Bounced cheque cases don’t end with prison term or a fine in UAE

Contrary to the popular belief that bounced cheque cases in the UAE can be closed by just paying a fine. It is within the rights of the victims to file civil cases against those who issue such cheques.

The legal order legislation approved by His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, through Law No (1) of 2017, helps to improve the judiciary’s efficiency and reduces its workload while fast-tracking the litigation process in Dubai.

According to the Legal Order Law No 1 of 2017 which came into effect on December 2017, people with bounced cheques worth less than Dh200,000 can be punished by the prosecution without the case being referred to the judges, with the payment of a maximum fine of Dh10,000.

Judge Ayman Al Hakam of the Dubai Courts said the issuer of a bounced cheque should not think that he can pay the fine and get absolved, as the receiver of the cheque can assert his rights by going to the Civil Court.

“The issuer of the bounced cheque may think all that he needs to do is pay a fine if he can’t settle the case. But the victim can still exercise his rights by opening a civil case against the issuer of the cheque for the amount of the cheque plus compensation. Bounced cheque cases don’t end with paying the fine,” he noted.

The order fined people accused of issuing bad cheques for amounts not exceeding Dh200,000 between Dh2,000 and Dh10,000 depending on the cheque value. “But paying a fine is not the end to this case, the plaintiff can legally file a civil lawsuit against the person who issued the cheque to claim its value.” if the Civil Court rules in favour of the plaintiff, a 12 per cent interest rate will also be added to the value of the cheque starting from its issue date. The accused is obliged to pay the amount along with legal charges.

Fines for bounced cheques
    Bounced cheques worth Dh1 to Dh50,000: Dh2,000
    Bounced cheques worth Dh50,000 to Dh100,000: Dh5,000
    Bounced cheques worth Dh100,000 to Dh200,000: Dh10,000

In the case of Civil Case: If Civil Court rules in favour of the plaintiff, the accused could be asked to:

•     Pay full value of the cheque
•     Pay 12 per cent interest starting from the issue date
•     Pay Legal charges
•     Face travel ban
•     Have assets frozen until final judgement

Fines to replace court trials in minor offences in Dubai from December 4th 2017

From December 4, 2017, on-wards, prosecutors in Dubai will be able to fine suspects involved in certain types of misdemeanor and minor offenses, including some bounced cheque and cursing cases, instead of referring them to court.

Dubai’s Attorney-General Essam Eisa Al Humaidan issued decision No. 88 of 2017, according to which prosecutors of the of Deira, Bur Dubai, and Family and Juvenile's prosecution wings can start issuing criminal orders starting December 4.

According to Al Humaidan’s decision, members of the three prosecution wings can fine suspects involved in specific minor offences rather than indicting them and referring them to the Dubai Misdemeanours Court to stand trial.

The list of misdemeanours is limited to certain minor offences including bounced cheques up to Dh200,000, failing to pay for food, car rent or room rent up to Dh50,000, defamation and cursing [excluding government sector employees], attempted suicide and disturbing victims through the use of telecommunication systems.

Prosecutor-General Mohammad Ali Rustom, Head of the Family and Juveniles Prosecution, told Gulf News on Monday: “The criminal order is an excellent step and a timely one as well. It has come to solve many hindrances and delays that litigants face. The litigation process requires a prosecutor to issue a decision on whether or not to indict a suspect and refer him/her to court or dismiss the case. Litigants [suspects and/or victims] used to wait for long periods … but now the criminal order has come to save the time for litigants and, remarkably, tourists.”

Dubai is a major international tourist hub attracting millions of visitors every year, many of whom could get involved in misdemeanours, he said.

“There have been cases involving tourists, who came here to enjoy their holidays but ended up getting stuck for weeks and months after having committed minor offences. In certain incidents, some litigants had to wait for six months. The criminal order reduces the waiting time for tourists, who end up being involved in such misdemeanours, and who do not have to wait for long periods waiting to be referred to the Misdemeanours Court … in case they are guilty, they pay a fine rather than waiting,” Rustom told Gulf News.

A chief prosecutor, who preferred not to be named, said the criminal order assists Dubai Public Prosecution in achieving its goals to make procedures faster and easier to complete for litigants in cases pertaining to specific minor crimes.

According to the Attorney-General’s decision, a copy of which was obtained by Gulf News, Rustom; Prosecutor-General Yousuf Foulad, head of the Deira Prosecution; and Prosecutor-General Sami Al Shamsi, head of the Bur Dubai Prosecution, are entitled to assign a prosecutor to issue, amend or cancel a criminal order.

Dubai Residence Visa Applications moving away from Typing Centres from November 1st

The latest service to be moved away from typing centres is residence visa applications — from November 1.

This might sound the death knell of 600-odd typing centres in Dubai.

In May this year, the General Directorate of Residency and Foreigners Affairs (GDRFA) launched the first of its 50 proposed Aamer Business Centres that would operate as one-stop shops for all residency-related services, helping people apply for and process their visas, without having to either visit the typing centres or the GDRFA offices.

From November 1

The GDRFA has also announced that from November 1, the typing centres will no longer be able to process visa applications, which has been their main area of service for several decades.Already stripped of their role as the main facilitators of government services like applying for labour permits, Emirates ID card and medical fitness tests, the smaller typing centres are now surviving on odd jobs.

Ilyas Ahmad has been in the typing business for 17 years and like many of his competitors, he works out of a small 50-square-foot office in Hor Al Anz East, which was once a major hub for typing services.

Clueless

Once thriving due to their proximity to the city’s Old Labour Office, the 50-odd typing centres in Hor Al Anz, including the one owned by Ahmad, are now clueless about their future.

“Slowly, everything is being taken away from us and we are left with no choice. Right now, I am only processing family visa applications because we are not allowed to do the employment visa applications or the Emirates ID and medical fitness applications,” said Ahmad.

The 45-year-old Indian expat once had five typists working for him, but due to thinning demand for their work, he was forced to lay off all his staff one by one.

“Now, I am somehow managing by accepting applications from my regular customers who continue to approach me, which I then take to the bigger centres and get them processed for a small commission," said Ahmad.

"I don’t know how long I will survive like this. I haven’t decided on what to do next. I just hope there will still be something for the likes of me in the system.”

Changing jobs

Egyptian expat, Mohammad, who only gave his first name, has been running his small typing business for the last two decades, but he is also now surviving doing a mandoob’s (PRO) job.

“I have been in this business since the time of manual applications when there were no computers and we had to type out every application on paper," said Mohammad.

"We have been part of the system playing a key role and providing an important service for so long and now we feel we are being pushed out to accommodate bigger businesses,” added Mohammad, who is now considering a change in profession.

In Hor Al Anz East, typing businesses continued to flourish even after the labour office moved to a new location and the application services were taken away from the typing centres and handed over to Tas-heel.

They continued to survive even after the Emirates ID and, more recently, medical fitness test applications were also moved away to bigger centres. However, taking the visa application services away, they feel, is the final proverbial nail in their coffin.

Cubicle centres not allowed

According to one of the government requirements, to be eligible to process Emirates ID and medical fitness applications, the typing centres need to be bigger than 1,500 square feet in size — which means only a handful qualify.

In Hor Al Anz East, there are only two such centres currently processing Emirates ID and medical fitness applications. The owner of one of these centres is also not sure until when he could do this.

“You never know what will happen next, things keep changing here very frequently. Right now, we are processing Emirates ID, medical as well as visa applications," said Abdul Kareem, who opened a bigger office only last year to be eligible to process medical and Emirates ID applications.

"From November 1, we won’t be able to process the visa applications, which will mean losing out on a major source of revenue,” said Abdul Kareem.

Operating with more typists, Kareem is now wondering whether he will be able to generate enough revenue to maintain his sprawling centre without the service fees accrued through visa applications.

While Kareem and some of the bigger centres might survive for some time more, many others from his tribe of typists will soon be out of work.

Dividend and Pension Scheme for middle-income Keralites proposed

 Millions of expatriates from the southern Indian state of Kerala living across the globe will be able to get an attractive lifelong monthly dividend-cum-pension with a one-time deposit if their government accepts a proposal in this regard.

The proposed ‘Dividend and Pension Scheme’ targeting middle-class Non-Resident Keralites (NRKs) aims to offer them an investment vehicle to secure their future, even if they lose their livelihood, a senior official told.

“I have seen tragic lives of many expats who were earning well in the Gulf but later had to live at the mercy of others because they did not save anything for themselves. Even their own children ditched them when they got old. Those experiences prompted me to think about such a scheme,” said P.T. Kunhi Mohammad, chairman of the Kerala Non-resident Keralites Welfare Board, a government agency implementing welfare and pension schemes for an estimated 3.5 million non-resident Keralites across the globe, including over a million in the UAE.

“I have submitted the proposal to the Kerala Chief Minister Pinararyi Vijayan and am expecting a positive response from him,” Mohammad said on phone from Kerala.

A comment from the chief minister’s office was not immediately available.

More than 160,000 non-resident Keralites have already joined a welfare and pension scheme run by the same government agency for low-income employees who have to pay Rs300 (Dh17) per month for at least 10 years. This payment makes the individual concerned eligible for a monthly pension of Rs2,000 (Dh114) per month after the age of 60.

The proposed new scheme for the middle-class NRKs gains relevance as the profile of Keralite migrants to the Gulf has improved over the years from unskilled workers to skilled employees and professionals.

The scheme envisages collecting a one-time deposit of between Rs500,000 (Dh28,607) and Rs5 million (Dh286,091) from NRKs, which could also be paid in six instalments in three years, the chairman said. After an initial three-year lock-in period, the deposit will start yielding a fixed monthly dividend between Rs5,000 (Dh286) and Rs50,000 Dh2,860), depending on the deposit, until the investor’s death, he said.

The scheme will be able to ensure such a high return on the deposit will be locked in during the lifetime of the depositor and his or her nominee. “This means the government gets the deposit for a long time; probably in many cases up to 20 or 40 years! The government can utilise that money for productive purposes including development projects for a long time,” Mohammad said.

“If approved, we expect to attract Rs100 billion deposit from NRKs to the scheme,” he said. If the government wants, it can hand over that money to other official organs such as KIIFB [Kerala Infrastructure Investment Fund Board — a government arm to facilitate the development of both physical and social infrastructure in the state], he added.

Government guarantee will be key

The proposed ‘Dividend and Pension Scheme’ for Non-Resident Keralites (NRKs) envisages a lifelong lock-in mechanism for deposits because it is crucial to secure the depositor’s future, a senior official told Gulf News.

“Many expats are able to save a few lakh [hundred thousand] rupees in their bank accounts and similar saving schemes. But they keep on withdrawing it for one or other urgent needs [mostly unproductive],” said P.T. Kunhi Mohammad, chairman of the Kerala Non-resident Keralites Welfare Board.

Expatriates are always flooded with financial demands from family, relatives and friends back home and most of them are receptive to such demands, which in turn keep them under constant financial strain, he explained. Many other expats who save money join businesses run by relatives or friends in the Gulf or back home as dormant partners. “Sometimes they are cheated or the business fails,” Mohammad points out.

Expats returning home for good from the Gulf also lose their money by getting into business ventures back home they never had any experience or expertise operating.

Proposed government guarantees for the deposit will help depositors accept the lifelong lock-in clause on their investments that will help them avoid the undesirable habit of emptying their savings. “It is a win-win situation for both the government and the depositor,” Mohammad explained.

After the death of the depositor, the monthly dividend would continue to go to his or her nominee, probably the depositor’s spouse, until the nominee’s death. After the nominee’s death, the deposit will be handed over to the legal heir, children or whoever they are, he said.

He observed why the scheme made sense for expatriates. “Finally the expat who had a handsome income ends up with nothing. I have seen such tragedies in my 12-year-long expat life in Abu Dhabi [as an administrator] and later as a political activist, filmmaker and TV-show host,” he said.

Mohammad also served as an elected state legislator in Kerala. As a noted filmmaker, he has also been hosting a popular TV show titled ‘Pravasa Lokam’ (the world of migrants) on the Kairali channel since 2000, which has helped trace more than 500 missing migrants in the Gulf.

Scheme could tap billions in NRI remittances with banks

The proposed ‘Dividend and Pension Scheme’ for Non-Resident Keralites (NRKs) is an attempt to utilise billions in remittances flowing to Kerala, of which a very small part ends up as deposits in banks.

Still, bank deposits by NRKs reached Rs1.48 trillion (Dh84.84 billion) in December 2016, according to data collected by the State Level Bankers’ Committee (SLBC). This is just 18.5 per cent of the total Rs8 trillion NRI remittances received in the past 14 years, based on the figures provided by the Centre For Development Studies (CDS) in Kerala. More than 80 per cent of the remittances is spent by families of NRKs, mostly for non-productive purposes such as extravagant weddings and on the construction of grand houses, according to social workers. Remittances account for around 35 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Kerala.

P.T. Kunhi Mohammad, chairman of the Kerala Non-Resident Keralites Welfare Board, said that successive central and state governments had never formulated any schemes to utilise remittances from NRKs to secure their own future and support the development of the state.

The proposed ‘Dividend and Pension Scheme’ will serve both these purposes, he said.

However, Kerala finance minister Thomas Isaac, in his 2017 budget speech on March 4, had announced a similar plan to raise Rs100 billion from NRKs for the construction of two highways through a chit fund scheme.

“The entire money collected would be invested in the NRI bonds of state-owned KIIFB [Kerala Infrastructure Investment Fund Board] in the name of KSFE [Kerala State Financial Enterprise], which runs chit fund schemes,” the minister had said.

• Dividend and pension scheme — in numbers
• Rupees 500,000 (Dh28,607) — minimum deposit
• Rupees 5 million (Dh286,091.56) — maximum deposit
• Maturity time to start getting dividends — 3 years
• Projected deposits from NRKs in new scheme — Rs100 billion
• Expected lock-in period of deposit — 20 to 40 years
• Bank deposits by NRKs in Kerala — Rs1.48 trillion (Dh84.84 billion)