UAE edition · 10
A trading company and a funded startup need very different books
The chart of accounts, the reports and the tax detail that matter depend on what your business actually does, not a generic template.
A UAE ecommerce seller needs marketplace payouts split into sales, fees and VAT before they reach the ledger. A trading company needs landed cost and customs duty tracked into inventory. A GCC subsidiary of a US or UK group needs figures that reconcile straight into a parent's consolidation. The pages below set out how Finbryn handles each one, and where a Qualifying Free Zone Person's Corporate Tax position changes what gets tracked.
- Ecommerce (Amazon and Shopify)Bookkeeping for online sellers on Amazon, Shopify, Etsy and their own storefronts, built around clean payout and sales tax data.
- SaaSBookkeeping and reporting for subscription software businesses tracking recurring revenue, deferred revenue and burn.
- Restaurants and multi-entity franchise groupsBookkeeping for restaurant groups and franchise operators running several locations or legal entities at once.
- Real estate and property managementBookkeeping for property owners and managers tracking income, expenses and reserves at the level of each individual property.
- Construction and job costingBookkeeping for contractors and builders who need cost and profitability tracked by job, not just by month.
- Medical and dental practicesBookkeeping for medical and dental practices reconciling insurance payments, patient billing and payroll.
- Agencies and consultanciesBookkeeping for marketing agencies, design studios and consulting firms billing clients on retainers and project fees.
- Startups and VC-backed companiesBookkeeping and reporting for early-stage, venture-backed companies watching burn, runway and investor reporting closely.
- Trucking and logisticsBookkeeping for trucking companies and logistics operators tracking cost per mile across a fleet of owner-operators or drivers.
- HospitalityBookkeeping for hotels, short-term rentals and hospitality operators reconciling booking platform payouts and occupancy-driven revenue.
What actually differs, sector by sector
Ecommerce and trading companies
A single Amazon.ae or Noon payout, or a supplier settlement, often lands as one blended figure hiding sales, platform fees, freight and VAT. That gets separated before it ever reaches your profit and loss account.
Startups and SaaS
Runway, deferred revenue recognised correctly, and figures a US or UK investor can actually use, sit alongside a Corporate Tax position that stays current from the first taxable dirham rather than getting reconstructed before a raise.
Agencies and consultancies
Time and cost tracked against the specific project earning the fee, not just against the business overall, matters more once a mainland licence is billing clients across several emirates at once.
GCC subsidiaries of foreign groups
A UAE entity sitting inside a larger group needs intercompany balances and Corporate Tax figures that tie out cleanly against the parent's own reporting standard, not a set of numbers that only makes sense on its own.
Questions
Before you look for your specific sector
What if my exact type of business is not on this list?
Book a call anyway. Most of what applies here is broader than the four categories shown, and we will tell you directly if your business needs something we have not built out yet.
Does a specific sector change what we are quoted?
It can, mainly where transaction volume, the number of entities, or a mix of free zone and mainland licences drives the actual work. We scope that on a call against your real accounts rather than a generic sector rate.
Do we need to already be VAT-registered for sector-specific bookkeeping to matter?
No. A business still below the AED 375,000 mandatory VAT threshold runs into most of the same sector-specific questions as a larger one, just at a smaller scale and without the VAT layer yet.
Will you already understand our specific niche within a sector?
We build from your existing chart of accounts and software rather than requiring deep prior exposure to your exact niche, though something with genuinely distinct rules, inventory-heavy trading or a multi-emirate licence structure, benefits from the dedicated approach set out on that sector's own page.
How does coverage differ between a free zone business and a mainland one in the same sector?
The underlying sector work is similar; what changes is the tax and licensing layer sitting on top of it, since a free zone entity's Qualifying Free Zone Person status affects its Corporate Tax position in a way a mainland licence does not.
How do you keep up with sector rules that change, like free zone licence conditions?
We track the statutory changes relevant to the sectors we cover, including Qualifying Free Zone Person conditions and free zone renewal requirements, and update our own process whenever a rule moves rather than running an onboarding setup that never gets revisited.
Next step
Describe your business, we will tell you what actually applies
A short call is enough to map your sector against how the bookkeeping would genuinely run.