Your resource for all things immigration.
To obtain an H-1B visa, a petitioner must establish that it will have an employment relationship with the beneficiary. While this seems like a very simple and easy enough thing to do, the problem is that in an employment relationship things are not always black and white. Continue reading “Navigating H-1B Requirements: The Existence of a Valid Employer-Employee Relationship”
When President Barack Obama first addressed the nation to unveil his Immigration Accountability Executive Actions, the media and the internet were in a frenzy to see who could get the story out first. Despite the fact that many of the specifics of the planned executive actions were unclear or not yet finalized, legal experts and analysts all across the country were discussing the potential consequences or effects on national security and the economy as a result of the estimated millions of undocumented immigrants in the United States who stood to benefit. Continue reading “The Devil is in the Details: What Employers and Businesses Need to Know About the President’s Executive Actions on Immigration”
Under the Immigrant and Nationality Act (“INA”), the hiring of a foreign worker must not adversely affect the wages or working conditions of similarly situated U.S. workers. The INA was also designed to protect foreign workers from being exploited. To make sure that does not happen, the INA requires employers to, among other things, pay foreign workers here on H1-B visas at least the local prevailing wage. Continue reading “To Amend, or Not to Amend?”
Quite often employers ask, “If it doesn’t work out, can we recover all the money we have spent on the H-1B process from the employee?” The short is answer to this repeatedly asked question is no. Department of Labor (DOL) regulations are clear that the employer must pay the filing fees and may not allow the worker to pay it directly, by deduction from wages or in any other fashion. DOL regulations say that the H-1B costs and fees are employer business expenses and exclude those fees and costs from the list of “authorized deductions.” (Read more about deductions for an H-1B worker’s pay.) Continue reading “A Cautionary Tale for H-1B Employers”