HRSD extends grace period to correct certain expired/unissued work permits until 31 December 2026
HRSD has announced an extension of the grace period allowing establishments to correct the status of certain expatriate workers where work permits have expired, or were not issued within specified windows.
What changed
HRSD announced an extension of a grace period allowing establishments to correct the status of certain expatriate workers where work permits have expired or were not issued within specified windows.
The extension is reported to run until 31 December 2026. That date comes from supporting professional-adviser briefings rather than from clearly extractable text on the ministry page — see the verification note below before relying on it for planning.
What employers should do
A grace period is only useful if the exposure is found before it closes:
Audit expatriate work permit status across the workforce now, rather than close to the deadline
Identify permits that are expired, or that were never issued within the specified windows
Confirm against the ministry’s published text which of them fall inside the extension
Correct the records in scope and retain evidence of the correction
Reconcile the corrected position against Qiwa and internal HR records
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