Five Key Benefits of DIFC Wills

A Will is arguably one of the most important documents which you require for yourself in your lifetime. By creating a Will, not only do you safeguard the assets of which you have ownership, but you also ensure the security of your near and dear ones by distributing your assets accordingly.

The UAE is one of the many countries which follows the Sharia law and not having a Will can have implications because the distribution of your Estate is then carried out as per the Sharia law. One such way of avoiding this is by creating a Will with the DIFC Courts (Dubai International Financial Center) Wills Service Center.

Listed below are five key benefits of having your Will registered with the DIFC Courts Wills Service Center:

1. English as the only language

While the UAE courts follow Arabic as the official language, the DIFC Courts Wills Service Center has English as their official language. This makes it more desirable for non-Muslim expats to get their Will registered with the DIFC Courts Wills Service Center as the entire process is carried out in English.

2. Different kinds of Wills

The DIFC Courts Wills Service Center provides you with the freedom to choose from five different types of Wills in Dubai. These types of Wills include the Guardianship Will, Property Will, Business Owners Will, Financial Assets Will and Full Will. Below is a brief overview on the five different kinds of Wills:

• Guardianship Will: As the name suggests, the purpose of the Guardianship Will is to appoint individuals you can trust, who would act as guardians of your children after your demise to ensure their overall well-being. You can appoint interim as well as permanent guardians. The role of the interim guardian is to take care of the child(ren) until the permanent guardian steps in. At the time of creating this Will, your child(ren) must be under the age of 18 and must be a resident of the UAE.
• Property Will: The Property Will is for protecting only your real estate properties in the UAE. By creating a Property Will, you have the option to enter up to five of your real estate properties which you are fully or partly an owner of. You would be required to present to the DIFC Courts Wills Service Center copies of Title Deeds as proof of ownership of your respective real estate properties.
• Business Owners Will: The Business Owners Will covers only your company shares in the UAE. The types of companies you can include in this Will are onshore, free-zone and offshore companies. This kind of Will also gives you the option to enter up to five of your companies which you are fully or partly an owner of.
• Financial Assets Will: The Financial Assets Will is for including your bank accounts and brokerage accounts in the UAE. The Financial Assets Will provides you the option to include up to ten different bank and brokerage accounts.
• Full Will: This Will is a combination of all the four types of Wills above, meaning you can include guardians for your child(ren) and all of your assets, whether these are your companies, bank accounts, investments or any other kind of assets. What makes this Will an attractive option is that there is no limit on the number of assets that you can include.

3. Inclusion of multiple jurisdictions in the Will

The DIFC Courts Wills Service Center provides you the option of including international assets on your Will. This means if you own assets in multiple countries, all of these assets can be covered under one Will and you can avoid the hassle of having separate Wills to protect your assets in each country. This is, however, subject to appropriate legal advice.

4. Flexibility on updating information

Another benefit of having your Will registered with the DIFC Courts Wills Service Center is that the DIFC Courts Wills Service Center asks the testator for identification details and contact information of all named individuals on the Will, so that during the time of the probate, in case the Executor is unable to locate the named individuals on the Will, the DIFC Courts Wills Service Center provides this list of contact information to the Executor to speed up the probate process. As we know, details like our residential address and passport numbers keep changing. The DIFC Courts Wills Service Center offers you the option to change these details on your Will at no additional cost. Further, if you require any other changes on the Will, the DIFC Courts Wills Service Center gives you the option to amend your Will by charging a small fee of AED 550, rather than creating a new Will all over again.

5. Own dedicated Probate Center

The DIFC Courts Wills Service Center have a dedicated section, just for the probate process. This ensures that after the death of the testator, the probate process is carried out in a smooth manner.

Please feel free to drop us a line at clients@legalinz.com, as being registered Wills draftsmen, we are qualified to draft and register your Will with the DIFC Courts Wills Service Center.

Related: Process for registering a DIFC Will