Move to the U.S

lexluther

Hi ive been offered a job in louisana in the Auto-Trade. I am 37 years old and have been unemployed for over a year.
Would anyone know what my chances are getting a working visa, greencard etc.


Hope someone can help me with this.
Thanx Guys.

silja

It's your employer who'd apply for your work visa (greencard comes later, after you've been in the US a few years). If your employer has not done this before, they may be shocked at the cost- they are looking at $5000+.

What exactly would you be doing? Similar to the EU laws on foreign workers, the US employer needs to prove they cannot find a US employee. This usually means a Masters degree or lots of experience, not just a "simple" mechanic. So unless you have extremely rare/ specialised experience, your chances are close to 0.

lexluther

Hi Silja thanx for your reply. My Possible Future employer was looking at the i-140 Application and it has catagory for many different types of Skilled and Unskilled aliens that can apply for a working visa not just Brain Surgeons etc lol.

Gandhi

Louisiana had an exodus of people after Katrina, so the employer could probably used that as justification to sponsor someone for a visa.

Is this a large company who would probably have a legal team well-versed in immigration law? If so, I doubt they would bother applying if they did not think you had a good chance of getting a visa.

silja

silja wrote: »

What exactly would you be doing? Similar to the EU laws on foreign workers, the US employer needs to prove they cannot find a US employee. This usually means a Masters degree or lots of experience, not just a "simple" mechanic. So unless you have extremely rare/ specialised experience, your chances are close to 0.

Curious about this part as it directly affects someone I know - what if that person already has the job, working from home, but the owner of the company requires them to relocate to work onsite? I understand it would still be expensive but would this be considered grounds for "specialised experience"? Thanks in advance if anyone can help!

Sorry for the thread hijack OP!

lexluther

I thought the fact that i was offered a Job would be enough to get a visa, guess im Wrong.

Gandhi

Did you fly over for an interview? Did you tell the employer that you will need visa sponsorship?

lexluther

Hi gandi, no havent flown to the u.s for an interview. my would be employer is my good friend.
He will sponsor me whatever that entails im not sure maybe you could shed light on this Subject?

Cheers all.

Gandhi

Your friend will probably need to talk to an immigration lawyer to see what can be done for your particular circumstances. AFAIK he will need to provide evidence that the job cannot be filled by a US citizen, but the lawyer will tell you for sure.

Fr Tod Umptious

lexluther wrote: »

Hi gandi, no havent flown to the u.s for an interview. my would be employer is my good friend.
He will sponsor me whatever that entails im not sure maybe you could shed light on this Subject?

Well at a high level the procedure is something like this.
Your potential employer will have to apply for a H1B visa for you, they will have to do this through an immigration lawyer and will have to give evidence that they have tried and failed to get a suitable US resident to fill the position.
There are lots of filling fees and forms to be submitted at various stages of the process.
If it is approved you will have to collect the visa in the US embassy, and pay another fee it two
It is something that large multi nationals do all the time but is rarer with small companies.

Back in the mid '90s a small IT company did it for the first time for me and it was a painful process back then for them to understand the process, I can imagine it is even tougher now, back then a bachelors degree or years of experience were the min requirements.

lexluther

Hi all can someone show me were my friend has to offer the job position to a u.s citizen before a potential immigrant can be offered the position.
ive read the U.S Homeland Security website and cant fint that in it anywhere. just would like to know were this supposedly fact came from?

Thanks.:)

Fr Tod Umptious

lexluther wrote: »

Hi all can someone show me were my friend has to offer the job position to a u.s citizen before a potential immigrant can be offered the position.
ive read the U.S Homeland Security website and cant fint that in it anywhere. just would like to know were this supposedly fact came from?

Thanks.:)

I have no idea what evidence has to be given all I know is that the applying company cannot just get a visa for anyone without first trying to fill the position with a US resident, but I am sure it's areas like this where the immigration lawyer, which your employer will need to use, comes in.

silja

Deleted User wrote: »

Curious about this part as it directly affects someone I know - what if that person already has the job, working from home, but the owner of the company requires them to relocate to work onsite? I understand it would still be expensive but would this be considered grounds for "specialised experience"? Thanks in advance if anyone can help!

Sorry for the thread hijack OP!

That would be different, as it is an intra-company transfer- L1 visa.

Killer Wench

lexluther wrote: »

Hi all can someone show me were my friend has to offer the job position to a u.s citizen before a potential immigrant can be offered the position.
ive read the U.S Homeland Security website and cant fint that in it anywhere. just would like to know were this supposedly fact came from?

Thanks.:)

The government regularly conducts audits on employers who hire international employees. However, I believe that they are most stringent on those large tech-oriented companies like Microsoft, Google, who tend to hire out from China and India.

He will have to submit forms to the government essentially verifying that there were no Americans who had the necessary qualifications to hold this position or risk losing future visa opportunity. It has been a while since I looked at the law.

For more info:
http://www.lawfirms.com/resources/immigration-law/working-us/immigration-compliance-company-protection.htm

spideog7

silja wrote: »

the US employer needs to prove they cannot find a US employee. This usually means a Masters degree or lots of experience

Gandhi wrote: »

AFAIK he will need to provide evidence that the job cannot be filled by a US citizen, but the lawyer will tell you for sure.

Fr Tod Umptious wrote: »

will have to give evidence that they have tried and failed to get a suitable US resident to fill the position.

lexluther wrote: »

Hi all can someone show me were my friend has to offer the job position to a u.s citizen before a potential immigrant can be offered the position.

I'm actually currently going through this process and I thought this was the case also, but it turns out that's a bit of an urban legend. There's no requirement on the company to advertise the job or "prove" that they can't find a US citizen to take the job. The only exception to this might be if the company has a very high percentage of foreign employees on visas. The visa is already defined as being only available for a "specialty occupation" so they're obviously not going to hand out visas to industries where there is a large number of skilled US citizens available. Forcing a company to hire a less suitable candidate because they are a US citizen is not a good way to build a competitive industry, luckily USCIS is aware of this..

The only real requirements are that the candidate be suitably qualified (usually a Bachelors degree or better). The company also has to pay the employee the prevailing wage (based on the higher of what they pay their equivalent US employees or the "going rate" as listed on some census data they use). There is also cap on the number of visas that can be issued in this category every year.