Free zone Dubai visa cancellation after labour dispute

[Froggystyle]

Dear Shawarma,

Thanks for giving so helpful advices in this forum.
Here is my question:
I had a labour case (which i won) with my previous employer (i was working in free zone in dubai). As the case is being closed in the court, DMC is asking me to cancel my visa by myself (as i could definitely not trust the PRO of the company to do so). Everything is fine, and i am ready to pay the 310 AED cancellation fee, but what i didn't get is that they said i would have to pay the 2500 AED deposit as well! I am not too sure why i should repay the deposit.
They said i could get it back when my residency is transfered to another company or when i leave the country. My plan is to leave the country as soon as this is over. But then again they said i would have to collect the deposit myself (which i obviously can't if i am outside the country) or ask a friend to collect for me (all my friends left due to the recession).
So my question is: what are my alternative so that i don't have to pay the deposit?
I could have just left the country and my visa would have automatically been canceled after 6 months anyway. But i decided to play by the rules.

[shawarma]

1. I presume DMC is Dubai Media City?

2. From what I understand, normally a company leaves a deposit with the Dubai immigration department for each employee. Perhaps because you are cancelling your Dubai visa yourself, you have to take over that deposit. It's normal that the deposit isn't returned to the sponsor until after the employee or visitor has left the UAE, or transferred to another sponsor.

3. As it's the immigration department that deals with the visas and deposits (I assume), all I can suggest is that you talk to them to see if there is an alternative to handing over a deposit, or another way of getting the refund. I can't think of anything myself apart from what you've already been told.

4. If you were to leave without cancelling your visa, then it doesn't automatically get cancelled, it becomes invalid which is a different thing. It means that you cannot enter the UAE again until it is cancelled so you'd still have to go through that procedure somehow. Perhaps what you can do is leave without cancelling the visa and then try to cancel it from overseas but that might not be easy to do on your own. Again, check with the immigration department if that's possible.