H1B Visa Gets Tougher for Indian IT Firms With Reduced Validity Clause

New H1B visa norms announced by the Trump administration, which has made the procedure of issuing H1B visas tedious. The new policy gives power to the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) to issue H1B visa to an employee only for the period, for which he/she has to work at a third-party worksite.

Currently, the H1B visa is issued for three years at a time. The issuing of H-1B visa could be for less than three years now.

The new policy is effective immediately. This new guidance has come weeks ahead of the beginning of the H1B visa filing season, which was expected to be April 2nd, for the FY 19 beginning October 1st, 2018. The new policy is part of President Donald Trump’s ‘Buy American and Hire American Executive Order’ and made to protect the interests of US workers.

Buy American & hire American are the principles at the core of my agenda, which is: JOBS, JOBS, JOBS! Thank you @exxonmobil.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 7, 2017

Indian IT Firms could be affected

The new policy would have a huge impact on the Indian Firms as the new norms will make the whole process of getting H1-B visas and continuing with them a little more difficult. The companies will have to make an extra effort in terms of the paper work involved both for the issuance of the visa, continuation and extension of it. The sector that will be maximum affected would be IT, which recruits large number of people to work in US from India.

Additionally, there are short gaps in between one project and the other; the skilled workers will have to make sure of the continuity of work. There are questions on how long the gap will be recognized, but clearly it is not as if the day the previous job ends the next starts.

The people who are specialised workers generally move from project to project and some short gaps are very much a part of the business these days.  Sometimes American companies abruptly end the contract of an employee, and during this period the employee has to maintain his/her H-1B visa status. The official investigations have showed that foreign IT workers on H-1B visas do not get paid, which the USCIS says is illegal and abuse of the system.

New H1B Visa Process

As per the new policy, the petitioner has to show the evidence that the beneficiary will be employed in a specialty occupation. The employer/companies have to maintain an employer-employee relationship with the beneficiary for the duration of the requested validity period. Further, the organization will have to show that they have specific and non-speculative qualifying assignments in a specialty occupation for that beneficiary for the entire time period requested for the visa.

Additionally, the paper work which the company would have to do, may include, technical documentation, marketing analysis, milestone tables, cost-benefit analysis, brochures, and funding documents.

The application should provide information, such as a detailed description of the specialised duties the beneficiary will perform, the duration of the job, hours worked, benefits, salary or wages paid, the qualifications required to perform those duties, a detailed description of who will supervise the beneficiary and the beneficiary’s duties, and any other related evidence.

Overall, the new policy by Trump Government will make Indian companies recruitment difficult in the US and for the specialized Indian workforce to work on American soil.