UAE businesses should have no qualms about allowing staff to travel outside the country on holiday, workplace experts have suggested.
Consultants said time off abroad could provide a welcome boost for employees following many months of working from home.
Under new guidance issued by Dubai authorities, residents no longer need to take a Covid-19 test before they travel.
Holidaymakers will instead be tested on returning to the emirate, with those found positive required to quarantine.
“People are so fed up of staying indoors and staying in the heat in the middle of summer that the one thing they are looking forward to is going on vacation,” said David Mackenzie, managing director of recruitment firm Mackenzie Jones in Dubai.
“It’s a very nice win for companies if you let them go. Obviously if they are going to high risk countries then the employer needs to know about it.”
It's been a tough few months and people definitely deserve a break.
The UAE has tested around 3.5 million residents for Covid-19, with more than 50,000 people found to have contracted the virus.
Like the rest of the world, thousands of employees have been working from home since March as governments fought to bring the pandemic under control.
Now, as travel restrictions and other measures are relaxed, more people are considering travelling abroad for some well-deserved time off.
Many expatriates have not been able to see their families for some time, making a holiday to their home countries all the more welcome.
“It’s been a tough few months and people definitely deserve a break,” said James Collin, managing director of recruitment firm Stanley Mac in Dubai.
“Any anxiety about travelling abroad is less at a corporate level and more from individuals.
“It’s vital though to keep up to date with the advice from health professionals in countries you are travelling to.
“Most companies have successfully adopted remote working conditions in recent months.
“Allowing staff to work remotely from laptops had never been tested to this extent before.”
Claire Donnelly, from HR consultancy MHC Consulting in Dubai, struck a more cautious tone on staff holidays, however.
She said some businesses may need all hands on deck as companies sought to begin operating on a more normal footing.
“Companies need to ask themselves if they should let people take a holiday as they are scrambling to get their businesses back together,” she said.
“A lot of companies are still keeping staff on half pay. They’ve got to recover and need to be at full strength.
“My strong counsel is that [travel is] at the employee’s own personal risk. It’s advisable to find out if a company has a Covid-19 policy before booking anything.”
Mr Mackenzie agreed that all staff should carefully consider relevant travel guidance before leaving the country, but that taking a holiday should not be discouraged.
“Nobody goes out there to [deliberately] get Covid-19,” he said. “The reality is if they go on leave and they contract it they are covered under our medical.
“One of our team is not able to come in the office because his brother just came back from the UK. He is having to work at home in a quarantine situation because he lives with his brother.”
Amy Beere, 31, who works for Mackenzie Jones as a consultant, said she planned to travel to Sri Lanka in August.
“I am not particularly worried,” she said. “You can only stay at hotels that have been approved by the health authorities and the number of cases there have been quite low anyway.”
The specs
Engine: Four electric motors, one at each wheel
Power: 579hp
Torque: 859Nm
Transmission: Single-speed automatic
Price: From Dh825,900
On sale: Now
A Long Way Home by Peter Carey
Faber & Faber
SPECS
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The specs
Engine: 1.5-litre, 4-cylinder turbo
Transmission: CVT
Power: 170bhp
Torque: 220Nm
Price: Dh98,900
$1,000 award for 1,000 days on madrasa portal
Daily cash awards of $1,000 dollars will sweeten the Madrasa e-learning project by tempting more pupils to an education portal to deepen their understanding of math and sciences.
School children are required to watch an educational video each day and answer a question related to it. They then enter into a raffle draw for the $1,000 prize.
“We are targeting everyone who wants to learn. This will be $1,000 for 1,000 days so there will be a winner every day for 1,000 days,” said Sara Al Nuaimi, project manager of the Madrasa e-learning platform that was launched on Tuesday by the Vice President and Ruler of Dubai, to reach Arab pupils from kindergarten to grade 12 with educational videos.
“The objective of the Madrasa is to become the number one reference for all Arab students in the world. The 5,000 videos we have online is just the beginning, we have big ambitions. Today in the Arab world there are 50 million students. We want to reach everyone who is willing to learn.”
ALRAWABI%20SCHOOL%20FOR%20GIRLS
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The five pillars of Islam
Challenge Cup result:
1. UAE 3 faults
2. Ireland 9 faults
3. Brazil 11 faults
4. Spain 15 faults
5. Great Britain 17 faults
6. New Zealand 20 faults
7. Italy 26 faults
WOMAN AND CHILD
Director: Saeed Roustaee
Starring: Parinaz Izadyar, Payman Maadi
Rating: 4/5
Ain Dubai in numbers
126: The length in metres of the legs supporting the structure
1 football pitch: The length of each permanent spoke is longer than a professional soccer pitch
16 A380 Airbuses: The equivalent weight of the wheel rim.
9,000 tonnes: The amount of steel used to construct the project.
5 tonnes: The weight of each permanent spoke that is holding the wheel rim in place
192: The amount of cable wires used to create the wheel. They measure a distance of 2,4000km in total, the equivalent of the distance between Dubai and Cairo.
Euro 2020
Group A: Italy, Switzerland, Wales, Turkey
Group B: Belgium, Russia, Denmark, Finland
Group C: Netherlands, Ukraine, Austria,
Georgia/Kosovo/Belarus/North Macedonia
Group D: England, Croatia, Czech Republic,
Scotland/Israel/Norway/Serbia
Group E: Spain, Poland, Sweden,
N.Ireland/Bosnia/Slovakia/Ireland
Group F: Germany, France, Portugal,
Iceland/Romania/Bulgaria/Hungary
Types of fraud
Phishing: Fraudsters send an unsolicited email that appears to be from a financial institution or online retailer. The hoax email requests that you provide sensitive information, often by clicking on to a link leading to a fake website.
Smishing: The SMS equivalent of phishing. Fraudsters falsify the telephone number through “text spoofing,” so that it appears to be a genuine text from the bank.
Vishing: The telephone equivalent of phishing and smishing. Fraudsters may pose as bank staff, police or government officials. They may persuade the consumer to transfer money or divulge personal information.
SIM swap: Fraudsters duplicate the SIM of your mobile number without your knowledge or authorisation, allowing them to conduct financial transactions with your bank.
Identity theft: Someone illegally obtains your confidential information, through various ways, such as theft of your wallet, bank and utility bill statements, computer intrusion and social networks.
Prize scams: Fraudsters claiming to be authorised representatives from well-known organisations (such as Etisalat, du, Dubai Shopping Festival, Expo2020, Lulu Hypermarket etc) contact victims to tell them they have won a cash prize and request them to share confidential banking details to transfer the prize money.
* Nada El Sawy
MATCH INFO
Uefa Champions League semi-final, first leg
Tottenham 0-1 Ajax, Tuesday
Second leg
Ajax v Tottenham, Wednesday, May 8, 11pm
Game is on BeIN Sports
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
