How to Choose a Fit Out Contractor in Dubai

Ask for the trade licence and check the activity line. It must explicitly cover “fit-out” or “interior decoration and finishing works”. A general maintenance or trading licence is not enough — building management will not issue an NOC, and you have no recourse if works go wrong. Verify the licence is current on the Dubai Economy (DED) portal.

If your project needs a Dubai Municipality or Trakhees permit, the contractor must be registered with that authority as a contractor of record. An unregistered contractor cannot pull a permit, which means your project is either illegal or dependent on a third-party consultant — adding cost and risk.

Not a brochure — actual completed projects of similar size, scope and finish level in the last 18 months. Ask for addresses (or at least communities), values, and a contact you can speak to. A contractor who cannot produce three recent references is a contractor who has not done three recent projects.

A verbal “one year” is worthless. The warranty must be in the contract, state the period (1 year is standard, 5 years for premium residential), and define what is covered — typically defects in workmanship and materials, excluding owner damage and normal wear. Ask whether the warranty is backed by the company or by individual sub-contractors. The latter leaves you chasing people who have left site.

This is the single biggest red-flag question. A healthy payment schedule ties payments to milestones, not to calendar dates. A typical staged structure: 10% mobilisation, 20% demolition and MEP, 30% partitions and plastering, 20% finishes, 15% joinery and second-fix, 5% retention released after defect inspection. Be wary of any contractor asking for 40% or more up front — that is a cash-flow signal, not a project signal.

An “estimate” is permission to charge you more later. A fixed-price contract locks the scope, materials and finishes; any change is a written, priced change order that you sign before the work happens. If the quote does not say “fixed price” and does not name the materials, it is an estimate dressed up as a quote.

You should have one named site supervisor and one named project manager, with phone numbers, before works start. “The team” is not an answer. When a problem arises on day 9, you need to know exactly who you are calling.

Ask for a written week-by-week programme with milestone dates: demolition complete, MEP rough-in, waterproofing inspection, tiling complete, joinery install, handover. A contractor who cannot produce a programme cannot deliver to a date. The programme is also your early-warning system — if week 3 milestones slip, you know in week 3, not week 12.

In any Dubai renovation, demolition exposes conditions you could not see: corroded plumbing, non-compliant electrical, failed waterproofing. Ask how these are priced and communicated. A good contractor carries a contingency line and quotes discoveries in writing before fixing them. A bad contractor fixes them, then adds them to your final invoice at retail.

Public liability and worker’s compensation insurance, current and adequate for your project value. Ask for the certificates. If a worker is injured on your site and the contractor is uninsured, the liability can land on the building owner. This is not theoretical in Dubai.

The contractor should handle the NOC submission, deposit, method statement and lift bookings — not hand you a form and disappear. Ask whether they have worked with your building’s management company before. Familiarity compresses the NOC timeline from weeks to days.

Ask about the snag process: a joint walk-through, a written snag list, a defined period to close it (usually 7–14 days), and a retention released only after the snag is closed. Then ask how defect-period call-outs work — response time, who attends, whether they are free. A contractor who is vague about the defect period is a contractor who will be hard to reach in month 11.