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Early this year, the Department of State (DOS) announced a pilot program, being implemented on an embassy-by-embassy basis, to waive the non-immigrant visa interview requirement for certain visa renewals. Recently, the U.S. Embassy in Bucharest, Romania, announced the expansion of the visa interview waiver program to certain applicants seeking to renew a B1/B2, C1/D, or F/J/M visa that expired within the last 48 months. Read More »
Individuals who are in the United States in F-1 (student) status should be aware of special rules that may apply if filing a petition for a change to H-1B status. Under the immigration regulations, certain students with pending or approved H-1B petitions are permitted to remain in the United States in F-1 status during the... Read More »
As of April 13, visa processing fees levied by the Department of State will change. While many temporary ("non-immigrant") visa fees will increase, all permanent ("immigrant") fees will decrease. Read More »
According to a USCIS teleconference today, as of April 4 they have received 22,320 H-1B visa petitions, about a third of which are master's degree cases. As a reminder, 65,000 "regular" H-1Bs and 20,000 U.S.-earned master's degree H-1B are released for each fiscal year. Read More »
Today the USCIS released details on Temporary Protective Status (TPS) application procedures for eligible Syrian nationals. In addition to Syria, other designated countries include El Salvador, Haiti, Honduras, Nicaragua, Somalia, Sudan, and South Sudan. TPS designation can be made by the Secretary of Homeland Security when a foreign country has conditions that temporarily prevent the... Read More »
According to Charlie Oppenheim, Chief, Immigrant Visa Control & Reporting in the State Department, the China and India EB-2 cut-off will retrogress to August 15, 2007 in the May 2012 Visa Bulletin. The reason for this is because demand for immigrant visas for these categories has been increasing. The State Department has not made projections... Read More »
The USCIS announced that Syria will be designated for Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for an 18-month period. We anticipate that later this week USCIS will provide additional details in the Federal Register, which will include information on how to register for TPS, who is eligible to apply for TPS, and when the TPS registration will... Read More »
With its analysis of new data from the government, the nonprofit, nonpartisan National Foundation for American Policy (NFAP) makes crystal clear: Over the past four years, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) has dramatically increased its denials of L-1 and H-1B petitions and much of the increase in denials involves Indian-born professionals and researchers... Read More »
On April 1, employers will be able to file H-1B petitions for their employees who require a first-time H-1B visa for work that will commence on October 1, 2012. Therefore, now is the time to identify new H-1B employees and begin preparing necessary petitions. With increased denial rates and skyrocketing requests for additional evidence, employers... Read More »
The Department of State recently announced a Visa Pilot Program intended to ease the visa issuance process for certain low-risk applicants. Details of the program have not yet been determined but generally applicants that have successfully applied for a visa in the past and who meet certain parameters will not be required to appear in... Read More »
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