Health Insurance For All-Employers cannot recover any health insurance cost; new law coming in UAE

Any employer who does not provide health insurance for his employees will be fined Dh10,000 – or more - per uninsured employee under his sponsorship, according to a draft federal law on insurance.Accordance to the draft federal law for health insurance, the sponsor will be committed to guarantee health insurance coverage for each person under his sponsorship, reported Al Ittihad newspaper.

Also, any employer who tries to recover any portion of the health insurance policy cost from the person under his sponsorship - will be fined a minimum of Dh10,000 and up to Dh30,000.
Any insurance firm, health service provider or insurance services provider, which works in the health insurance field without a licence from Health Authority and competent authorities, will be fined not less than Dh100,000 and not more than Dh500,000 per case.
Whoever provides incorrect information to anybody with the intent to obtain a service or benefit from health insurance, will be fined between Dh10,000 and Dh30,000.
Also, anybody or firm, which does not maintain the confidentiality of information, data and files and records of the beneficiaries of health insurance services, will be punished by a fine of not less than Dh50,000 and not exceeding Dh200,000.
New Authority
According to the draft law, a new authority is proposed to regulate health insurance.The ministry staff will be designated by the Minister of Justice along with the head of the new authority. The authority will have judicial powers.

Staff of the authority will have the power to control and prove violations, issue regulations and decisions and implement them within the limits of their work and jobs.

The new authority, in coordination with the Ministry of Health and other health authorities, will develop a system to coordinate the transfer of benefits to the beneficiary in the case of transfer of coverage of health insurance to another provider.

Proof of Coverage
According to the law, the sponsor must submit proof of coverage of each beneficiary and submit that information electronically to relevant authorities.
The new law stipulates that the regulations will set out the conditions and the data required for proof of health insurance coverage.

Insurance Premiums

The draft law indicates that the health insurance authority have the power to fix the rates of the benefits offered by health service providers. They can only modify the rates after approval from the authority.

Health insurance companies can only amend the cost of insurance coverage contained in the basic health insurance contract - only after the approval of the Authority and in compliance with the terms and conditions prescribed by the law.
Also, health insurance providers, insurance companies and the third party management companies, have the right to hire doctors and other specialists to monitor and verify the extent to which health providers complied with the conditions and obligations of the contract.
The insurance company will bear the costs of health services provided to the beneficiary in accordance with the terms of the contract of insurance. The insurance company may request refund from any other insurance company responsible for such costs under the alternative insurance provisions.
Obligatory Service

All health services providers will be obliged to provide health services to any beneficiary who provides proof of coverage such as health insurance card.
Health services providers will also be obliged to continue to provide health services to the beneficiary during the coverage period notwithstanding any dispute among the health provider and insurance coverage.

According to the draft law, health authorities will have to provide health services to anyone with proof of coverage even though the person is not within the network of prescribed healthcare providers.
They are obliged to provide health care services in accordance with the professional and ethical standards adopted in the laws in force in the State.
Prohibitions
The draft law prohibits insurance companies to own or manage or participate in the management of the facilities of health service providers.
It also prevents health providers to own or manage or participate in the management of insurance companies.
However, there may be exceptions of this article through a decision from the Council of Ministers.
The draft law confines the licensing and accreditation mechanism to the proposed authority in coordination with the Ministry of Health and health bodies.

Sick leave certificates to be registered online from May 1st Dubai Health Authority

As part of the recently announced changes to the health regulatory system of Dubai Health Authority (DHA), the doctor’s sick leave certificates will have to be registered online, even if it covers just one day.

Earlier, a day of sick leave did not mandate a doctor’s certificate, but with this new rule come a couple of implications, which might change the way residents think about taking a sick leave.

Recently, the DHA announced that sick leave will have to be registered electronically from May 1, 2013, with the aim of creating more transparency in the issuance of the sick leave notes.

“All sick leaves need to be issued electronically for the sake of auditing and prevention of abuse of sick leave. Henceforth, if a sick leave is needed, it should be issued electronically regardless of the number of days,” said Dr. Ramadan Ibrahim, Director of Health Regulation at the DHA.

“Issuing unnecessary sick leave leads to loss in valuable time for organisations and institutions, and DHA is here to protect the public and to ensure that healthcare organisations do not misuse any policy. This includes issuance of sick leaves.”

Until now, doctors could manually dispense handwritten sick leave certificates (on a medical institute’s letterhead). Sometimes, however, this resulted in fraud, say healthcare authorities.

Cases have been brought to light where doctors did not mind issuing a not-fit-to-work certificate for a day or two if the patient delivered a convincing speech as to why he would need some days off from work.

From next month onward, however, manual issuance of a sick leave note will be penalised with a Dh5,000 fine. And that is not all that is going to change.

Previously, when the consultation was provided by a public healthcare provider, the issuance of a sick leave note would require DHA attestation.

With the electronic system in place, attestation is no longer needed. “Any sick leave issued electronically does not need to be attested by the DHA,” commented Dr. Ramadan.

The abolishment of attestation is likely to be welcomed by patients in the public sector, although the issuance of the electronic certificate will carry a cost too. “I was required to pay Dh60 when I had to have my sick leave note attested two weeks ago,” says M.K., an employee in the public sector.

“If I only want to take a sick leave for one or two days, Dh60 is quite a lot to pay. I would rather consume some of my annual leave days in order to save some money.”

“There is small charge for issuing a sick leave and this is applicable in order to prevent abuse,” said Dr. Ramadan.

“However, DHA is always open to suggestions and comments, and we are currently reviewing the charges.

UAE asked to deny housemaid visas to Nepalese women under 30

The South Asian country banned women younger than this from taking these jobs in the Arabian Gulf in August last year following claims of abuse.
But there is no such ban under UAE law and visas can still be issued.Many young Nepalese women have reported being lured to the UAE with the false promise of jobs but were abused and illegally hired out for a few thousand dirhams by unscrupulous agents.
The embassy will emphasise its ban in a letter to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.“The Nepalese Embassy in Abu Dhabi will reiterate to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that, if they want to help the government of Nepal, please don’t issue housemaid visas to any Nepalese girl who is below 30,” said the ambassador, Dhananjay Jha.
“The embassy has previously written to the ministry about the matter and it will again reiterate them to mutually resolve our people’s grievances.”
The embassy is also calling for domestic workers to be governed by labour laws rather than come under the protection of the Ministry of Interior.
The move is part of talks between the Nepalese government and all GCC countries over the rights of domestic workers.
“Housemaid affairs are dealt with only by the immigration departments in the UAE, as well as in other GCC and Arab countries, but all labour-sending countries urge labour-receiving countries, particularly in the GCC region, to include domestic workers’ – especially housemaids’ – affairs into the labour laws,” Mr Jha said.
“We want the provisions of the ILO [International Labour Organisation] to be implemented on housemaids.

“I have raised the issue with the director general of the UAE Foreign Ministry and also raised the issue in Colombo Process [a management of overseas employment organisation in Asia] that housemaid matters should come under the labour laws.

“The major labour-sending countries are telling the GCC countries that any domestic workers, male or female, should come under labour laws.”
There are about 160,000 Nepali citizens working in the UAE, many of them housemaids.The embassy repatriates between 90 and 100 women a year and is currently sheltering 11 housemaids.

Each of them, aged between 19 and 26, came to their sponsor through unscrupulous agents, who had been paid illegal fees of between Dh7,000 and Dh9,000. The women were paid between Dh500 and Dh900 a month.

They are recruited as cleaners by agents for immigration purposes and to avoid the age rules. But the visa applied for in the UAE is that of a housemaid.Once in the country, the girls are sold to the highest bidder, and some sponsors are abusive.

Mr Jha said it was practically a full-time job for an embassy official to visit police stations and immigration departments to help victims.“They [the girls at the embassy] were mistreated, denied wages, overworked, had inappropriate language directed at them, sexually harassed, then fled from the clutches and sheltered at the mission to get repatriated,” Mr Jha said.

He cited the example of two “very beautiful” young ladies, who had to be repatriated after their sponsor started harassing them for sex.

Another maid was sent home after her hands were burnt with cigarette butts. Mr Jha stressed that his government had cracked down on agents in their country. Rules had also been tightened for workers going overseas to be cleaners.

The introduction of the housemaid age restrictions last year came 18 months after the Nepalese government had to end a 12-year ban on women working in Arabian Gulf countries over human rights issues.

The ban had been in place after a young, abused woman committed suicide in Kuwait, sparking outrage in Nepal. 

Illegal car lift Dh5,000 fine-Dubai’s Roads and transport Authority

Car lifts, unregistered taxis, or carpooling against payment: these seem like the perfect solutions in the face of a young public transportation system. But they are not perfect – these services are illegal, and can land you with hefty fines and even a jail term.
Dubai’s Roads and transport Authority (RTA) maintains a strict policy when it comes to illegal car rides. “Motorists using private vehicles as taxis and those offering car-lift services will face fines and deportation,” it has warned in the past.
“Motorists caught offering such service will be fined Dh5,000. Second-time offenders will be fined Dh10,000. And those who commit the offence twice in a year will be handed over to the police and deported,” was the warning.
But this does not seem to scare away commuters from trying alternatives to public transportation. Car lifts, especially, are a popular service, suiting the needs of many who travel on a daily basis, but do not have a car.

“For me, it is a very good solution. My colleague picks me up on his way to work, and I pay him an amount of money per week to share the gas. It is a fair deal to me,” says H.K., a Syrian working and living in Dubai.

“I have a standard driver. I pay him an amount of money per month. And whenever I need him, I can call him to go wherever I want. He is reliable and will always come,” says I.K., an Indian man working and living in Dubai.
A quick search on one of the classifieds websites in the UAE will result in many options. There are those offering the service between two particular places, and those who offer to drive wherever you need. For every location in Dubai, there seems to be an option.

However, this is exactly what the inspectors do. A Pakistani driver tells how he was fooled by an inspector and caught: “I was offering car lift services from International City on a classifieds website. One day I was contacted by a man, who wanted a car lift to Dubai Media City. Once I met him, he identified himself as an inspector. I was fined Dh4,000.”

Another driver says how he was followed by an inspector last Friday after he had picked up his customer. “I stopped over at a bus stop to meet the person I was supposed to give a car lift. As soon as I took off, I was followed by a car. I was pulled over and fined Dh4,000 for providing an illegal car ride. I was also warned that next time I was caught, my driving license would be confiscated,” says the Indian.

The rules are such to protect people from allowing potential criminals inside the car, as passengers may be exposed to theft or face other risks.

The Central Bank plans to introduce the direct debit payment system to the UAE by June 15

But bankers warned that the UAE must press ahead with plans for a credit bureau if the direct debits are to fully replace security cheques carrying criminal liabilities for bounced payments.

All of the UAE's banks and finance companies are to adopt the service, which allows borrowers to fund repayments from their bank account when instalments are due."The facility is designed to eliminate the need to sign several post-dated cheques for instalments upon obtaining a loan," said the Central Bank in a statement. "The benefit for account holders is that they can plan their expenses more efficiently."

The system, which covers mortgages, personal loans and credit cards, is part of a federal government strategy that involves "adopting technology to enhance electronic systems and improve services to banking customers in the UAE", the statement added.

"Given our focus as a regulator we believe it is necessary to have a prudent, stronger and stable economy. Our current intention is to establish a more convenient retail banking system that will create more stable and progressive economic development," the Central Bank said.
In November that the Central Bank was in the midst of trials of its direct debit system to address the 1.4 million cheques that failed at the point of use during last year, representing one in every five used.
The invalid payments were worth Dh46.8 billion (US$12.74bn), according to the Central Bank's data, and although the data do not differentiate between cheques that fail for technical reasons and those that bounce, banks and ATM vendors say there are no major issues with the UAE's cheque-clearing technology.

Bouncing a cheque is a criminal offence, although a presidential decree in October immunised UAE nationals from serving jail time for writing a bad cheque. Since then, more than 1,000 Emirati defaulters have been released from prison.

The implementation of direct debits would be a step in the right direction towards an end of cheque use, but the creation of a credit bureau is still needed, said Ala'a Eraiqat, the chief executive of Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, at the bank's annual general meeting last week.
"It's an operational change, and it definitely brings more efficiency. But will it replace the use of cheques when you sign a loan? Not yet."
The new system would reduce risks in the processing of payments for loan and mortgage instalments, but would not alter the need for better assessment of credit risk, Mr Eraiqat added.

"You can have a much smoother execution," he said."However, the credit bureau will be the real mark in the evolution of lending."
At present, banks use cheques as a method of securing payments as they have no means of assessing a borrower's creditworthiness.
A consensus has emerged during the past year that the UAE's reliance on criminal penalties to ensure discipline among borrowers is in need of overhaul.
The UAE Banks Federation has been discussing how to proceed with decriminalisation of bounced cheques with the Central Bank, although it has warned that an alternative should be found to ensure that banks are still willing to lend.
Bankers say they expect the long-delayed Federal Credit Bureau to become operational at some point during the third