expat packages in UAE

There are more jobs being advertised now than before and recruiters are voicing their concern that it is increasingly getting difficult to get the right people onboard.

Some have dubbed it as a “war for talent” – something we were accustomed to see in the years before 2008. If this were the case, then professionals working in the UAE – or rather those coming to the country now – should be boasting of hefty expat packages.

This, however, is not the case.

Experts in the industry believe we are not seeing madness seep in yet, and expat packages cannot be termed “crazy” or much different from what we got used to in the past few years.

Ideally, an expat package consists of a basic pay, housing allowance, annual tickets, health insurance and, in some cases, children’s schooling allowance. This is true for most professionals in the country with, of course, exceptions in place.

Konstantina Sakellariou, Partner, Marketing & Operations Director at Stanton Chase, believes the benefits still fit in the broadly outlined parameters.

“Depending on the seniority of the executive and the policy of the company, the remuneration is either basic + bonus + allowances (housing, schooling), or one amount per month that includes everything (except insurance and, in most cases, tickets home),” she says.

One sector where expat packages are fatter seems to be banking and financial services.

According to efinancialcareers, a jobs website, “financial services recruiters in the Middle East are not only competing for candidates with local rivals, but – because of the tendency to look internationally for candidates – they’re also trying to increase salaries to compete with firms in Asia, the UK and the US.

“Traditionally, financial services firms in the Middle East would have offered similar salaries to Western locations and cited the tax-free income as a selling point. However, a combination of dissatisfaction over bonuses and an emergence of counteroffers has fuelled rapid salary inflation over the past few months,” an article on the portal reads.

Not all roles are created equal, however, and only a select few are offering pay-hikes that go into the double-digits, the portal maintains.