Currently there are about 140,000 EB Green Card Visas issued each year and only a maximum of 7% can be issued to any one nationality annually. What that has meant in practice for the EB2 and EB3 categories is that b/c of the sheer number of Indian and Chinese applicants in particular, that there is a large backlog of waiting lists of people working in the US in limbo not being able to move up or on in their jobs, passing up promotions and better offers, etc. waiting for their visa number in the queue to be called.

For the EB2 category it is about a 4-6 year wait for Indians and Chinese and in the EB3 category that goes up to 10 years and beyond. Of course if the nationality cap is removed then many citizens from other countries in both these categories who had jumped ahead in the queue b/c of these limits may have to wait a bit longer.

Sadly each year many of the 140,000 green card visas go to waste with people who have abandoned their application and returned home or moved elsewhere and b/c of the nature of the law these are wasted for good. If all the green card visas that had been wasted over the last few years had allowed to be reused (so not increasing any caps just using what was already authorized by the US Congress), then the entire current backlog for EB2 and EB3 would be removed for all nations. This actually has been done once before in the early 2000s but such a “radical” or more correctly logical move would seen to be too hard in today’s politically charged, cable news driven, extreme partisan US Immigration landscape.

The startling part of this so far is that it was able to pass with such overwhelming support from Conservative and Tea Party backed Republicans and Liberal and Most Left Leaning Democrats alike. The major premise is so that the US retains high skilled talent to help grow the economy and create jobs. According to Bloomberg, only 15% of visas are granted for economic reasons, a policy that undermines U.S. companies competing in a global talent pool.

Then foreign students studying in the US account for the majority of computer science and engineering doctorates earned from U.S. institutions. (In 2006, more than 4,500 foreign students earned engineering Ph.D.’s in the U.S., almost two-thirds of the total.) There is no policy or incentivized scheme to get them to stay in the U.S. after graduation given that these immigrants have a much higher propensity to create new businesses. We have mentioned before the Duke University study found that foreign immigrants helped found more than a quarter of the technology and engineering companies established in the U.S. between 1995 and 2005 (inc. Google, Yahoo, Paypal, etc.) so a huge amount of jobs and wealth for the US and her citizens.

However there is a roadblock!

One of our “favorite” politicians, Senator Charles (Chuck) Grassley, a Republican from Iowa placed a hold on the bill now it has reach the Senate. Even though it is expected to have broad support in the Upper House of the US Congress, it is now effectively in limbo due to the actions of one Senator for reasons that are not quite clear and that he has not fully expressed. Of course Iowa whose economy is still heavily influenced by Agriculture is not really a mecca for driving US innovation and wealth and nor is it a massive location for foreign highly skilled immigrants to reside, so really this bill would have very little effect if anything there.

However Senator Grassley seemingly unilaterally has put everything on hold possibly because of an earlier 2009 H1B and L1 Visa reform bill he put before Congress with Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois which thankfully has not gone anywhere as would be a major dent in the US economy.

We hope sanity prevails as it has in the House branch of the US Congress but I certainly would not be getting to excited as with the December – January Congress recess coming up and 2012 being a Presidential election year and where partisan politics is at its peak, anything getting done sometimes is a miracle.

Cj

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

On November 22, 2011, the H1B visa quota has been reached according to the USCIS and they will no longer accept new H1B visa petitions for this current year as they assume the applications on hand will fulfill the current quota

This equates to about about a 15,000 increase in the main cap in the last 10 days which is a massive acceleration given that in September we were not even half way through either the Advance Degree Exemption cap or the Main cap. The Advanced Degree Exemption category which is now fully exhausted for this H1B visa season cycle as at October 21 for the 20,000 visas.

It should be noted that the related H-1B1 visa for Chilean and Singaporean citizens are not included in this cap which is about 6,800 set aside each year but is rarely filled and unused from the previous year are used in the current year. These are still being accepted for FY2012.

Congrats to all those who were successful this year and good luck to those on F1 Visa OPT for next year which would begin on April 1, 2012. It may well be a more competitive year next year so would be good to begin your search now and plan ahead.

Cj

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

- E3 Visa General Information
- E3 Visa US Consulate Interview
- E3 Visa Bachelors Degree and Specialty Occupation conditions explained
- Extending, Renewing or Changing Employers on the E3 Visa

Now here are the major points of note that apply to ALL cases. Just because your case varies slightly from this does NOT mean the US Consulate assessing your case are going to give you any special treatment as they assess hundreds of cases daily and are often making snap decisions so is best to be well prepared.

- The Bachelors Degree requirement is specifically for the position you are applying for that as advertised or if not advertised for in the normal course of events would have a bachelors degree as a minimum required criteria
- If you do not have a bachelors degree as a minimum, then you have to prove that any post high school education experience you have (completed or not) combined with your relevant years of professional experience in the area of the specific role you are applying for at least at minimum equals the level of a US Bachelors degree
- While not a stated policy anywhere, given the length of a standard US Bachelors Degree is 4 years, 3 years of relevant professional experience would equal one year of a degree. So that would mean as a rule of thumb, 12 years of relevant professional experience would equal a US bachelors degree (relevance is important as if you are applying for a investment finance job, experience working on a hotel front desk is not going to matter)

- Even though many Australian undergraduate University degrees are 3 years, the US would consider that equivalent to as US Bachelors degree
- Getting your experience and/or partial education accredited by a US company or institution as to its equivalency to a US Bachelors Degree will certainly help (possibly a fair bit) but is by no means a guarantee as to whether you will be approved
- Each case is at the total and ultimate discretion of the US consulate around the world to which you are applying and more particularly to the specific case officer in your case. That Consulate and case officer is under no obligation to provide you full reasoning behind their decision making and you have no right of appeal. You can only try again fully to apply for a new e3 visa application with new information if you have it

- Given that and the lack of clear stated black and white guidelines, you may be denied on technicalities and depending on where you apply you might be denied with a similar case and background to somebody else. This is obviously not fair but is the current system
- If you get denied, that does not preclude from applying again for a future US visa nor does it necessarily count against you. However it is always on your permanent record and you may get asked about it a future US Consulate interview. Given a US Consulate is “never wrong”, you would be well advised to not answer disparaging a previous consular official or consulate in a subsequent consulate interview if asked about a previous denial
- The more specialized your occupation you are applying for, the potential for them to be more relaxed about your level of experience/education. Again this is all completely arbitrary but if you are applying for a highly specialized bio-tech or nuclear role then your chances of being approved on relevant experience alone is probably higher than a generic business role

- In terms of supporting documents apart from getting a degree equivalency done, you could bring references on official letterheads, official HR documents explaining tenure, time at the company, job title and duties of the role you had, tax returns/financials/official company docs if it was your own company, awards and other certificates, diplomas and anything highlighting the level of your experience and education that could be provable if the US consular official so desired by calling somebody or looking up databases online. (it is certainly not advisable to fudge things hear b/c once you lose credibility with the Consulate, it would be hard to regain it). There is no official list of documents, but the more proof the better
- If you are applying for an occupation that you are not sure whether it is a specialty, bring copies of your Bachelors Degrees as well as information about the company, the position and duties as well as copies of where the job was advertised showing the bachelors degree minimum criteria all helps
- With professions where you need US licensing to actually do the job it is a little grey as to whether you can undertake this after you arrive and once you have started work but where possible getting this in advance is helpful and/or having your employer clearly state a plan of action around this when you arrive (NB: most licensing is state based in the US so you would need it from the State where you are working)

In recent times we have been hearing anecdotal experiences from some people, that Canadian based US Consulates are not even processing first time new E3 visa cases brought before them but only renewals of subsequent E3 visas whether the same or a different company. This is NOT a stated policy anywhere and the US Consulates in Canada all allow you to book online a new E3 visa appointment. However given the wait times for interviews for the US Consulates in Canada and the expense of traveling and staying somewhere, it is important to share this type of information that some people seem to be having at face value.

There may be underlying reasons whether pertinent to their specific case and/or due to the case load at a particular Consulate as to why this may be happening but given we don’t know, it is important to be wary. Whether some US Consulate locations are more favorable and easier then others is really unknown and can really only be gleaned from people’s experiences.

Ultimately with all of this it is very arbitrary and may seem unfair. However that is the US Immigration system and you just have to as best you can navigate through the misinformation and lack of clear public guidelines. We encourage you all to share you own experiences here and be as detailed as possible as to your background, your position and which US Consulate you applied so you can all learn from each other as that is definitely the best way to determine success.

Good Luck,
Cj

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

The Lottery is run by the US Government and is very simple application for the most part with just basic details required along with a digital photo. More official information can be found at the official Green Card Lottery Information area of the US State Department.

This year is began October 4, 2011 and if successful you will be notified via a formal letter as well as be able to check online between around May to July in 2012. These dates of announcement will be formally confirmed later The dates of the Green Card Lottery entrance period are fixed so get your entry in early to ensure you do not miss out or leave it to the last minute and risk any issues with site outages. Official instructions and eligble countries are yet to be announced for this year but if you read our Diversity Visa Lottery Instructions you will get a pretty good year about a lot of this as it doesn’t change that much

The green card lottery winners (diversity visa lottery) winners have been announced for Dv-2012 held online from October to November in 2011 twice in May and then again in July due to a computer glitch which we documented. Given a US Federal court upheld the decision to decide the winners again and deny the applications of those that were originally nominated as winners this year in May, that we will never see anything like that where false hopes are raised for so many around the world. Anyway you should note that being selected as a winner does not guarantee you a green card as you must pass some additional criteria as well in the application process.

Unfortunately those who missed out on the green card and permanent residency will NOT receive any notification but you will be able to check the status of their entry through the E-DV website. You MUST keep the confirmation page information from when you entered the DV Lottery

Between April and July 2012 results should be sent out to the lucky applicants with an official letter from the U.S. Department of State Kentucky Consular Center in Williamsburg, Kentucky. All notifications are by mail to your nominated address and you should note that there is NOT any email notification. It seems like already people have started receiving their winning letters so hopefully this will be the case for all of you that read this post and applied!

The notification letters will have additional instructions, including information about additional forms and other documentation required as well as immigrant visa application fees.

A couple of additional points to note.

1. Be patient with receiving the 2nd letter if you have received the first as sometime the mail is slow. The only people that you can contact that will give you any insightful information if you are a winner and received the first letter is the KCC.

2. Check the US government websites to see the current dates for your number if you are a winner

3. If you were a child on a winner’s application and since turned 21 after being 20 at the time of application, you are still eligible as your age is frozen. However you must take up the green card within a year as otherwise you will be ineligible

4. High School education or its equivalent as per the requirements of the primary applicant means the successful completion of a twelve year course of elementary/primary and secondary education in the U.S. or successful completion in another county of a formal course of elementary/primary and secondary education that is comparable to the US 12 year education system.

5. If you are currently residing in the US on another non-immigrant visa, you are able to adjust your status within the US if you are a winner

Good Luck

CJ

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

As October 1st is the start of the new year otherwise known as FY2012. That means if you have already been approved for an H1B visa since April 1, 2011, your new visa has already taken effect and you can legally begin working for your sponsor employer now. It also means that if you are sponsored now, given how long the application process takes even with premium processing, you will be able to start working immediately which is a great selling point for foreigners to a prospective employer and sponsor as opposed to earlier in the year.

So as of November 18, 2011, which is the most recent H1B quota update the USCIS has announced. There are currently 61,800 petitions to count towards the general 65,000 H1B visa cap which only includes petitions that are approved or pending. Anything that has already been denied is not included.

This equates to about another 5,500 increase in the main cap since the last USCIS update on November 14 which is a light slowing of the H1B visa approval acceleration of September to mid October. The Advanced Degree Exemption category which is now fully exhausted for this H1B visa season cycle as at October 21 for the 20,000 visas.

In the last weeks the main cap has gone up by over 10,000 and the Advanced exemption quota is almost complete so if you are a foreigner looking work in the US and be sponsored by a employer, don’t delay because for whatever reason there is certainly an acceleration happening in recent times.

Remember if you have a US graduate degree and eligible for the Advance Degree additional cap, that now that cap is exhausted your application just falls under the main H1B quota.

(It should be noted that the related H-1B1 visa for Chilean and Singaporean citizens are not included in this cap which is about 6,800 set aside each year but is rarely filled and unused from the previous year are used in the current year)

So it would seem that there is plenty of visas still available and judging by the moderate amount of applications received thus far, traditional H1B visa sponsor companies are still nowhere the levels of hiring they were in 2006-8,

Good Luck to All Who Are Searching!

Cj

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

You can see even within the questions below they contradict themselves as to where you can apply for an E3 Visa and do your US Consulate Interview. So no wonder people get confused but just follow as best as you can the advice here and the experiences and guidelines we share and most often you should be OK!

Do I have to find a job in the United States first before applying for an E-3 visa?

• Yes. You need to have a job offer from a sponsoring employer in the United States before you can apply for the E-3 visa.

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

In the past we have looked at the Top 100 companies that sponsored US work visas and E3 Visa specific employer sponsors among other tips around creating US resumes, US interview tips and our Top 10 steps to working in the US. So there is many a good grounding of resources across the site along with the many reader experiences as to how they traveled to the US and found a job.

Given the nature of this information we think it gives a foreigners a good idea of the pulse of the US hiring market and where the majority of opportunities currently lie from a corporate and sector perspective as well as the cities and regions of the country that you may have most success.

The data below while not specific in the source of the numbers from Rediff, is certainly great from a directional perspective and shows everybody a great perspective on the US economy and job market at large. Firstly we look at the Top 10 companies in terms of spending on the H1B visa

Top 10 H1B Visa Companies

This list of company is not that different from some of the past years and other top employer lists we released. You can see it is dominated by high tech and bio tech companies obviously seeking the highly skilled foreign engineers, computer scientists and graduate/phd level foreigners. A good proportion of which would have graduated as students on the F1 visa from US colleges and universities and may have worked during their F1 OPT period at these companies prior to their full employment and H1B visa sponsorship. US students are a minority as colleges and universities for studies in the sciences, engineering, math and technology particularly at the graduate level. Hence the push from a lot of these companies to push for even greater quota for the H1B visa to help fill large vacancies.

Top 10 H1B Visa Cities

The Top 10 H1B visa cities presents information that in many ways matches the list above. 7 of the 10 cities in this list come from the Bay Area and Silicon Valley in Northern California home to the tech industry of the world and some of the most innovative companies of recent history such as;

- Apple (Cupertino)
- Facebook (Palo Alto)
- Twitter (San Francisco)
- Yahoo (Sunnyvale)
- Google (Mountain View)

Then when you consider that Redmond in Washington is home to Microsoft and that Oracle is also located in this Northern California area and that New York and Chicago are two of the world’s largest cities for not just technology but finance, health and many other industries you can start to see a common trend.

One thing to note is that where there is opportunity there is also competition. So if you look at other major centers like Houston TX, Charlotte NC, Austin TX, Boston MA among other areas of the country that there are also many other great regions in the country to live and work

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

Today we thought we give an update as released by the US Government as the nature of Deportations of foreigners from the US in the fiscal Immigration year FY-2011. We don’t really have an opinion on this as we don’t know anything about any of the individual cases or much about deportation generally as a US Immigration issue. Certainly for convicted violent felons who happen to be foreigners it is hard to feel much sympathy when you think the many thousands of foreigners who are want to come to the US legally or those that are already here on waiting lists for more permanent status like a Green Card or US Citizenship.

However deportation is something that any Immigrant who is not a US citizen certainly faces as a reality of the status whether due to fault of their own or things beyond their control. So it is important to be aware of what is going on in the world of US Immigration as far as deportation is concerned. In the past we have written specifically about the cases of deportation of people who were already approved and received an H1B visa from the US consulate for dubious and yet fully unknown reasons at best.

So exactly 396,906 foreigners were deported in FY2011 of which about 55% had either a felony or misdemeanor conviction for some crime committed within the US. Unfortunately this crime rate was up about 89% from 2008 levels and possibly could be attributed to the more bleak economic picture and bad job situation meaning many of these immigrants who are living close to the poverty line were following a trend that is all too common with crime and bad prospects for prosperity. This also includes people who were found to have re-entered the US after being ordered to leave or violating an earlier order to leave the country.

Let’s hope that these negative statistics with both deportation and violent crimes committed by foreigners trends back down in next period and that positive legislative efforts and reforms are made to make the whole US Immigration system fairer for all.

Cj

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.

The United States government expects to see a well-drafted business plan as support for applications in both the E Treaty Visa category and the EB5 Immigrant Entrepreneur category. Additionally, USCIS often kicks back a request for a feasibility study in L1 “New Office” petitions, which is something that is normally included in a well-drafted business plan. Hence, it stands to reason that inclusion of a well-drafted business plan is essential as supporting documentation in an L1 “New Office” Petition.

As evidence of the critical importance of a well-drafted plan is the fact that the United States government frequently denies L1 visa, E2 visa and EB5 visa petitions and applications due to their lack of a plan that is both comprehensive and credible.

Business plans that are not comprehensive and are more in the nature of a summary or overview of the business are generally not acceptable for L1 visa, E2 visa, and EB5 visa purposes. Instead, in any one given case the United States government expects to receive and review a quality product that, at minimum:

a.) Fully describes the enterprise, its products and services;

b.) Analyzes the market in detail, including potential customers and competition;

c.) Outlines a marketing strategy;

d.) Projects sales, costs, and income over a period of 5 years, showing the basis for these projections; and

e.) Presents complete details regarding the enterprises organizational structure, including complete job descriptions and a staffing timetable.

In short, the United States government expects to see a business plan that is as comprehensive as one that would be presented to a bank for purposes of seeking funding. Therefore, it is strongly recommended that one seek the services of a professional who is familiar with the relevant immigration regulations to draft ones plan if one hopes to stand a strong chance at success in an L1 visa, E2 visa or EB5 visa petition or application.

When selecting the right firm to draft a visa-specific business plan, a company or investor should seek out a firm that possesses both experience in the writing of bespoke business plans as well as the appropriate legal expertise to tailor the plan to the specific requirements of the L1 visa, E2 visa or EB5 visa categories.

To ensure that all the required elements of a well-drafted business plan will be covered to the satisfaction of the United States government, the company or investor should satisfy themselves that all of the following services will be covered by the fee that they will be paying for the business plan writing service:

a.) Setup of business plan according to target visa category;

b.) Gathering of information and documentation regarding company ownership, objectives and mission;

c.) Working with business owner to determine concise statement regarding company’s success formula;

d.) Work out with owner the visa-appropriate management and staffing plan (i.e., executive/management mix for L1 visa; marginality avoidance for E2 visa; creation of 10 full-time positions over a 2-year period for EB5 visa;

e.) Draft an easy to read service summary;

f.) Collaborate with client to create feasibility study, which covers target market, customer/client potentiality in geographical area (with growth projections), and competition analysis;

g.) Gather financial information to draft financial plan and Tables, including Start-up Summary (as applicable), Sales Forecast, Operating Expenses, and 5-year Projections.

Once the business plan has been developed into its penultimate draft, it should undergo a final review by the responsible immigration attorney to secure an opinion as to the viability of the plan, from a financial perspective. (Obviously, if the responsible immigration attorney is drafting the business plan, his or her opinion will be rendered simultaneously with the creation of the penultimate draft.) Once the responsible immigration attorney has rendered his opinion that the plan is fiscally viable, the plan can be finalized and signed off for inclusion in the visa application package.

©2012 E3 Visa. All Rights Reserved.