H1B Becomes Tough Once Again; US Govt. Makes It Hard To Issue Work Visa!

Donald Trump led US Govt. has once again flexed its muscles, and made it even tougher for companies to get H1B work visa approved.

The new regulations will likely make the process of getting H1B visa at third party locations, tougher.

But how much impact will these new changes have?

We will soon find out.

New H1B Rules: More Scrutiny Of The Need For Visa

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), the US Govt. department which issues and checks all types of visas, have issued a new Policy Memorandum, whose subject reads: “Contracts and Itineraries Requirements for H-1B Petitions Involving Third-Party Worksites.”

This new H1B visa related policy is targeted for those companies, which sponsor H1B visas to citizens from other nations like India, who can visit the US, and work at a third-party location.

As per the new rules, the company seeking H1B visa approval will now have to ‘prove’ that the employee who is receiving H1B work visa is indeed required, and whether he or she has the required specialization to operate.

And, if all these conditions are met, whether he or she will work on that same specialization, for the full tenure of the visa.

Hence, from now on, it will be tough getting 3 years H1B visa, as was the norm till now. It will be very difficult to prove to USCIS, that a specialized skill is required for three years at a stretch.

USCIS, in their memo, said,

“This memo stated that the former Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) may request and consider any additional information deemed appropriate to adjudicate a petition. The memo required INS to make such requests, which include requests for third-party contracts, on a case-by-case basis.”

Will Indians Be Impacted?

While some sections of the industry are dismissing these new rules as mere paperwork, some sections are claiming that it will have some serious impact.

An unnamed official from an IT firm claimed that it will be very tough for the USCIS to connect the dots between qualification of the H1B visa holder, and the type of work he or she will be doing.

IT association Nasscom’s president, R Chandrasekhar said,

“The implication of this is there will be a lot more paperwork. A series of executive orders have been coming out. Each one by itself may not be much, but they have cumulatively added up to making it much more difficult and onerous for companies to use the H-1B route,”

On the other hand, Sandip Agarwal of Edelweiss Financial Services said that the new visa rules will have very less impact, and maybe 2-3% of overall H1B visa applicants would be impacted.

You can find the entire memo issued by USCIS right here.