Kuwait's 2025 Work-Permit Overhaul: Fees, Transfers and Exit Permits

Employers and recruitment agencies deploying a project workforce across the GCC and moving expatriate staff into Kuwait are operating under a restructured work-permit regime. Across 2025 Kuwait raised the cost of work permits, replaced its tiered employer-transfer rules with a flat fee, removed long-standing exemptions, and tightened the exit-permit requirement for private-sector workers, with processing moved onto the Public Authority for Manpower's online system. The changes affect what it costs to sponsor a worker, how and when a worker can move between employers, and what an employer must approve before a worker can leave the country. This guide sets out the new fees, the transfer rules, the exit-permit requirement, and what employers should check before placing or moving staff.

Kuwait's work-permit changes at a glance

Kuwait's 2025 reforms raised the cost of a work permit and replaced its time-based transfer waivers with a flat-fee framework. The table below sets the headline changes against the position they replaced.

Change	Before	Now
Work-permit processing fee	KWD 175	KWD 325
Local vs foreign permit	Distinguished	No distinction
Transfer fee	Tiered; free after 12 months	Flat KD 150 per transfer, all eligible sectors (from June 2025); prior exemptions removed
Early transfer (within 3 years)	KWD 300, only between 6 and 12 months	KWD 300 early-transfer fee within three years
Exit permit (Article 18)	Not required	Employer-approved, from 1 July 2025
Processing	In person	Online through the Public Authority for Manpower (PAM)

The new work-permit fees

Kuwait's standard work-permit processing fee rose to KWD 325, up from KWD 175. Alongside the increase, the system no longer distinguishes between local and foreign workers for the purpose of the permit, and applications, renewals, and transfers now run through the Public Authority for Manpower online rather than at in-person counters. The combined effect is a higher headline cost per permit and a higher bar on documentation accuracy, because the online process leaves less room for correcting incomplete files after submission. The changes are set out in immigration advisories including Fragomen's analysis of the revised rules.

The employer-transfer rules

Foreign workers changing employer within three years of a work-permit grant now pay an early-transfer fee of KWD 300. This replaces the previous tiered model, under which a transfer was generally not allowed in the first six months, attracted a KWD 300 early-transfer fee between six and twelve months, and was free after twelve months. Separately, from June 2025 a flat fee of KD 150 applies to every work-permit transfer across all eligible sectors, and the exemptions that previously applied were removed. Employers therefore face a defined transfer-cost framework rather than the older time-based waiver, which changes how the cost of recruiting or moving an already-resident worker is calculated.

Exit permits for private-sector workers

From 1 July 2025, Article 18 private-sector expatriate workers need an employer-approved exit permit to leave Kuwait. The requirement places the approval of a worker's departure with the sponsoring employer, and it applies during a transfer as well: the current sponsor must still approve any exit until the new work permit is issued. For employers, the exit-permit step becomes part of offboarding and of any mid-assignment travel, and for workers it ties the ability to leave to the sponsor's authorisation through the PAM system.

The sector transfer window closing in 2026

Workers in agriculture, fishing, livestock, small and medium enterprises, and industry can transfer only until 30 June 2026 under Ministerial Resolution No. 2. After that date, transfers in those named sectors are restricted again, so the window is both near-term and limited to specific sectors rather than a general allowance. Employers recruiting from, or moving workers within, those sectors should treat the date as a hard planning constraint, because a transfer that is not completed inside the window may not be available afterwards.

What employers should check before placing or moving staff

The reforms change the cost and the control of sponsoring expatriate staff, so a short set of checks protects budget and timelines.

1. Budget the higher KWD 325 processing fee and the flat KD 150 transfer fee into the cost of each placement.
2. Confirm whether a target worker is inside the three-year window that triggers the KWD 300 early-transfer fee.
3. Build the employer-approved exit permit into offboarding and into any mid-assignment travel for Article 18 workers.
4. For agriculture, fishing, livestock, SMEs, and industry, complete any intended transfer before 30 June 2026.

Worked example: moving a worker after eighteen months

An engineer already in Kuwait on another company's permit, eighteen months in, shows how the transfer rules now add up. Because the worker is inside the three-year window, the move triggers the KWD 300 early-transfer fee, on top of the flat KD 150 fee that now applies to every transfer, and the outgoing sponsor must still approve the worker's exit steps until the new permit is issued, a control that analyses of the 2025 reforms tie to the wider exit-permit change. Against the previous rule, where a transfer after twelve months was free, the same hire now carries a defined transfer cost to budget and a timeline that depends on the outgoing sponsor's cooperation. If the role sat in agriculture, fishing, livestock, an SME, or industry, the transfer would also need to complete before 30 June 2026.

Employing in Kuwait without a local entity

Employers without a Kuwait entity can place staff through an employer of record that holds a local entity and manages PAM permits and transfers. The employer of record is the legal employer in-country: it sponsors the work permit, carries the fee and transfer obligations, administers the exit-permit process, and runs payroll that meets the way wage protection system checks work across the Gulf, while the client directs the work and a recruitment agency, where one is involved, keeps the commercial relationship. This route lets a company or agency place a worker in Kuwait without registering an entity or operating the PAM process directly. The mechanics of employing through a local provider are set out on the Employer of Record service page.

About Aspirock

Aspirock is an Employer of Record and payroll provider operating across 70+ countries, with six global offices and over 22 years of experience supporting more than 5,000 workers. Every client works with a named account team that owns the deployment end to end, so contracts, payroll, visas, and compliance filings in each market are handled by people accountable for the outcome. For employer-of-record and payroll support, see the Employer of Record service page.

Frequently asked questions