travelling for interview to us (h1b) immigration questions?

hoggy1012

Hi all
I’m travelling to Denver this Sunday for an interview with a potential h1b sponsor. My question is in regards to the us immigration authorities. Should I declare that my reason for travelling is to seek employment and maybe bring unnecessary interrogation upon myself or should I simply say I’m travelling for a visit? Staying for one week at a hotel doesn’t sound convincing and I doubt the respond well to be deceived at all. In the same manner when completing the esta application I didn’t declare I was travelling to seek employment either. so anybody got any ideas?

lil_lisa

They will ask for a copy of your return ticket and see you're here to visit. If you just say you're here to see a friend that should be fine. They will ask about previous entries to the US. Mentioning that you have an interview for a prospective job should not be a problem. Its very acceptable for people to go over on the three month visa waiver looking for jobs, as long as they do NOT work a day while there.

Therefore if you mention its for an interview you may be asked for further proof of leaving the country before coming back on a H1B visa, so maybe some prepared papers for the H1B visa or the company's papers or something.

The easiest thing is just to say you are visiting a friend or relative for a week and show your return flight.

Good luck!

silja

Never lie to an immigration officer. That being said, no need to volunteer info either I'd stay with the "visiting friend" reason unless you get asked directly about looking for work or similar.

InTheTrees

Its normal for them to ask "business or pleasure" but beyond that I dont know that they have much right to ask much about the specifics of your business and there's certainly nothing irregular about an interview so i;d say just tell them your over on business for a few days for a job interview.

Dont worry.

And best of luck with the interview too!

Adrock-aka

Hi guys,

Firstly Hoggy, hope you get it man, best of luck!

I'm in the same boat, will be going to the US for the summer looking for H1B sponsorship. Can I ask what industry you're in and how you got a company to even consider you? I'm getting a lot of static once the ''V'' word comes up. I'm basically blackballed from the get go. Any tips you have would be great.

Regarding the US immigration, I have no intention to stay past the 90 days and will have return flights. My GF is from the US and we've been going out for 3 years (met her on the J1).

Whats the safest thing to say i'll be doing when asked!? Ill be going for 85 days or so.

Appreciate it,
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hoggy1012

Hi all
Thanks for the posts. Think I’ll just go with visiting and say no more.
Adrock-aka I work as an automation engineer (programmer of machinery). I have fairly good experience in certain components so I logged on to their websites and whenever I could find a list of companies using those components in the states I then sent them an email explaining that I’d like to travel to the states on a H1B visa. I included my cv and a cover letter explaining my experience. I also have video clips of machines I’ve worked on on YouTube. Anyway I can’t claim to be an expert I must have sent 100 emails and only got 1 solid reply so I know it’s very difficult.
Depending on what industry you’re in there are some companies who hire quite a few every year (and now’s the time). It really is very difficult though so my only real advice is to find a company’s direct email address from they’re site and send them an email. Send loads and loads of emails and hopefully someone will be interested.
If you let us know what you do someone might be able to help.
Good luck.

Adrock-aka

Cheers Hoggy, good advice. I'll crank up the volume of cv's im sending to the US then and e-mail HR departments as much as possible. I'm in financial services so i'm a dime a dozen over there which doesnt help! I'm going to get a list of companies that arent too averse to hiring H1B'ers and hit them up first.

Thanks! Let us know how the interview goes.

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InTheTrees

hoggy1012 wrote: »

Hi all
I’m travelling to Denver this Sunday for an interview with a potential h1b sponsor.

So how'd it go?

hoggy1012

Immigration went fine, a bit abrupt by their nature but as long as you have a return ticket and no history of overstaying it’s not a problem at all.
As for the interview, it went great. they seem as excited as me. Haven’t talked money yet but besides that I can’t see any problems.
Now my next problem is to try and find an ipad…completely sold out.

lil_lisa

Well the 3G iPad is coming out in a few days time, most people pre-ordered them but didn't have to pay a deposit so my guess is that there'll be loads that are not collected straight away. We've been told if its not collected on the day then it'll be sold off so just make sure you're in an Apple store on the day it comes out. I'll double check the date for you!

InTheTrees

hoggy1012 wrote: »

Immigration went fine, a bit abrupt by their nature but as long as you have a return ticket and no history of overstaying it’s not a problem at all.
As for the interview, it went great. they seem as excited as me. Haven’t talked money yet but besides that I can’t see any problems.
Now my next problem is to try and find an ipad…completely sold out.

Well done! Congrats.

Good job on the ipad too, you're better off waiting.