Legal services
Support across the project life cycle, from finance and design to completion and final account.
We advise employers, contractors, subcontractors, consultants and lenders on construction contracts and disputes in the UAE. Our focus is on practical solutions that keep the project moving and protect the client's position when it does not.
Construction in the UAE is fast, large and contract-driven. Most projects are built on FIDIC-based forms amended by the employer, with a chain of subcontracts flowing down from them, and the UAE Civil Code adds rules that cannot be contracted out of, including the ten-year decennial liability of the contractor and the designer for structural defects. Payment delays, variations, extensions of time and defects are the everyday sources of dispute, and the sums involved make arbitration before DIAC or ADCCAC the usual forum.
Khalifa Al Sada Advocates & Legal Consultants offers services throughout a project's life cycle, from the early stages of finance, development and design through implementation, construction and close-out. Our focus is on effective and creative solutions that minimise legal obstacles to the project goals.
We act for:
We work on residential, commercial, hospitality, industrial and infrastructure projects of every scale.
At the front end we draft and negotiate construction, design, consultancy, subcontract and supply agreements, advise on FIDIC amendments and on the bonds, guarantees and insurances that support them. We review tender documents and letters of intent, and we advise on the licensing and approvals a contractor needs from the municipality and the free zone authorities.
During the project we advise on notices, variations, extension of time and prolongation claims, payment certificates and the enforcement or restraint of on-demand bonds. When disputes arise we represent clients in negotiation, adjudication and expert determination, in arbitration before DIAC, ADCCAC and the ICC, and before the UAE courts, including claims for unpaid certificates, wrongful termination, defective work and decennial liability. We work with delay and quantum experts, and we enforce awards and judgments against the counterparty's assets, including through our debt collection department for undisputed sums.
Our lawyers combine common law training, which is where most standard forms come from, with the civil law experience needed to apply the UAE Civil Code to them. That matters when a clause on liability or termination reads one way in English and is applied another way by a UAE tribunal.
We work from Dubai and Abu Dhabi in Arabic and English, and our litigation and arbitration teams sit in the same office, so a project dispute is handled by lawyers who already know the contract.
We read the contract, the amendments and the correspondence and identify the notice requirements, time bars and risk allocation.
We prepare the claim or the defence with the delay and quantum evidence the tribunal will expect.
We negotiate, and if necessary arbitrate or litigate, in the forum the contract provides.
We enforce the award or judgment and pursue the bond, the retention or the other assets available.
Yes. Under the Civil Code the contractor and the supervising engineer are jointly liable for ten years for the collapse or serious structural defect of a building, and the liability cannot be excluded by contract.
On-demand bonds are paid against a compliant demand, but the courts can restrain a call that is clearly abusive or fraudulent. Speed is essential, so contact us before the demand is made if you can.
UAE tribunals often enforce notice requirements, though they may relieve a party in some circumstances. Serve the notices the contract requires and keep records.
If the contract contains a valid arbitration clause the court will normally decline the case. We review the clause and advise on the forum before any step is taken.
Insights
20 Jul 2023 4 min read
Why parties increasingly choose arbitration over the courts, the arbitration institutions the UAE has built in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, and how our offices support clients before DIAC, ICC, DIFC and ADCCAC.
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