Category: H Visas

Congress sets a limit on the number of H-1B visas available each year. This past fiscal year, H-1B numbers were exhausted within the first five days of filing. The Alliance of Business Immigration Lawyers (ABIL) anticipates that the numbers will run out quickly again this year. If U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) receives more… Read More

On April 24, 2013, the Departments of Labor (DOL) and Homeland Security published a joint interim final rule on wage methodology for the temporary non-agricultural employment H-2B program. The rule revises the prevailing wage methodology used by the DOL to calculate certain prevailing wages paid to H-2B workers and U.S. workers recruited in connection with… Read More

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has added Grenada to the list of countries (PDF) whose nationals are eligible to participate in the H-2A and H-2B programs for the coming year, effective January 18, 2013. The agency explained that under DHS regulations, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) may approve petitions for H-2A and H-2B… Read More

The Department of Labor’s Office of Foreign Labor Certification (OFLC) released a FAQ (PDF) in December 2012 on H-2A and H-2B iCERT implementation. The iCERT visa portal system is a Web-based filing and case management platform that provides access to program services across the foreign labor certification programs that OFLC administers. Among other things, the… Read More

The Chicago National Processing Center (CNPC) has a new address. Paper filings for the D-1, H-2A, and H-2B programs should be sent to the CNPC’s new addresses below. The CNPC move does not affect the electronic filing of labor condition applications (LCAs), but any employer with permission to file by hard copy should direct its… Read More