Article 29 of the Saudi Chambers of Commerce Law

This article answers a question many business owners ask: is joining the chamber of commerce mandatory?

Paragraph 1: mandatory subscription

• Every establishment registered in the commercial register must join the chamber.
• The competent chamber is the one in whose area the establishment's head office or one of its branches is located.
• If the establishment has more than one branch within the area of the same chamber, the subscription is not multiplied by the number of branches.
• All of this is as set out in the Implementing Regulations.

Paragraph 2: voluntary subscription for those not required to register

• The Minister, after coordinating with the competent authorities, may allow those who carry on a legally licensed activity and are not required to register in the commercial register to join the chamber.
• However, they have no right to vote, stand for election or be elected.

This limit matters because a subscriber, as defined in Article 1, is anyone with a valid subscription, while this paragraph denies a category of subscribers electoral rights.

The article is linked to Article 30, which refers to the Implementing Regulations for setting the categories of subscribers and the fee for each category, and provides that the fee falls due after 3 years from the date of registration in the commercial register. The article does not detail how the competent chamber is determined when branches are in different regions; that is left to the Implementing Regulations.