The P&L showed AED 6M profit. Ninety days later, the same contractor couldn’t make payroll. The warning signs were flashing the whole time — just not in the accounts. Profit is a rear-view mirror. Cash is the windscreen. I saw this on a Dubai sewerage package under FIDIC Red Book 1999: certified revenue looked healthy,…
The work was done. The variation was real. And the money was gone anyway — because the notice missed the 28-day bar. On one project, two missed notices cost a contractor AED 1.3M. Here is the hardest lesson in contractor finance: the notice is the entitlement. Under FIDIC, your right to be paid for a…
A contractor with an AED 100M order book walked into his bank and got declined. A rival with AED 50M got approved the same week. The order book was never the point. In the UAE, a full pipeline feels like leverage. It isn’t. Banks don’t lend against the size of your order book — they…
