Saudi Visa

1) Legally, you cannot work on visit visa.  Many people do this but if ever caught, it means deportation, fines and ban
2) Visit visa is visit visa i.e. you cannot process a new visit visa if the previous one is still valid
3) You CAN process a work visa (which leads to Iqama) even if you have a valid visit visa
4) If rejected for work visa, provided they don't cancel your visit visa, then you can continue as before

Legally, and not many people know this, a work visa for Saudi can be processed from anywhere that has an Embassy and where the applicant is resident i.e. if you are from the UK and are resident in the UAE, the visa can be processed from there and you don't need to go back to the UK.   It has nothing to do with wasta - your employer must have a visa dedicated for your nationality in that location.  Most employers don't as when they get a quota by nationality; they designate it to the home country of that nationality.   

So if you are resident in the UAE, your employer should be able to process the visa for you - in that case, you just need a police report from the UAE and not the UK.  If you are not resident in the UAE then I am not sure how that will work - wasta will help but will they not ask for a police report from the UK? not sure about that.

Thanks for the informative response.

My first Visa I had when I originally started with different employer the Visa states not permitted to work. This Visa doesn't say that with my current employer, not sure what Visa I have tbh guess I'll ask someone to read the Arabic for me.

I don't have a UAE residency, however the new employers PRO said I could get the Visa issued in abu dhabi just take basic UK police report with spent convictions not showing up and attested degree etc..

I'm concerned to leave one job not to have another.

Don't resign until you have the visa in your hand.  Also be clear on which visa they are getting for you.

I'm just concerned that my current employer will need to cancel their Visa for the work Visa to be issued. The visa will be work visa for iqama processing. I'm actually seconded into the company that is looking to take me on directly