64(1).
Wait for the effective date in writing
The service card gives approximately 20 business days for the FTA to complete a request once received, with a further period if it asks for more information. Article 14(6) requires the Authority to notify you of the effective date of deregistration within 10 business days of the decision.
#The effective date you are given is not the date you applied
This detail decides how many more returns you owe, and it is set by the Regulation rather than by your preference.
Where the application is approved on the compulsory grounds, Article 14(3) deregisters you with effect from the last day of the tax period during which you met the conditions, or from another date the Authority determines. Where you are leaving because supplies fell below the mandatory threshold, Article 14(5) allows the date you requested, the date of submission if you requested none, or a date the Authority specifies. If the Authority is satisfied the conditions are met and you never applied — or started an application and abandoned it — Article 14(4) lets it deregister you anyway, with effect from the date it became satisfied.
Until that effective date you are still a registrant, and a period you thought you had exited still carries a filing obligation. Read the effective date on the confirmation before you assume the file is closed.
The final return, and the input tax year that ends early
Article 64(2) of the Executive Regulation requires a person whose registration has been cancelled to file a final tax return for the last tax period they were registered for, on the standard deadline in Article 64(1) — the 28th day after the period ends. For input tax apportionment, Article 55(4)(a) ends the tax year on the last day the person was a taxable person, so the annual adjustment is computed to that date and not to your normal year end.
A credit balance does not follow you out
The FTA's VAT Deregistration user manual states that where the account carries a credit, the registrant must initiate the refund process in EmaraTax. Deregistration does not sweep the balance back to your bank account. Check the ledger while the registration is still live — recovering a credit from a closed registration is materially harder than claiming it before the file shuts.
#If you are already late, or the FTA deregistered you first
Being struck off by the Authority is not an escape, and neither is letting the licence lapse.
Article 14 bis of the Executive Regulation, added by Cabinet Decision No. 100 of 2024, lets the FTA deregister a person on its own initiative where maintaining the registration may prejudice the integrity of the tax system — including where the registrant no longer meets the requirements, has failed to apply under Article 21(1), or began an application and never completed it. Clause 3 states that deregistration initiated by the Authority does not absolve the person from complying with the law, including registering again when the conditions are met; Article 14(9) says the same of an ordinary deregistration. Article 21(3) of the Decree-Law adds that deregistration does not relinquish the Authority's right to claim due tax or administrative penalties, and Article 18 of the Executive Regulation confirms that it does not exempt a person from obligations that applied while registered.
If a penalty has already been imposed, the route is not to argue it on the deregistration form. Reconsideration under Article 29 of Federal Decree-Law No. 28 of 2022 and the waiver and instalment controls in Cabinet Decision No. 105 of 2021 are separate applications with their own deadlines, and an error in an earlier return is corrected by voluntary disclosure.
#Where we can help, and what this page will not state
The work on a deregistration is mostly sequencing: establishing the date the obligation arose, reconstructing the periods that were missed, computing the deemed supply under Article 14(8) on the assets still on the books, filing the final return, and clearing the ledger so that Article 14(7) does not stall the application — alongside the corporate tax and excise deregistrations a closing company usually needs at the same time, on different clocks.
This page states no professional fee, no turnaround promise of our own and no success rate; none are published, and inventing one would be worse than the omission. Nor does it list the documents your particular basis needs: that list is on the FTA's own service card, it varies by reason, and it was last updated on 19 August 2026.
Checked against the primary texts on 21 August 2026 — the VAT Law as consolidated to Federal Decree-Law No. 16 of 2025, the Executive Regulation as consolidated to Cabinet Decision No. 100 of 2024, and the penalties schedule as consolidated to Cabinet Decision No. 129 of 2025.
Sources and legal basis
This page relies on
- Federal Tax Authority (FTA)
- EmaraTax
- Federal Decree-Law No. 8 of 2017 on Value Added Tax
- Article 21 of the VAT Law (tax deregistration cases)
- Article 22 of the VAT Law (application for tax deregistration below the mandatory threshold)
- Article 23 of the VAT Law (no voluntary deregistration within 12 months)
- Article 17 of the VAT Law (voluntary registration)
- Cabinet Decision No. 52 of 2017 (Executive Regulation of the VAT Law)
- Article 14 of the VAT Executive Regulation (tax deregistration, 20 business days)
- Article 14 bis of the VAT Executive Regulation, added by Cabinet Decision No. 100 of 2024
- Article 64(2) of the VAT Executive Regulation (final tax return)
- Article 55(4)(a) of the VAT Executive Regulation (tax year ends on deregistration)
- Cabinet Decision No. 40 of 2017 on Administrative Penalties, Table 1 item 4
- Cabinet Decision No. 129 of 2025 (penalties amendment effective 14 April 2026)
- Cabinet Decision No. 105 of 2021 (instalments, waiver and refund of penalties)
- Federal Decree-Law No. 28 of 2022 on Tax Procedures
- Voluntary registration threshold of AED 187,500
- Mandatory registration threshold of AED 375,000
- Federal Decree-Law No. 8 of 2017 on Value Added Tax and its amendments, consolidated to Federal Decree-Law No. 16 of 2025 — Articles 17, 21, 22 and 23Federal Tax Authority, as published by the Ministry of Finance
- Executive Regulation of the VAT Law, Cabinet Decision No. 52 of 2017 and its amendments — Articles 14, 14 bis, 18, 55 and 64Federal Tax Authority
- VAT Deregistration service card — fee, service time and required documentsFederal Tax Authority
- VAT Deregistration taxpayer user manualFederal Tax Authority
- Cabinet Decision No. 40 of 2017 on Administrative Penalties and its amendments, consolidated to Cabinet Decision No. 129 of 2025 — Table 1 item 4Federal Tax Authority, as published by the Ministry of Finance
- Federal Decree-Law No. 28 of 2022 on Tax Procedures and its amendments — Articles 29 and 50Federal Tax Authority, as published by the Ministry of Finance
- Cabinet Decision No. 105 of 2021 on the controls for paying administrative penalties by instalments and for waiving and refunding themFederal Tax Authority
Rates, thresholds and deadlines change. Every figure above is linked to the authority that publishes it — if the two ever disagree, the authority is right and this page is out of date. Tell us and we will fix it.
Frequently asked questions
What is the UAE VAT deregistration process?
You apply through EmaraTax from the taxable person account, choosing Actions against the VAT registration and then De-Register. State the basis and the requested effective date, attach the evidence the FTA's service card lists for that basis, pay all outstanding tax and penalties, and file the final return for your last tax period. The FTA then notifies you of the effective date of deregistration.
Is there a fee for VAT deregistration in the UAE?
No. The Federal Tax Authority's VAT Deregistration service card records the service as free of charge, submitted through EmaraTax. What people often mean by a deregistration fee is the late-application penalty of AED 1,000 rising monthly to a maximum of AED 10,000, or the outstanding tax the Executive Regulation requires you to settle before the application can be accepted.
When must a UAE business apply for VAT deregistration?
Within 20 business days of the occurrence, under Article 14(1) of the VAT Executive Regulation. The triggering events are in Article 21(1) of the VAT Law: stopping taxable supplies, or taxable supplies over 12 consecutive months falling below the AED 187,500 voluntary threshold with no expectation of exceeding it in the next 30 days. The clock starts at the event, not at licence cancellation.
What is the penalty for late VAT deregistration in the UAE?
Item 4 of Table 1 to Cabinet Decision No. 40 of 2017, as amended, charges AED 1,000 for failing to submit the deregistration application on time, and the same amount on the same date monthly thereafter, capped at AED 10,000. Because Article 14(7) of the Executive Regulation requires all penalties to be paid before deregistration, the charge also blocks the exit.
How long does VAT deregistration take in the UAE?
The FTA's service card estimates about 45 minutes to submit the application and approximately 20 business days for the Authority to complete a received request, with additional time if further information is requested. Article 14(6) of the Executive Regulation requires the FTA to notify you of the effective date within 10 business days of its decision to deregister.
Can a company that registered voluntarily deregister straight away?
No. Article 23 of Federal Decree-Law No. 8 of 2017 prevents a person registered voluntarily under Article 17 from applying for tax deregistration within 12 months of the date of registration. Voluntary registration below the AED 375,000 mandatory threshold is therefore a twelve-month commitment, which is worth weighing before registering to appear established to a customer.