» Business-based Immigration

With the visa bulletin showing major retrogressions, and unavailability in some categories, many foreign nationals may be reconsidering their employment-based permanent residence strategies. In fact, this is a great time to re-evaluate and develop a… Read More

The American Immigration Lawyers Association (AILA) has just reported that several I-485 applications for permanent residence have been improperly rejected by USCIS. Apparently, on April 30th there was a processing problem that caused the incorrect r… Read More

USCIS reports that the agency has received approximately 36,700 H-1B cap-subject petitions as of May 11, 2012. They also report that they have received approximately 14,800 H-1B petitions for the U.S. Master’s degree cap. The annual H-1B cap is… Read More

USCIS reports that as of April 13, they have received approximately 20,600 H-1B cap subject petitions. They have also received an additional 9,700 H-1B petitions for the U.S. master’s cap of 20,000. What does this mean? A little less than one t… Read More

Attention employers: this is friendly reminder to give priority to your H-1B petitions! The H-1B cap has lasted several months in recent years (it was met in November last year). No one can predict how long the cap will last this year. However, with… Read More

Numerical limit/annual cap: There is an annual cap of 65,000 H-1Bs available every year, plus an additional 20,000 H-1Bs for U.S. master’s degree holders. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service’s (USCIS) fiscal year begins October 1. Therefore… Read More

The Administrative Appeals Office adjudicates immigration cases that have been appealed from a denial by USCIS. If an immigration filing is denied, the applicant or petitioner may sometimes have the option of appealing the decision, or of re-filing a… Read More

In the previous post, I reviewed the key requirements for a successful H-1B petition. The last part of that post was about how the employer must prove a need for the position. On a related note, the employer must clearly establish the employee-employ… Read More