Commercial contracts, before or after signing
For Iranian traders and investors with a draft in hand, no text yet, or a signed contract they want to understand fully.
A vague payment term or a missing dispute clause looks harmless on signing day and can turn into months of cost later. Send me your draft, or even a contract you have already signed. As a contract legal consultant in Dubai, I will make every part of it clear to you in plain language.
One day a week I offer a free consultation for Iranian clients, by appointment. The day is shown on the booking page.
I draft contracts from scratch, review drafts sent by the other side, and advise on signed contracts that now need an amendment or a renewal. In all three, what you should expect from contract drafting in Dubai is the same: a text that says exactly what you agreed.
The deal is agreed but there is no text yet, or you would rather not negotiate on the other side's template. I start from the commercial terms, payment and delivery, and write a draft that protects your position from the first line.
Your UAE counterparty has sent a draft and is waiting for a signature. I read it clause by clause, isolate the risky ones and propose replacement wording, so you negotiate with reasons rather than objections.
You want to renew, change a clause or add an addendum. Before you sign the change, I check how it interacts with the existing terms so the new text does not contradict the old one.
Most clients who come to me for drafting or review have at least one Iranian party to the contract. The other side may be Iranian, Emirati or of any other nationality. Each type of contract has its own sensitive clauses, and that is where the work starts.
One-off sales, recurring supply and purchase orders. Specifications, delivery time and place, inspection and responsibility for damage in transit are where most trade disputes begin.
Commercial agency in the UAE has its own statute (Federal Law No. 3 of 2022), and its protections depend on registration of the agency agreement. Before signing, it should be clear whether yours is a registrable agency or an ordinary distribution deal.
When you invest in a project or business in the UAE, the agreement should say how your share is calculated, what reporting you receive and how you exit. Settle these with a legal consultant before you sign, not after the money is committed. See legal points on investing in the UAE for background.
If you are starting a joint business with a partner in the UAE or buying into one, decision-making, profit sharing, entry and exit of partners and management deadlock should be in writing from day one. See the guide to shareholder agreements in the UAE.
The counterparty sits in a third country or the goods cross several borders. Language, governing law and the dispute forum have to fit together, or you may win a judgment that cannot be enforced where the other side's assets are.
Every clause that could turn into a dispute or a loss after signing. In any contract review in the UAE I read the clauses below separately, but I start with your core obligations: quantity, quality, price and timing.
Five steps, and you receive the fee and delivery time in writing before the review starts. When you hand a draft to a contract legal consultant in Dubai, you should know from the outset what comes back and in what form.
If you need drafting from scratch, step one is the deal outline, and the remaining steps run on the draft I write.
What to prepare
Book an appointment to talk about the deal first, or, if the draft is ready, send it for review through the contact page.
Your draft is used only for this review, and sending it creates no obligation.
If the other side has sent a draft and you accept the basic deal, a review is usually enough. If there is no text, or the existing one does not fit your deal, drafting from scratch works better. The real difference is where the work starts and how much control you have over the text.
When most clauses of a draft need to change, writing a new text is usually simpler than patching the old one.
This service is for contracts before signing, or for changing a contract that has no dispute yet. If the other side has failed to perform or a dispute has begun, the work is different and another page will serve you better.
The other side has not delivered, has not paid or has not performed the contract.
Commercial dispute legal consultant in DubaiThe dispute is between partners or shareholders of a UAE company.
Partner and shareholder disputes in Dubai
I, Rahil Mostafaei, read every contract with one question in mind: if this deal ever ends in a dispute, how well will this text defend you? Whoever you choose as a contract lawyer in Dubai, start by checking their registration number.
Not necessarily. Many commercial contracts in the UAE are written in English or in two languages. But Arabic is the official language of the UAE onshore courts, and if a dispute reaches them a non-Arabic text needs a certified translation. That is why a bilingual contract should state which version prevails, so a later translation cannot shift the meaning of a clause.
A Persian version helps you understand the deal, but your UAE counterparty and the courts will not work from it. I explain the clauses in Persian, but as a rule the version the contract names as prevailing is decisive, and onshore courts will also read an Arabic translation. Before you sign, you need to know exactly what that version says.
It depends on the length of the text and its annexes. A few pages of sale terms are not the same as a shareholder agreement with dozens of clauses. Once I have seen the draft, and before work starts, I tell you when the report will be ready.
Yes, until it is signed, through negotiation. A draft from the other side is their proposal, not the final text. Under the new UAE Civil Transactions Law, pre-contract negotiations must also be conducted in good faith. I write each proposed change with its reasoning, so your request looks reasonable and the business relationship is not strained.
Yes. Sending the draft, the meeting and the report can all happen online, so working with a contract legal consultant in Dubai does not require travel. If an in-person signature or official attestation of a document is needed later, I tell you beforehand what it involves. If you prefer to meet, the Dubai office is available by appointment.
The fee is set after I have seen the text or the deal outline, and you receive it in writing. It depends on the scope: reviewing a short contract is different from drafting an investment agreement from scratch. Nothing starts until you accept the estimate, and sending a draft creates no obligation for you.
That depends on the loss one bad clause could cause, not on the page count. A supply contract repeated every month repeats its risk with every shipment. If I see no particular risk after reading the text, I will say so plainly.
A good contract records what was agreed. An enforceable one also keeps that meaning on the day the other side fails to perform, before a court or a tribunal, and leads to a decision that works where the other side's assets are. Iran UAE contracts can fail at the second step even when the first is done well. So the text should be written for enforcement from day one, not only for signing.
Most of them come from rushing to close the deal or from trusting a personal relationship, not from a lack of knowledge.
A template was written for someone else's deal and often for another country's law. It may contain clauses that work differently in the UAE, or miss what your deal needs, such as inspection of goods at destination. As a result, a template can remind you of the topics, but it cannot replace a text written for your transaction.
The new UAE Civil Transactions Law has applied since 1 June 2026. Under it, negotiations must be conducted in good faith, each party must disclose information that is decisive for the other's consent, and confidential information exchanged during negotiations must not be disclosed or misused. As a result, keep your negotiation emails and drafts from day one.
Suppose an Iranian supplier ships monthly to a buyer in Dubai. The buyer's draft says goods must be "to the buyer's satisfaction", with no quality standard and no deadline for complaints. That leaves the buyer free to reject shipments. As a result, write a quality standard and a complaint deadline into the text before signing.
Each step prepares the input for the next. A fuller list is in the guide to contracts with a UAE company.
