F1 US Non-Immigrants: Home to All Non Immigrants

For five business days beginning Wednesday, April 1st, United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) started accepting petitions for the H-1B for the 2010 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1. In recent years, visa limits were reached on the first days of the application period.Last year, USCIS published a new rule according to which they will select H1-B visa application received during first five business days through H1B lottery process if cap limit is reached on first day of application. Successively after five business days if cap is not reached, any applications received on the day cap is reached will be used for H1B lottery process. It should be noted that though there is a notion from the last year, that USCIS will accept application for first five business days for H1B lottery if cap is reached anytime within first five days, but this statement has not been explicitly published anywhere this year on USCIS website.

There were wide reports that the H-1B cap filing for FY 2010 will be much lighter this year because of current economic recession and hiring freeze in the companies. With companies laying off so many workers and stringent laws imposed on companies getting bailout money through Trouble Asset Relief Program (TARP), you would expect that H1B cap for FY 2010 will last for few months. But recent article published in New York Times suggests that there still may be rush for H1B visa application this year even as the demands seems to dip. This may be due to large amount of backlog from applicants from last two years, who could not get H1B because of lottery in FY 2009 and FY 2008. Failure to get selected through H1B lottery last year forced these applicants to work on Optional Practical Training (OPT) for more than a year, thanks to the new rule published last year on OPT extension for 17 months for STEM (Science, Technological, Mathematics and Engineering) students. Needless to say big Indian technological companies, who could not get visas last year will try for them this year.

There have been recent reports that Department of Labor (DOL) has become strict on many US based small consulting companies who exploit H1B visa program by filing many H1B application with no legitimate client requirements. These companies are in strict scrutiny by DOL and hopefully will be filing less worker visas this year. There is also information that these small companies to surmount any explanation to DOL this year, plan to file many H1B under Consular Processing (CP). Consular Processing requires applicant to obtain H1B visa stamped before they could work for an employer who filed a petition. This way they will only provide I-797 to their employees when they will have legitimate requirements from the clients.

It has been 3 official days since Cap has been open but there is no formal release on H1B cap count for FY 2010 on USCIS website. There are unconfirmed reports or rumors that on the first day, the agency had received less than 40,000 out of the total cap of 75,820 excluding the free trade special H-1B1 cap numbers for Singapore and Chile (Oh Law firm). Considering the fact that most of the employers had sent in cap petitions on the first day of April, the volume can be considered much lighter this year than that of last year. Those who have filed or will file before the end of the day of April 7, 2009 have good chances to get their H1B application accepted. Only cases that will be subject to the lottery will be those received on final receipt day when cap is reached.

Looking back at those 40,000 numbers for the first day of H1B filing, they seems a lot in this market condition. If cap is reached within few days from now, then there is a specific need to overhaul H1B visa Program plus immediate need to ban some of the participating companies who abuse the system left and right. It is less likely in this economic recession that there is such a high demand for H1B visas when there are so many right candidates available in America especially when unemployment rate hit 8.3% in March 2009.

There is no doubt that America needs talented and skilled workers for continuous economic growth but this should be achieved with rational means and by bringing reform in H1B system through strict regulations by DOL. Major reform in the system also calls for total H1B CAP exempt for International students who have earned Masters and PhD from American Universities thus preventing reverse brain drain of talented individuals who contribute to continuous development of technology in the country. These individuals not only include STEM majors but also Business majors who add so much to American Financial System.

This is a new blog that will cover latest on the following Non-immigrant visas.

B-1/B-2 - Temporary visitor for business or pleasure
C - Transit through the United States
D - Crew (airline/ship)
E-1/E-2 - Treaty Trader/Investor Visa
E-3 - Specialty Work Visa
F - Student (academic or language program)
H - Individuals in specialty occupations (e.g. nurses)
I - Journalists
J - Exchange visitors
K - Fiancé(e) of U.S. citizen - while technically a non-immigrant visa, the processing of this category actually falls under immigrant visas
L - Intra-company transfer
M - Student in vocational or recognized non-academic program
O - Individuals with extraordinary abilities in sciences, arts, education, business, athletics
P - Internationally recognized athlete or member of internationally recognized entertainment group
Q - Participants in an international cultural program
R - Religious workers
Official and Diplomatic visas
I-485/I-140/AOS/EAD – Though this is an immigrant application, but is of an interest to all non-immigrants